Are new players having fun yet?

[Doubleplay]

In the new story arc, it just seems to me that there is not much a relatively new player can do to feel a part of the community. Take, for example, the invasion. If a new player had chosen to become a mage, warrior, mystic, tamer or any other discipline, there is no place on the character development curve where he/she could possibly participate. The invasion pretty much is held hostage to the high end tamers and super decked out warrior class. This is not meant to be critical of those classes, but if they were not ganging up and tanking the mobs, all other people would not have a chance to get a couple of hits in. They have to depend on the chaos to score a point.

You can say that this is a mature multi-player environment and character development is fun enough for new players. I have been a player for 15 years and understand this. However, as much as I value the journey to becoming a powerful character, I did it through a game that was growing with me. I remember the big orc invasion. Anyone could participate at the time and all had a great time. More recently, the Tokuno invasion was fun too, it had grown to a more difficult scenario, but it matched the development of the players (those who started early).

Today's invasion has grown much more difficult too. It matches the development of high end warriors and fully developed trainers. These character builds are highly specialized and took years to develop. The new people to the game are being encouraged to join a group to have a chance at the fun.

I believe that this misses the point. The new people are not having the fun we remember because they are like leaves in the wind. Unless the "group" they join is full of high end tamers, then they still do not have a chance of making a difference. For sure they have no chance of ever earning a reward.

My suggestion simply is for the devs to consider the plight of the newer and less developed people when making the story arcs. There needs to be another thread of activity that is exciting, yet rewarding for these people. New people are critical to UO. It is about time to develop meaningful story arc content for them too. They can develop their characters as we all do a majority of the time, but be able to jump in and have a bawl when the story arc advances too.

 

[BeaIank]

Extremely well put.
There needs to be content that the new players can take part on this invasion to get their own Minax arties to trade in.
The captain monster spawn is usually too coupled together, so it is really hard for them to lure the weaker monsters to fight.
And they face certain death should the captain aggro them.

 

[Uvtha]

Not just new players but also people who don't max thier stuff out. That is why I prefered older invasion scenarios. Weaker and solo players were fine, but you still needed a group to push the spawn.

 

[Goldberg-Chessy]

In the new story arc, it just seems to me that there is not much a relatively new player can do to feel a part of the community. Take, for example, the invasion. If a new player had chosen to become a mage, warrior, mystic, tamer or any other discipline, there is no place on the character development curve where he/she could possibly participate. The invasion pretty much is held hostage to the high end tamers and super decked out warrior class. This is not meant to be critical of those classes, but if they were not ganging up and tanking the mobs, all other people would not have a chance to get a couple of hits in. They have to depend on the chaos to score a point.

You can say that this is a mature multi-player environment and character development is fun enough for new players. I have been a player for 15 years and understand this. However, as much as I value the journey to becoming a powerful character, I did it through a game that was growing with me. I remember the big orc invasion. Anyone could participate at the time and all had a great time. More recently, the Tokuno invasion was fun too, it had grown to a more difficult scenario, but it matched the development of the players (those who started early).

Today's invasion has grown much more difficult too. It matches the development of high end warriors and fully developed trainers. These character builds are highly specialized and took years to develop. The new people to the game are being encouraged to join a group to have a chance at the fun.

I believe that this misses the point. The new people are not having the fun we remember because they are like leaves in the wind. Unless the "group" they join is full of high end tamers, then they still do not have a chance of making a difference. For sure they have no chance of ever earning a reward.

My suggestion simply is for the devs to consider the plight of the newer and less developed people when making the story arcs. There needs to be another thread of activity that is exciting, yet rewarding for these people. New people are critical to UO. It is about time to develop meaningful story arc content for them too. They can develop their characters as we all do a majority of the time, but be able to jump in and have a bawl when the story arc advances too.

Don't agree with what you are saying one bit.

I started 16 years ago and even after playing for a month I could not afford one set of decent armor and most certainly could not leave town for more then 10 seconds without getting pked. And that was the norm back then. Skills were also much harder to train and the relative amount of gold needed to live was also harder to obtain. Basic things may cost many millions these days but gold is so much easier to make now risk-free.

There was no chance at all for any new players to "make a difference" as you stated.
And there certainly was less chance of earning a reward back then.
A new player today can start a basic mage and just by hanging back and healing others get huge rewards.

New players have the entire world to explore and gain rewards from today. They do not need to be diving into massive invasions imo.

You simply appear to be nostalgic for a time when the game was brand new to everyone and growing with it from its infancy was amazing. That cannot ever be replicated and does not need to be replicated.
The invasion itself is proof that the game is still growing and evolving in a different way though.

 

[Lythos-]

Severely disagree with making the game even easier.

This invasion was meant as a way to make the community work together for rewards. When people ACT as a community then the invasion is pretty damn easy and the drops are plentiful if such community actions are performed.

Lighthouse gives a guaranteed drop for the newest of new characters.

 

[Lord Frodo]

Lighthouse gives a guaranteed drop for the newest of new characters.

The lighthouse DOES NOT DROP A MARTY TO ALL PLAYERS. I do not know where people are getting their info but this is not true. I have done damage to the lighthouse and not gotten any drops.

 

[Goldberg-Chessy]

The lighthouse DOES NOT DROP A MARTY TO ALL PLAYERS. I do not know where people are getting their info but this is not true. I have done damage to the lighthouse and not gotten any drops.

I believe you are correct but I also believe that it is damn near a guaranteed drop

 

[Uvtha]

Severely disagree with making the game even easier.

This invasion was meant as a way to make the community work together for rewards. When people ACT as a community then the invasion is pretty damn easy and the drops are plentiful if such community actions are performed.

Lighthouse gives a guaranteed drop for the newest of new characters.

You can diversify character level efficiency and not significantly lower difficulty. Like the old invasions.

 

[Troop]

There are completely new players? That's wonderful. They should have things to keep them interested.

 

[Giggles]

Wait.... There's new players?

 

[Lythos-]

The lighthouse DOES NOT DROP A MARTY TO ALL PLAYERS. I do not know where people are getting their info but this is not true. I have done damage to the lighthouse and not gotten any drops.

When I first checked it out I assumed it was guaranteed. I had a crafter with gm magery casting a few mind blasts. If it's not guaranteed then it obviously doesn't take much.

 

[hen]

If there are new players then their numbers are so low that the people running the game do not deem them significant enough to cater for them in the current events.

 

[Goodmann]

They just need to keep adding hps to monsters to make the game more fun

 

[Lug]

"They just need to keep adding hps to monsters to make the game more fun" CLASSIC!

 

[Riply]

I'm enjoying the new invasion, I have not played my warrior in a long time. It's addicting like the old times, because it's more of a challenge and takes in most cases team work. New players should join a guild and learn first and start out slowly and learn and just have fun. There are ton's of area's to explore outside
the invasion that were not available when the game first came out. If you make it to easy then the vets will come in and clean it out before the new players even have a chance to blink. Then the arties will just be common place and easy to get.

 

[Bobar]

I have to agree to a great extent with the poster. Whilst I have never bothered to do more than be able to take part in things like this event. It does seem they are making the bosses harder every time a new arc starts. I just tag along to them and get just minor success. I do not have the commitment to attempt to be one of those who get drops at shard events. One consequence of this is that for years, if able, I have gone to every event on Europa, till the last three run by our stand-in EM, I went to the first and decided that that sort of event was totally, not for me. How they might of appeared to a new player is a matter for conjecture. Perhaps they might think it was a competition to see who could collect most robes. I would doubt if any new player going got too much 'fun' from them, they certainly would not have got any kind of reward to remember them by

As ever my plea is for at least one more event like the 'Candle of Love' you didn't have to be Jack the Giant Killer to take part although as might be expected some fighting was involved but doing the quest was within the reach of most if not all players. I even did it with my Smith! just to see if I could.

We are a diverse group and sure many player would like things to continue totally in the same way. However not all of us want an eternal fight fest, it would be nice to get a quest or event where one has to think a little.

 

[Hoffs]

Production shard invasions must be different that Siege ones then. Here, most of the captains are handled by a group of people, whoever is around. And pretty much anyone can contribute. Provided there is a tamer to tank, or you have the mob bagballed, then mages and archers can just stand off and whack him and/or help heal the pets. And it is far better for people to work together because you get the extra points credit for killing multiple mobs. Also, the basic spawn is fairly simple with the exception of things like the bone demons and hydras. So I don't see what the problem is quite frankly. Last I heard, this was still a MMO.

 

[Lady CaT]

In the new story arc, it just seems to me that there is not much a relatively new player can do to feel a part of the community. Take, for example, the invasion. If a new player had chosen to become a mage, warrior, mystic, tamer or any other discipline, there is no place on the character development curve where he/she could possibly participate. The invasion pretty much is held hostage to the high end tamers and super decked out warrior class. This is not meant to be critical of those classes, but if they were not ganging up and tanking the mobs, all other people would not have a chance to get a couple of hits in. They have to depend on the chaos to score a point.

You can say that this is a mature multi-player environment and character development is fun enough for new players. I have been a player for 15 years and understand this. However, as much as I value the journey to becoming a powerful character, I did it through a game that was growing with me. I remember the big orc invasion. Anyone could participate at the time and all had a great time. More recently, the Tokuno invasion was fun too, it had grown to a more difficult scenario, but it matched the development of the players (those who started early).

Today's invasion has grown much more difficult too. It matches the development of high end warriors and fully developed trainers. These character builds are highly specialized and took years to develop. The new people to the game are being encouraged to join a group to have a chance at the fun.

I believe that this misses the point. The new people are not having the fun we remember because they are like leaves in the wind. Unless the "group" they join is full of high end tamers, then they still do not have a chance of making a difference. For sure they have no chance of ever earning a reward.

My suggestion simply is for the devs to consider the plight of the newer and less developed people when making the story arcs. There needs to be another thread of activity that is exciting, yet rewarding for these people. New people are critical to UO. It is about time to develop meaningful story arc content for them too. They can develop their characters as we all do a majority of the time, but be able to jump in and have a bawl when the story arc advances too.

.


Sorry I don't agree with your assessment at all. I have been having a blast playing the invasion entirely with a brand new archer with only starting clothes. I have made millions of gold pieces(way faster than if there was no invasion) as a new character and received numerous minax artifacts. That's just with a ordinary bow, starting archer skill, some hide skill, clothes on my back. (that's right zero armor..gasp!). I don't have any false illusions that I should be competing at the same level as a veteran. But to say the invasion is not fun for a new template player is completely wrong!

Do I have recall? Nope, have to run to the action via moongates.
Can I kill a captain? Not a chance. But neither can most veterans. Can I help? sure.
Can I kill all the mobs? Nope. But I can pick off some of the lesser creatures. (snakes,drakes, and depending on what other slayer bows I've found along way)
Can I hit the lighthouse? Yep sure can.
Do I die alot? On occassion I've been cut down by a captain, blasted by a beacon, greatly poisoned by a spider ..etc... ( I first scout out healers because I have absolutely no healing ability other than the potions I buy from npc healers or the occassional insured greater healing wand)
Do I find tons of cast away equipment, gold, gems as a brand new template? You bet! (lots of left behind gold, gems and equipment useless to a veteran but an absolute god send to my new template. More than I can carry in most battles)
Do I get minax artifacts? Yep. (Run to light house and attack as often as I can and get blasted by beacon sometimes!)
Can I solo the invasion? Not a chance, but then again it isn't meant to be by a single player!

Am I having fun? More than I've had in a long long time!

 

[Lug]

"Last I heard, this was still a MMO." See that is the problem. UO is supposed to be a MMO. On Legends and other less populated shards, UO is a single player game outside of primetime. Example last night on Legends New Maginica is invaded. I'm the ONLY person fighting off the invasion. Now I've solo'ed just about everything in UO over the years. So fighting solo is not a big deal at all to me - hell I'm willing to say I'm used it (soloed doom, peerless, and champs for years on legends). This invasion is NOT hard to solo - the AI is simple to figure out. I can stand toe to toe with all of the champs using my 4/6 chiv, pot chugging tamer and NOT die. I'm not using the LAME tactics of using a boat or bag balls (that is a totally different rant). The problem i'm having is killing the damn things. They has sooooo many G** D*** hitpoints that 20 minutes into fighting one not even 1/10th of its health is gone. This is when I get pissed off. I'm on a shard that has NO ONE else willing to engage the enemy. Its not legends fault, its EA's for not doing enough to populate the servers! Now I have been proactive and played on Atlantic, GL, Drac with my other chars just to be able to fight the captains with other people. It is a breeze with 4 or more semi skilled players to do. But it pisses me off to no end that I have to jump shards to enjoy this event. UO needs more players, and it doesnt seem like EA is doing anything to bring them in. So ya... UO supposed to be a MMO-tell that to EA!

 

[BeaIank]

Sorry I wasn't there yesterday night to help, Lug.
I am only playing during the weekends nowadays, but last weekend I was always at an invasion, helping and tanking as much with my macer as possible so other people could just damage the captains.

 

[Merus]

I play a pretty slow shard, even during prime time. I have 17+ characters all geared for specific tasks. I can usually run 3 clients (bard, range melee, and warrior) together and consider myself pretty adept at soloing most everything UO has to offer. It took me 6.5 hours of solid play to solo a single town witha demon invasion. I came away with just over 30 minors from this. Was using a bard for the buff, archer for range attack and mystic/weaver for ebolt a and WOD... All from a boat.


It is worth noting I did not set out to solo the town, but in 6.5 hours no one else showed up.

 

[Lug]

BeaIank, Your a brave warrior and one of the reasons why legends is such a great shard. We might be few in number but legends are great people and is why I make it my home. Merus, I have nothing but respect for you. I too used to run multiple clients in the past. But as of three months ago, I'm down to just ONE uo account. At one point, at the height of my UO sickness, I had 14 accounts, 9 of them active. I could activate my other accounts and farm this event with no problem, but I've spent alot of time downsizing, years in fact, just to get to one account and Im not falling back in to that UO trap again.