I just came back from a long break, at least a year or so. I figured when I came back I'd see even more magic items for sale on vendors since imbueing would be in the game. In fact it looks like the opposite. There is very little for sale on Chessy. Barbed kits are now 1mil they used to be 4mil, heartwood fletcher kits are 2 mill they used to be much more. Fewer vendors and fewer items for sale. Very little if any armor. What happened? Is this just a Chessy thing?
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Myna
Guest
no, same on europa
almost everybody has an imbuer so there is no really market for magic items. everybody makes his own stuff
almost everybody has an imbuer so there is no really market for magic items. everybody makes his own stuff
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Yen Sid
Guest
Nope, pretty sure its an everywhere thing. At least I know it is on Origin. Except Heatwood Kits are 1mil as well as the Barbed Kits. You dont see any magical items for sale because the only way to get Residue/Essence/Relic Frags is to unravel magical items, destoying them and giving you said materials in return. So every magical item found usually gets unraveled.
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Yen Sid
Guest
Some people throw books on a vendor with an ICQ number and then you can chat that way about Imbuing. PMs here work too. I Imbued a bow for someone and I am dropping it off tonight. We discussed cost and all of that through PMs here. If your on Origin, I have a 120 Artificer and I can Imbue for a nominal fee
. The secure way to hire someone to Imbue is to not pay the Artificer until they drop the item into a trade window . Thats how I do it anyway. If I make something for someone I dont have them pay until I get the item for them. I suppose you could do a half before, like a deposit, and then half when you get the stuff.Oh and spamming in Luna is a good way too i suppose
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Trebr Drab
Guest
Things have gotten too complicated. What's going on here is game play for the "extreme" UO player. And that leaves out more casual players. The old "classic" system still worked the best for everybody, because it was simpler and allowed access to everyone.
L
longshanks
Guest
imbuing has made the crafting of items a very specific thing. Therefore it is a waste of time to craft a generic piece with the intent of selling it on a vendor.
i generally craft for my guildmates. They bring me the items. I build what they want.
My advise is to find a good guild and go this route. Spend some time down in the abyss and farm the essences you need for what you want. Most crafters would be more than happy to make it for you.
There are no ingredients now that are impossible to come by. Some are more different than others but its much easier than say turning in smit barbs in the hopes of getting a full set of 20 except val deeds...
i generally craft for my guildmates. They bring me the items. I build what they want.
My advise is to find a good guild and go this route. Spend some time down in the abyss and farm the essences you need for what you want. Most crafters would be more than happy to make it for you.
There are no ingredients now that are impossible to come by. Some are more different than others but its much easier than say turning in smit barbs in the hopes of getting a full set of 20 except val deeds...
The problem is, there really is no point in making items with imbuing. Since you can make custom pieces for yourself, you may not need exactly the piece on the vendor. For instance, if i need a piece with 5 hit point increase, 2mr, 7lmc, 18lrc, and 19 fire resist with other specific base resists, im not going to buy something similiar to it off of a vendor like you would of pre-imbuing, i'll just craft exactly what i need.
Agreeing with everything here. I used to keep my eye out for months for that one perfect piece of armor i needed, but now i just make my own.
I do really miss that monster loot has essentially become worthless, ill look over the loot for maybe a basic 3/1 or 2/1, but only to imbue. Jewls that are Almost perfect, and weapons, are cool when you find them, but if you want to make a max suit imbued is usually always better.
There are a few things imbueing does not totally cover tho. I like it how you still sometimes have to craft a base piece of armor to get a resist higher than allowed, and how (although very expensive) you can imbue a piece and then enhance with wood to make an amazing piece of armor.
Runic hammers - theres a use for low level runics again!, and valorite hammers are still the only possible way to get 6 max mods on a weapon, which is great.
Crafting has become very precise, but ill still burn some barbed kits once in a while for the hell of it. I keep one character in all non-imbued, just because i like to see the regular armor once in a while.
I do really miss that monster loot has essentially become worthless, ill look over the loot for maybe a basic 3/1 or 2/1, but only to imbue. Jewls that are Almost perfect, and weapons, are cool when you find them, but if you want to make a max suit imbued is usually always better.
There are a few things imbueing does not totally cover tho. I like it how you still sometimes have to craft a base piece of armor to get a resist higher than allowed, and how (although very expensive) you can imbue a piece and then enhance with wood to make an amazing piece of armor.
Runic hammers - theres a use for low level runics again!, and valorite hammers are still the only possible way to get 6 max mods on a weapon, which is great.
Crafting has become very precise, but ill still burn some barbed kits once in a while for the hell of it. I keep one character in all non-imbued, just because i like to see the regular armor once in a while.
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Very true I keep several characters in Non-Imbued (Except Jewelry) simply because I don't want to replace a suit in the future. I'm liking Barbed Kits being so cheap at the moment I can afford to burn through them to get that piece that fits.
Imbuing has ruined the world of pvming for items. there is no need to do it anymore. All you need is something that can kill Swoops, gather up all the items and melt em down for residue and essence. The relics you get form burning low level hammers.
Whats better. Kill a Lady Mel with 4k luck for 12 relics or burn a bronze hammer and get a guaranteed minimum 30 relics at 1/10th the time??
I wish they would have made it so crafted items could not be broken down, thus driving the both the pvm world and the crafting world...
Whats better. Kill a Lady Mel with 4k luck for 12 relics or burn a bronze hammer and get a guaranteed minimum 30 relics at 1/10th the time??
I wish they would have made it so crafted items could not be broken down, thus driving the both the pvm world and the crafting world...
O
Old Man of UO
Guest
I'm hunting now for the "perfect" weapons to imbue, say with 100% fire damage and no DI, maybe slayer/hml. It's now very hard to find anything like this when they used to be throw-aways. I also look for jewelry with certain 100% intensities that I can add other mods. It just saves a few rare ingredients.Imbuing has ruined the world of pvming for items. there is no need to do it anymore. ...
So, at least for me, PvM loot still has a purpose.
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Aye me and my guildies do much the same... We look for things like 3/1 bracelets and 1/3 rings with no other properties, weapons with certain mods etc..
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Stupid Miner
Guest
Huh... odd. I look at imbuing and tend to get the exact opposite conclusion. For me it now seems much, much simpler to get an effective suit.
People just don't seem to be used to the old paradigm (=pattern) being revived: You don't have to craft everything for yourself on a mule, but rather can order from dedicated crafters. Not directed at you specifically, but just commenting in general.
Yeah thats what i do, for jewls its great, and ill do it in rare cases to make a weapon that i dont want damage increase on. Its a shame tho for most loot weapons, because you cant imbue to max weight. I might craft 500 weapons to try to get a 100 percent cold or fire exceptional weapon. I would love to see the exceptional requirement removed, as it is for jewls. This would make loot weapons much more valuable.
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Stupid Miner
Guest
and 100% elemental damage weapons. Ach, i'd kill to get a vendor on GL or LS that realized the usefulness of selling 100% elemental damage weapons to imbue.
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UOKaiser
Guest
Hunting for 100 elemental weapons and 2 save on imbuing ingrediants does not make PVM any better. It's just there hanging on a thin rope compared to it being the center of attention to the majority of the community that it once was. Whats better hunt for 1 week looking for items to unravel or use the gold that you were going to use on items back in the days to just but the fragments at rock bottom prices. Siege is not included in this scenerio. It's over for PVM it's on its last legs for temporaly amusement and the few rares that are out there. The market for that is done and over with, Just like I pointed out and everyone experience everyone can make there own items they don't need nobody else,They don't need months of searching or years of collecting to find something better. They all reach there end game in no time resulting in boredom and quiting. This doen't count PVP players either for as long there is someone to kill they won't be bored. This is for the PVM,crafters,resource gatherers,collectors,venders,pretty much all trammel type proffesions.
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Trebr Drab
Guest
It's not just about the items. The the combinations and all with skill sets and the entire package. It's having so much depth that a player can actually play not knowing that they don't know many things that are critical to their enjoyment. It's about frustration, then finding out "oh, hey, ok, that was easy", then getting frustrated all over again, repeatedly.
Take Stratics out of it. Look at a newbie playing, and not knowing about Stratics. No skill gain formulas. No item charts. No lists of this and that. They'd be lost. And soon UO will lose them. And I think that's a large part of what's happening.
Edit to add: Player run cities and social connections would be a huge boost to fix this. But to get players to join, there needs to be some incentive, some reason they *want* to join.
I'm interested to know how you all feel that the new properties that were introduced with SA (which are not imbuable) are bolstering pve/pvm?
Also, I find it counter intuitive that a system that requires 20 + high intensity items to make 1 new item would "kill" pve/pvm. For those of you who are claiming this is true, what makes you say this is happening?
As for new players, if you just need to get a full set of armor/weapons, show up at any of the live events where there is one of the random reward treasure chests... people tend to dump a lot of equipment on the ground there if it doesn't fit their current armor plan and you can just take it.
By design, building the "perfect suit" is an advanced player game. It is not required to enjoy UO and the definition of the "perfect suit" continues to evolve as new properties are introduced. Optimization is fun for many people and thus this element of UO is there for them as a long term goal.
I would like to create some kind of support to help players who don't want to figure out imbuing to contact people who enjoy it. In the mean time, people will just have to talk to each other in game and work it out. UO community has always been good about networking.
Also, I find it counter intuitive that a system that requires 20 + high intensity items to make 1 new item would "kill" pve/pvm. For those of you who are claiming this is true, what makes you say this is happening?
As for new players, if you just need to get a full set of armor/weapons, show up at any of the live events where there is one of the random reward treasure chests... people tend to dump a lot of equipment on the ground there if it doesn't fit their current armor plan and you can just take it.
By design, building the "perfect suit" is an advanced player game. It is not required to enjoy UO and the definition of the "perfect suit" continues to evolve as new properties are introduced. Optimization is fun for many people and thus this element of UO is there for them as a long term goal.
I would like to create some kind of support to help players who don't want to figure out imbuing to contact people who enjoy it. In the mean time, people will just have to talk to each other in game and work it out. UO community has always been good about networking.
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Old Man of UO
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Here's a rare bow that I imbued... I believe I actually got it from miasma. I only had to add 1-1/2 POF and imbue with Stamina Leech. Does 150 avg and 261 max damage to miasma.... never ever run out of stam/mana.
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Diggity
Guest
A lot of the properties seemed intriguing, but when I try them out, the results were disappointing. This ties into imbuing in that the special SA item properties require compromises compared to the imbued stuff it replaces. So I haven't yet found an SA item with a special property that will out perform the replaced imbued piece(s). With so many item properties and combinations possible, the SA arties with special SA properties but other fixed property combos limit the types of templates/playstyles you can do - again comparing to imbued equipment.
Maybe allow imbuing of the SA properties - start out with a heavy intensity weighting on TC. Lower the weighting until people start using it - then nerf the @#$ out of it.
LOL, I'm not from the old school where you introduce things to get people to use them and nerf them. Maybe I'm too progressive? Hard to say.
I do like your idea of having a series of items that are almost exactly the same except with various special properties on them so that you could more easily work them into a template. I'll make some spreadsheets and see how viable it is in practice.
I don't want to make them imbuable for the reason posted above... if everything is imbuable then pve/pvm isn't as fun.
Thanks for your feedback!
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UOKaiser
Guest
I will try to explain why in more detail on what is currently and will happen along the way. I have explained it before but perhaps you may be able to understand better from a objective point of view. But lets start with answering your questions.
Once items are easily aquired and you can verify this just by going to a shard that's populated. Can I suggest ATlantic or Pacific. You will see demand for almost everything is down. Sur ethere are still players looking for things but for regulars that have seen every change this game has gone to we easily notice the difference between 1000's of people looking for something to maybe 50 a day looking for something.
Now to refute your last statement
It doesn't take long now to reach the perfect suit it takes not more than a day of planning compare of years of struggle and feeling accomplishment from achieving your goals. Doesn't matter what new items are introduce everyone still has a cap. Non of these new items will increase there dci,hci above 45 or there 70 phy to 90 or there 300 damge cap in items. Just easier to reach thats all. The rest of the items you would sell but who would buy it? They all have there own imbuers, there own items they trying to sell. This in turn = endgame and complete boredome that doesn't justify paying.
New players are not and will not come in droves,Returning vets usually leave no matter what as they let other games peak ther interest and leave them also. UO continued support and profit is from the players that being paying month by month continously since they first started playing or even taking small breaks. Most of these players have huge amout of resources and have reached there endgame as well. PVM players who were mostly the ones that stayed during all these years trying to aquire the perfect item, suit etc since the beggining of there UO life.
In those quest system games once the majority of players reach a certain level a expansion has to be made or all will get bored. This is a sandbox that cannot afford continued expansions. The content is repetitive but it must be given a reason to continue to use the content for years to come like before.
Sadly the future without some interaction does not look too good and this is just the start of the end. The ghost towns,The lost malls,the empty venders, The even more empty dugeons, the drop in subs and the continual boredom.
The new properties are fine for the PVM. "I don't like using the PVE term in UO which came about in another game some years back. It doesnt describe the multitude of UO culture" The new items makes it more variable to combat with against repetitive monsters adding more strategy into your investment.
Now requiring 20+ high intensity items is not completely correct. To make 1 max intesity exact mods you want item all you need is if required 320k for 10 relics and 5k 50 charges of a dull runic or 8k for shadow to get essence also. Or just wood. Anybody who had the money to train imbuing can easily aquire this. This is most people. Relics were mass produced so much in the begining it destroyed the whole concept of needing pvm to aquire them. The amount produce in the beggining,how much you need to make anything. and the continued amount still easily produced will in turn never make relics at a higher price this in turn lowers the price and market for everything underneath and inturn lowers the interest in aquiring said items.
Once items are easily aquired and you can verify this just by going to a shard that's populated. Can I suggest ATlantic or Pacific. You will see demand for almost everything is down. Sur ethere are still players looking for things but for regulars that have seen every change this game has gone to we easily notice the difference between 1000's of people looking for something to maybe 50 a day looking for something.
Now to refute your last statement
This is misleading as this makes all players in UO advance players which even a begginer knows his goal is to get stronger and aquire better items to make the perfect suit.. Think about it for a sec. Why do players kill a monster? The first time for the experience,The second time for the challenge, The third time for the items. Then what? Uo has survived because after you kill a monster you kill it millions of times to get said items to increase your suit or stash or to sell. Would a player return to kill a monster that he has killed over a 1000's times? Yes, they will but rarely and only for remmebering and for training someone else. In order for this player to constantly return to this monster that monster must have something the player wants. Imbuing has changed this for all PVM players. The goals of a PVM from the first time they come out of haven to 10 years later is to constantly aquire something that makes them stronger and to constantly kill something they never killed before. There is not enough resources for Uo to add a new monster every week to the system with new art. Imbuing allows you to cap your character. Items found on corpses of monsters are almost unsellable so we end back to why should a PVM player kill the same UO monsters a month form now?,a year?5 years?
It doesn't take long now to reach the perfect suit it takes not more than a day of planning compare of years of struggle and feeling accomplishment from achieving your goals. Doesn't matter what new items are introduce everyone still has a cap. Non of these new items will increase there dci,hci above 45 or there 70 phy to 90 or there 300 damge cap in items. Just easier to reach thats all. The rest of the items you would sell but who would buy it? They all have there own imbuers, there own items they trying to sell. This in turn = endgame and complete boredome that doesn't justify paying.
New players are not and will not come in droves,Returning vets usually leave no matter what as they let other games peak ther interest and leave them also. UO continued support and profit is from the players that being paying month by month continously since they first started playing or even taking small breaks. Most of these players have huge amout of resources and have reached there endgame as well. PVM players who were mostly the ones that stayed during all these years trying to aquire the perfect item, suit etc since the beggining of there UO life.
In those quest system games once the majority of players reach a certain level a expansion has to be made or all will get bored. This is a sandbox that cannot afford continued expansions. The content is repetitive but it must be given a reason to continue to use the content for years to come like before.
Sadly the future without some interaction does not look too good and this is just the start of the end. The ghost towns,The lost malls,the empty venders, The even more empty dugeons, the drop in subs and the continual boredom.
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UOKaiser
Guest
Very nice. Though thats the problem how long would it take you to get that bow without imbuing? It would of taken me maybe 1-2years but when I got it I would be so happy and I would of payed monthly 1-2 years of fees to EA just to try to get to my goal in getting that bow.Here's a rare bow that I imbued... I believe I actually got it from miasma. I only had to add 1-1/2 POF and imbue with Stamina Leech. Does 150 avg and 261 max damage to miasma.... never ever run out of stam/mana.
D
Death Adder
Guest
The only new property that I've played around with is Damage Eater, as the others are mostly on gargoyle items or swords. I'm building a suit around the Basilisk Breastplate for PvP but I use the same char for PvM. I honestly find Damage Eater pretty underwhelming and consider it a poor-man's HPR (which is why I built an HPR suit so I could get a marginal improvement with Damage Eater). At 10% I only get 1, 2 or 3 HP back every 3 seconds (? on timer, haven't tested that yet) assuming I'm taking enough damage to fire it off but not so quickly that it delays the damage conversion. I think that over time HPR 5 is notably superior to 10 Damage Eater. Maybe it will be better once other Damage Eater items are introduced but as I said it's pretty underwhelming.
I am getting bored because I need many many seeds of renewal to build suits but the only spawn that drops them is the rat spawn in Cavern, and that is an incredibly easy and boring spawn to do. It would be nicer if the seeds would drop on all spawns so I could have more variety and fun when PvMing.
I LOVE optimizing suits and imbuing.
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UOKaiser
Guest
I will make this as a joke but im serious ablout the issue so don't take it personaly. Start joke
"This is a problem. You are self independent and doesn't look like you need the services of others. There is this proffesion called botanist you see and all they do in the game is grow many many plants. There even is a botanist forum. They have only one thing they can really use to make gold right now and thats seeds of renewal. You see when you kill monsters in the abyss they drop these things called essences and maybe a little shiny thing called gold. Gold is used to trade for products you need and botanist use the gold to buy things they need. Now essences that you don't need are placed in a vender. 10 of each essence is about 250k. So instead of hunting for these seeds go out and hunt for these essense of whatever. Then you drop these essenses and someone that was hunting something and sold what they didn't need comes buy and gives you shiny gold for the stuff you hunted and don't need. Now here comes the great part you use these shiny things and you give it to this botanist that has so many seeds of renewal that you need and he has so much of. Ta DA botanist paid for there work, you got what you wanted by hunting and the other guy got what he wanted from hunting something else. Now this continues down the line and up the line and soon everyone is happy and everyone got what they wanted doing exactly what they wanted to do in game. Result=Happy UO The end..."
Joke finish once again not personal I think my point comes out better like this and you provided the perfect example for me to use.
What about some sort of ordering system for imbueing? Almost like a bod i guess, for instance:
I could sell a deed on my vendor for an imbuing contract, the buyer could buy my contract and fill it with one item that the seller designates.
say you buy a imbuing contract for a ring, a kryss, etc etc. The buyer checks boxes for intensitys, durability, resists needed on a piece, etc.
On the sellers side, he has a deed that is binded to the contract, he can fill it like a bod which would then collect the gold and place the piece in the buyers bank box or something. Possibly give them a message and say their order has been completed. I dunno, just blowing smoke i suppose, this is off the top of my head without a whole lot of thought, like most things
Also while you are looking for some feedback, i saw some threads from new/returing players who could not figure out how to even get involved in the game. Would there be an suggesstions for feedback to revamp the new player system? maybe even a pop up for new players after they do new things, that they can request help from a veteran, etc? Help them on their way to making money and getting items more (since the game depends on such things) etc? i have alot of ideas on the subject if you would be interested.
That has been my exact argument for power scrolls VS. artifacts/crimmy/tangle/slither etc in this game for years. Someone who doesn't want to pvp can pvm and get arties, etc in tram. PvPers will buy these artifacts with the gold used from doing/raiding spawns and getting power scrolls, and then selling them. You can buy these power scrolls by selling your hard earned pvm-wares and making the gold to buy them. and the cycle goes on forever, in this case, imbueing ingreds are king, and TBH, many pvpers will buy the bulk of their needed ingreds way before they farm them.
We've been looking at this for a while now, but it would require us first to create a centralized bank. Currently, your "bank" is actually stored on your character and is not accessible when you are not online. We would need some kind of bank to put your payment in so that you don't have to be online to make the transaction. This is not out of the question, it's just a bigger task than it may appear on the surface.What about some sort of ordering system for imbueing? Almost like a bod i guess, for instance:
I could sell a deed on my vendor for an imbuing contract, the buyer could buy my contract and fill it with one item that the seller designates.
say you buy a imbuing contract for a ring, a kryss, etc etc. The buyer checks boxes for intensitys, durability, resists needed on a piece, etc.
On the sellers side, he has a deed that is binded to the contract, he can fill it like a bod which would then collect the gold and place the piece in the buyers bank box or something. Possibly give them a message and say their order has been completed. I dunno, just blowing smoke i suppose, this is off the top of my head without a whole lot of thought, like most things
Just want to chime in here with my 2 cents. I think the above statement is false, at least for me and how I play. I still haven`t made "the perfect suit" for any of my characters. I doubt I ever will. I am still tweaking, changing , testing in ways I never could before. I still hunt for loot, for other reasons now - some of which have been listed earlier in the thread. I still feel pvm is valid, for me even more so than previously.
To those who think imbuing etc is too complicated: When imbuing still was in beta many who tried it out said it wouldn`t be for everybody. It is complicated to some extent and involves some number crunching. If you don`t like crafting as part of your gaming experience it is pretty easy to find someone to imbue for you these days. Either through ingame chat or through the trade boards. Of course, then you actually need to talk to people...
In truth, the intensities that they come in are generally so low as to not make a difference, so I don't build suits around them.
Well, here's the issue, Mark. In order to make making those items even worthwhile, you have to spend all kinds of time either farming the materials yourself OR farming the gold to buy them, and so at some point, it gets frustrating. Add on top of that, many of these items start with a low durability, and combined with the significant rate of decay AND the fairly decent chance to lose a point of durability, that means you either have to farm or buy the PoF for the items. In short, imbuing, while a great idea in concept, takes so much effort to make a few items that the casual player gets left out of the loop or it takes weeks to make a set. There's just not enough balance to the return for the creation.
Uh... yeah, okay, first off, those aren't always running. Second, if you're a new player, you're unlikely to know that it IS running -- in fact, you're more likely at the moment to try to find out about this Ilshenar place and take part in a Treasures of Tokuno that's been over for a year. Frankly, the community aspect of the new player experience is lacking, and part of that has to do with how the new player experience is set up.
Believe me, I enjoy building the "perfect suit," but I think imbuing is still unbalanced in the way of making it fully worth the effort.
It should always remain about networking, but tell me, where in the new player experience do you explain that to new players? Where do you point out the good places to go? How do you convey that to them?
In my experience, it doesn't happen, which means that community-minded people have to stand around waiting for hours for a potential new player only to often discover that player isn't really new at all.
I would **love** to spend some time on new player experience. It is like my pet soap box around here. Again, the trick is getting time on the schedule. The core of what I want to do is have a more extensive tool tip system. Like, I'm a new player and I have a pair of scissors in my backpack... I'm like..."what is that for?" I click on a question mark icon, then click on the scissors and it tells you. Also, there are a few UI things I would like to improve. How many times do you think a newb attacks their own horse? I also think the change in state from peace mode to war mode should be more obvious. I know these are the kinds of things that make new players crazy but vets are just used to it so they don't even notice anymore.
It has killed pvm because its easier to craft the high level items and to unravel, or just buy the materials.
It has killed pvm because its not possible to imbue max weight on a "good" loot weapon because they are not "exceptional"
It has killed pvm because a jewel that would be worth maybe 50 million gold, is now able to be imbued for about 2 million gold. A jewel that that used to be worth about 10 million gold can now be created for almost nothing. And its not worth wearing even the near perfect loot jewels, because you can make a perfect one so easily.
Lastly, it has affected the idea of groups for pvm, because it is so easy to create a character that can solo just about everything in the game.
I see I see, everything is more complicated than it appears, im in IT, i gotcha lol
I'm not sure if you read the thread about the player who returned after 10 years, but reading his stories is pretty eye opening. Just the sheer curve as he mentioned. he went through haven, through new player quests and tools, looting all monsters of their gold and magical items. He has a few thousand gold, he goes to luna, overwhelmed by the amount of vendors in one central location, he checks one. He finds a 5 charge bottle of black natural dye for 350,000 gold. This for a simple 5 charges of the dye. This portion has to do with the uo inflation, but his other tales are very very interesting in regards to all types of uo.
My one thought was in regards to veteran player help. There are many dedicated veterans in the game, that play the game a vast variety of ways, but the player has no way to find them and interact with them. Sure forums are great, but if they could use a menu to request help from a veteran, and there was a queue, or something even tied to the chat system, that a player could use to mark himself as a new player helper, it think that would be great.
Now granted, obviously, there could be some downfalls to this, and could also be some rewards for this. You could open this up to a new branch of the virtue system, etc.
Here is that thread: http://vboards.stratics.com/showthread.php?t=212057
It is a very interesting read, it brings back alot of the nostalgia that was UO as you begin to remember what the game was like in those days, and it makes you realize a few things here and there you could do to help this guy(new player or returning player) out in his quest to know the game, work himself into the game. I'd love to be able to see an influx of crafty new players in fel to pvp, obviously they wouldnt have the vast experience as a veteran, but with the help of a new player system and veterans alike, i think the learning curve would be eased. People say that a player should be able to grow into the game like they did years ago. Well with that attitude, we won't have any new blood in this game. I can't imagine, without alot of help, a new player could grow into this world fast enough to really enjoy the game before they become frusterated with it. i believe skills are fine, its the ability to get gold and items. Many individuals have posted ways to make gold fast as a newbie and stuff, but honestly, they need to think about their systems, a newbie would have no idea what theya re talking about. Like Mark mentioned with his scissors example. That is a real thing that can/will/does happen.
I always find statements as the above rather flawed. This is new how? I had the exact same experience when I started playing when a small tower had the price tag of 3 Million gold. A silver vanq katana was just something I could dream of. I don`t see that as a bad thing. It comes with the new player experience.
Things have gotten LESS complicated. Now instead of spending 4 million and crossing your fingers that 1 of 15 will be the piece you need for your suit, you can just make the exact piece you want.
As for claiming its all for the "extreme" player... thats rubbish. Those items that before cost tens of millions of dollars are now extremely cheap, and replaceable.
You may have to contact an actual person (shocking i know, to have to interact with another human being!) to have them made, but I'm willing to bet you could easily find someone who is willing to do it for free if you provide the materials, which are all relatively easy to come by.
The only problem with the system is insurance, which should now be done away with.
The depth of choice in UO is very comparable to similar games, and if newbies are familiar with mmos at all (how many of them honestly wont be) they will be more than used to seeing numbers, and searching for the right properties with higher numbers.
Cetric, I think this topic has a lot of merit but I don't want to derail the thread by continuing it here so if you want to make a new thread about new player experience that might be appropriate.
Here's what I mean by when I say PVM is dead. I spent the better part of a year doing Lady Mels looking for perfect weapons, jewels. No particular play style, just perfect mods on specific weapons.
One day I pulled a SC -20 Mage wep, 14 DCI Leafblade. About two months later I got a set of rune blades with 50ish mana leech, 50ish stam leech, 30 SSI, 46 DI.
That is what I lived for. Two weapon that were nearly perfect!! That is why I was doing the Mels, I had acquired a set of amazing weapons.
Sadly, now all one has to do is imbue for 5 minutes and they can get the same results.
You can't say that needing "20" special materials is tough when you have 10000 people farming these materials and selling them all over the place. With relics being crafted, its even easier.
Here is the ultimate fix to bringing PVM back.
If your weapon has an "imbued" tag on it. You cannot insure that item as it has already been "imbued with magical powers."
That would make regular crafted weapons worth while, and pvm weapons/jewels worth gathering again!
If your weapon has an "imbued" tag on it. You cannot insure that item as it has already been "imbued with magical powers."
That would make regular crafted weapons worth while, and pvm weapons/jewels worth gathering again!
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Diggity
Guest
And this is exactly why I prefer the imbuing system. The previous RNG lotto grind should not be the incentive for PVM, imo.
Having said that, I agree that imbuing basically kills off a lot of reason to farm PVM. A few items you need to PVM to get. But once you have your ornie, crystalline, crimmy/tangle, sash, boots etc and you can imbue whatever else you use, where is the incentive to pvm? For me, I still don't have (enough) ornies, crimmies/tangles etc etc, so I still PVM in hopes of getting those. Also, if I want to experiment with new imbued gear, I can farm for the ingredients. Agreed it doesn't take long to do. Compared to hanging out in a peerless for the better part of a year hoping to maybe get a usable item, I find the imbuing system more appealing. Since I know I can get the ingredients to try out new equipment, doing the Abyss mini-spawns is more fun and less of a grind than working the RNG lotto.
In general with the advent of more diversified items, the game for pvmers became "fight what can drop something that MIGHT improve my stats.", and while thats still something one can do to some degree, the bulk of the hunt has been chopped off, when you can make a suit and a weapon with like 95% of the perfect stats in a day, without much effort if you know whats up, and most people at this point do. I know I stopped pvming for anything but essences (or things that drop lots of crap for residue etc) since imbuing has come around.
And as for 20+ high end items... not really. Like someone said you can just burn a bronze hammer and get relics falling out of your butt.
Even ignoring that, theres a really good chance that you could find 200 really high intensity items pvming that dont have the mods, or spread you are looking for, so I can cash them in for an item that is EXACTLY what I want, and lets be honest they don't take all that long to get, and then I'm set... for months and months, until the thing breaks. Greatly reducing my incentive to go hunt monsters for items. Ive got an item too close to "the best" to bother with hours of grinding champs unless I just find that amusing in its own right, or im just used to doing it. As usual in my eyes... insurance is the real problem causer. It just sets up an artificial "end game" of attaining "the perfect suit".
Eh, I dunno. I've seen really new players working on their perfect set ups once they got the hang of it down, which can be quickly. And really, there isn't much rewarding activity in UO until you can hunt high end stuff, pvm wise. I mean, whats the purpose of fighting trolls? Or even ogre lords? Not much of one. UO has been a game pretty much strictly for fairly developed characters for quite some time. When was the last time you ever saw anyone in first level of any dungeon not hunting leather?
Thats not a big deal to me. As time goes on I feel like character development through the raising of skill or levels may be outmoded, especially when the game usually doesn't really start until all of the grinding is accomplished. Of course thats not a paradigm a game can really just snap out of easily, but I digress....
As for new item properties, I think this is being done in a wrong way. You have a really easy solution here I think to the whole pvm has lost its punch issue. Lots of the new properties are quite appealing, but the problems is, I cant get them unless its on some goofy artifact. For some people that artifact may be spot on for what they want to do, but for most people it usually isn't, and they are just using them because of novelty and or a desire to experiment with the efficacy of he new properties.
I'm not saying don't make these artifacts, just don't limit the properties strictly to these artifacts. I think that more even properties should be developed, and that these properties (and or the current arti only ones) should only be attainable from monster drops. That way players have a reason to hunt again, and the new properties get more use. If some of the properties are imbalanced than just leave them arti only, and come up with some more balanced ones.
I don't think its an issue really. Just classic shard people who cant keep their heads out of the past being overly dramatic (and overly nostalgic) about the current set up, which is NOT that hard to understand, especially to people with mmo backgrounds, which is pretty much everyone at this point.
Or just make more public Soul forges around the world with bonuses, so that people will congregate in public. Queens forge is nice, but kinda out of the way.
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UOKaiser
Guest
I don't see how it could feel better. Remmeber farming a area for hours daily and needing to recall out to unload all the items you aquired. Feeling happy when you found items you can put on or sell. Then go back and try again because it is wonderful to know you are getting rewarded for your time. That feeling is in the life blood of every pvmer That's the feeling we want. Not this current feeling of emptyness.
It's easy to get your perfect suit In less than a day. If your on atlantic bring a character around and I'll imbue 1 of the characters of yours with max chosen imbued mods free of cost and unfortunetely this will end your hunt for your perfect suit for that character but i can show better by example.
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UOKaiser
Guest
Don't forget join factions and you have a better orni better crimmy better crystalline and whatever else also. Silver is so easy to come buy so are points
The problem of getting best items outside of a grinding or random system is that after you get them what are you going to use them for? To kill monsters for what? If they don't give you anything so It just ends up bank sitting therefore durability doesn't drain and they are essentualy foever. The pvp players are joyed they can go kill other players with them so they don't have to spend time farming. The pvmers trive on farming and ends there game when they killed everything and aquired all they need. if they can't sell the extra the hunt is no longer worth it.
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UOKaiser
Guest
I wish it was that easy. It will work only on the fel side but then again everyone will be just robbing each other items to keep supplied. PVM side they can just pick it up again most of the time. So it will take more than that to bring PVM. It will take drastic measures. Eventualy they will be forced to enter these measures but it's better that they know ahead of time of whats going to happen so when they are forced to concentrate on all there resources to bringing pvm back they won't be unsurprised.