Back for RTB, a returning vet's impression.

[Skrag]

Post typed on the fly as I walk around.

* Brit bank is redecorated, rather tastelessly, but no one is there. Great Lakes has become one of those Luna shards. Population has plainly declined substantially.

* Wanted to see what sort of armor everyone is wearing these days, but apparently there are robes with stats now. I have yet to see an unrobed player character.

* Wanted to see a gargoyle, but there are zero among the Luna bank people. Other than Luna bank, I have no idea where I would go to see another player. Were these a total flop? Does anyone have gargoyle characters?

Welp, Great Lakes is a ghost shard, let's go hit Atlantic.

* Hey there's a reasonable crowd at Luna, all standing on top of each other spamming. Someone is trying to sell his stuff on another shard for stuff here, so clearly this is where the population is condensing.

* There are a whopping one or two characters among the crowd not wearing a stat robe. There are a couple of gargoyles, and I wondered what their armor looks like, but they're both in robes.

* Brit bank is dead even on Atlantic. The age in which Brit Bank was "the place" in UO is officially over. There was one guy there, forlornly spamming for some event.

* Hey at least Haven has a bit of a crowd. Every last one in robes.

* Is that a general chat channel? Nobody is using it except for like one guy. How do I talk in it? Comically, the Mythic playguide tells me that this feature exists, but offers no instructions on how to use it. My macro list says alt+T is chat, but hitting that just makes it say "You are already in channel help". Asked a guy in sweet gear who looked like he knew what he was doing. He didn't know how to talk in it either, never uses it.

* Oh well, let's go look around Luna and see how expensive crap is. The usual bunch of 16,000,000 gold leather armor pieces, check. Bloodwood Spirit 3,000,000 gold? Huh? Oh well it's Luna, I'll probably find another 3 screens away for 50k.

* Pigments of Tokuno seem cheaper than I remember. Competition from those crafted dyes I think I heard about? Wonder where those are.

* How the hell do I turn this chat off? I don't want to hear those two guys spam each other with what they're selling to infinity.

* Natural dye is 350k for 5 uses? Either it's hard to make, or the people who can make it are just gouging, or the economy is so blown out that anything worth anything is worth at least 300.

* Well that's a quarter loop of Luna. Wish I could remember that site that catalogs Luna with scripts, because this is bullcrap. Game needs an Auction House.

Meh. I threw or gave away everything last time I quit. I'll never make enough money to be worth anything again. I could kill a thousand dragons and be 10% of the way to buying a pair of gloves.

 

[Storm]

make a Imbuer and you can pretty much make a good outfit!
as to the robes you dont have to wear them! or you can find most of them reasonably priced!
everything in luna is always way over priced!

if all else fails their are plenty of people that will help you get back on your feet!

 

[Mervyn]

Meh. I threw or gave away everything last time I quit. I'll never make enough money to be worth anything again. I could kill a thousand dragons and be 10% of the way to buying a pair of gloves.

The game is actually pretty easy on newcomers, you can get someone to imbue a fiendishly good suit for next to nothing as long as you don't want maxed out everything like a perfectionist.

Plus if you want to pvp, you can join factions and most of the artifacts you would use are provided for you for free (just gotta farm a little silver) hell at the moment you don't even have to pvp, can join factions just for the artis

 

[Skrag]

Oh I can get enough gear to function, sure. Then I can use it to farm for the next 40 years in order to buy an upgraded gorget or something. The economy appears to be completely hyperinflated to death. Gold seems almost worthless now, certainly not worth looting off monster corpses.

What can a poorly geared new or returning player expect to find/farm in order to sell and make enough money to care about?

Also, do people really pay hundreds of thousands or millions for crafted dyes? I have zero chance of not looking like the typical artifact clown once I get geared.

 

[Victim of Siege]

There are several of the Renowned in the abyss that can be farmed for the new items, that in turn can be sold for a lot of gold. then there are the essences, and other drops in the abyss that can be farmed as well. in less than a week or two you could have plenty of gold.

 

[Tazar]

On item #2 - if you load up the Enhanced Client - you can see every armor slot - robe or no. You can even see the jewelry easily.

General Chat - Just click on the chat button on the main toolbar at the top. From there, you will get a menu of available chat channels. You can join any channel - or leave your current channel there. If you are in a chat channel, just put a , (comma) before typing to talk in chat.

If you get a decent suit from fellow players, you will be able to do most anything in game. There are lots of rarer drops these days and getting large amounts of gold are not too hard. From there, you can work up your suit towards perfection any time.

Welcome back!

 

[GalenKnighthawke]

no text

 

[Mapper]

Welcome back!

Some Natural dyes are quite expensive if they are black or white, The quest to get the ingredients is quite a pain!

I doubt you'll be staying though, Seem to have a more glass half empty attitude rather than half full. You'll be right at home on Stratics though.

 

[UOKaiser]

Oh things are pretty cheap actually. Remmeber anybody that plays UO and doesn't leave has a average of 50mil and up worth. A few mil is easily made within hours so prices are pretty low on things really compared to what they should be.

 

[Uvtha]

Oh I can get enough gear to function, sure. Then I can use it to farm for the next 40 years in order to buy an upgraded gorget or something. The economy appears to be completely hyperinflated to death. Gold seems almost worthless now, certainly not worth looting off monster corpses.

What can a poorly geared new or returning player expect to find/farm in order to sell and make enough money to care about?

Also, do people really pay hundreds of thousands or millions for crafted dyes? I have zero chance of not looking like the typical artifact clown once I get geared.

You seem like you are thinking of how things used to be. Theres really no reason to not wear a suit that looks like you want it to, and pay a very reasonable price to get it. Arti-rainbow suits are a thing of the past since imbuing.

Imbuing got rid of the 5 year grind to upgrade one part of your suit. You can make a 95% maxed out suit for very little money. If you collect the needed ingredients which are all fairly easy to attain, you could find someone who would make your suit for cheap or for free, or you could just raise imbuing yourself.

Imbuing has made the playing field more even and accessible than its been since pre aos. Artifacts aren't absolutely necessary anymore, they are just a nice option if you have them. You can fight anything in the game (people, and bosses included) with completely affordable imbued weapons and armor.

The new plant dyes don't require much, just the patience to garden, and to raise alch to 100. And I would bet a million that you can find the dyes elsewhere for 50k or less for common ones.

Inflation is a reality of course, but thats to be expected, unless you play on siege. But its not a big deal, gold is not hard to get. There are plenty of ways to get large sums of gold very quickly, from gathering imbuing ingredients to champ spawn gold rains.

I think you should give it another look, cause your assumptions aren't that accurate.

 

[Skrag]

herf derf arglebargle

Hey guys I logged in for the first time in years and saw what I thought was a shockingly tiny bank "crowd" all decked out in Conjuror's Garb like it's the game's uniform. Then this guy made a post and I realized I didn't see any of that at all.

There were a whopping six people at Great Lakes Luna bank when I ran by a few minutes ago. A couple years ago you'd see that many there, plus a full crowd at Brit bank besides.

 

[Lady Storm]

Im not sure what time you were there as time is now the factor in finding people on any given shard encluding Atlantic.
Brit banks across the shards were done to enhance the look of the city some were done to taste of the shard...
Forgive me ....
Welcome back of course.
Population is lower, many had to go due to the finacial situation in the RL. Others left for greener pastures... we expect them back when they get so fed up with the other games out there that yet again we look great to play. (We are a great game, ask any UO adict)
Classic or EC client UO is a great game with good people. Stay awhile and see for yourself.

 

[Lorax_Pacific]

Bottom line this game is what you make it. Last week I met a guy and he had been playing for a couple hours. I took him to moonglow because didn't know how to get to Papua. I took him there and helped navigate the teleporters and entrance to t2a. I asked him what he was going to do there and he said tame an ostard. So I told him he should go to the Vesper entrance. He had never heard of Vesper. So I took him there and showed him around and took him through the hidden cavern to t2a.

So I invited him to go treasure hunting since a couple guildmates were all ready to do a level 6 map. He went and got his ostard and when ready he let me know. Oh my he had fun. He had so much fun. I thought it was hilarious when I offered for him to take the 30k gold. He was in shock and took all the gold. I offered to use my bag of sending, but apparently young status can't use them. So I offered for him to give me the gold and I would return it afterwards. He didn't say anything at first, but didn't want to let go of the gold.

So he started dropping all this loot stuff he had collected in the 3 or so hours he played a tamer. I offered to take the gold and give it back to him later. He was still overloaded and I was telling my guildmates in guildchat that he was not going to have anything to do with letting that 30k gold go. Anyway after about 5 minutes of this he finally gave me the gold and I sent it to my bank.

The next chest I offered my other new guildmate to take the 30k gold and this fellow got the pirate hat. Anyway he looked pretty cool in this new arty pirate hat and was real excited about it. However he started taking a bunch of loot out of the chest and spawned a bunch of creatures.

I thought young status couldn't die once on the first chest his health went to 0 and yet didn't die. So on this one somehow he died and somehow we couldn't rez him in time to keep the pirate hat. I don't know what happened since my computer crashed at that point and took me 5 minutes to return.

Anyway we took him to the bank and I gave him the 30k. Then I offered him to join our guild and he has.

Yesterday, I made him a 1335 Luck tamer suit with all 70's and 6MR, 100 LRC and some other properties on his jewelry. Took me about 2 hours to make the suit for him all imbued up and each piece 140 luck.

Anyway, My point is if you enjoy meeting new people and showing them the game and helping them adventure this game is for you. If you don't like adventure...leave now. Don't forget to sail the High Seas at launch...I'll be there.

-Lorax

p.s.

This game has about 10 more shards than when I started and what are there five or six moongate facets. I could hardly expect anyone to be sitting at the bank. Don't you think maybe people are out doing stuff???

p.p.s
I just counted there are 28 servers now and I started there were 5.

 

[Mapper]

Lovely story there Lorax, Thanks for the read!

 

[popps]

Meh. I threw or gave away everything last time I quit. I'll never make enough money to be worth anything again. I could kill a thousand dragons and be 10% of the way to buying a pair of gloves.

Oh I can get enough gear to function, sure. Then I can use it to farm for the next 40 years in order to buy an upgraded gorget or something. The economy appears to be completely hyperinflated to death. Gold seems almost worthless now, certainly not worth looting off monster corpses.

I have been trying to argue for quite a long time now, that inflation in the game can be a deterrant to new or returning players into the game getting them to feel that everything in the game is beyond reach and thus, the game not worth their time and effort.

I was jumped at.....

I was accused that I wanted things in UO be served on a silver platter and blah blah blah.

Well, all I want is players, whether new or returning, to STAY with Ultima Online and keep playing it, NOT be scared away because they might feel anything is way beyond a reasonable reach.

Inflation in the game should be dealt with more, I think.

 

[It Lives]

Oh I can get enough gear to function, sure. Then I can use it to farm for the next 40 years in order to buy an upgraded gorget or something. The economy appears to be completely hyperinflated to death. Gold seems almost worthless now, certainly not worth looting off monster corpses.

What can a poorly geared new or returning player expect to find/farm in order to sell and make enough money to care about?

Also, do people really pay hundreds of thousands or millions for crafted dyes? I have zero chance of not looking like the typical artifact clown once I get geared.

It's the journey that matters not the end result.

Returning players beware the game has not changed, you have.

Or not?

 

[DanteSignas]

I've been back for about 2 months with a bare account that just had finished chars with no armor and not much else and after getting a nice cheap suit and weapons and getting some good hunting in down in the abyss and some lucky drops, im back to over 200 mill. It's not hard to get back on your feet. I also work 40 hours a week and have a life. Still back to a nice level in game.

Just have to want to do it and stop worrying about what other folks have or are doing.

 

[copycon]

I think the OP is implying is that the game mechanics are broken, and horribly I might add. It seems to me that a player could over spend on an item by hundreds of millions of gold and not blink an eye. I think the real problem is that gold has very little value any more.

No one player should have millions of gold in the first place, let alone need to spend that to obtain any particular item, and no item should cost that much to begin with unless it were a joke.

How could that even be called inflation? I would call that broken game mechanics.

 

[canary]

Hey guys I logged in for the first time in years and saw what I thought was a shockingly tiny bank "crowd" all decked out in Conjuror's Garb like it's the game's uniform. Then this guy made a post and I realized I didn't see any of that at all.

There were a whopping six people at Great Lakes Luna bank when I ran by a few minutes ago. A couple years ago you'd see that many there, plus a full crowd at Brit bank besides.

Not that you don't have some very valid points in that population has indeed dwindled, but you cite MIDNIGHT as when you checked out the bank, according to your stratics post. Why don't you go there at say 8 or 9 pm?

 

[Babble]

Playing on my old account, it seems it is the same as 2-3 years ago.
Though there seem to be less people about in the places I hang out normally.

Other 'oldtimers' I asked seem more reluctant to drop by and rather either try to get lotr to lvl 50 on a f2p account or just refuse to play again.

 

[[JD]]

UO should have had a special "returning player feedback" so they can gather more first impressions like these. If this returning guy is this confused think of what an actual newbie starting out would be. Luckily the UO community is at his disposal...

I'm not sure why Galen decided to start bashing some dude who is confused how things work now and get anal retentive as far as opinion vs. other things. Really dude? Was it that hard to be helpful? Uh, maybe stay away from being a 911 operator or suicide counselor in your career? LOL

And to OP, if you want to start on Sonoma, PM me, I'll make you an all 70s LRC suit or something to help get you started.

To the rest..... IBTL!

 

[GalenKnighthawke]

no text

 

[GalenKnighthawke]

no text

 

[Lord Chaos]

Oh I can get enough gear to function, sure. Then I can use it to farm for the next 40 years in order to buy an upgraded gorget or something. The economy appears to be completely hyperinflated to death. Gold seems almost worthless now, certainly not worth looting off monster corpses.

Get a decent imbued suit + Soul Seeker + Bag of Sending, then hit the painted caves and kill troglodytes, send money home at every 30-40K gold (gold weigh less now) or more.

You'll be able to make millions after a while.

Also, do people really pay hundreds of thousands or millions for crafted dyes? I have zero chance of not looking like the typical artifact clown once I get geared.

Imbued gear is awesome and quite powerful and once you get to the arties stage, you will have enough for dyes.

 

[Babble]

Get a decent imbued suit + Soul Seeker + Bag of Sending, then hit the painted caves and kill troglodytes, send money home at every 30-40K gold (gold weigh less now) or more.

You'll be able to make millions after a while.



Imbued gear is awesome and quite powerful and once you get to the arties stage, you will have enough for dyes.

Problem is that it is the wow formula.
Hunt for more and better gear and wow even has a story for grinding that gear which UO does not have ....

For PvE UO sucks. The other features though are cool like housing and rp possibilities.

 

[hawkeye_pike]

I have been trying to argue for quite a long time now, that inflation in the game can be a deterrant to new or returning players into the game getting them to feel that everything in the game is beyond reach and thus, the game not worth their time and effort.
[...]
Inflation in the game should be dealt with more, I think.

I agree with you on this. However, I think it would be very difficult (if not impossible) to solve the inflation problem. New players should receive a more valuable and useful starter pack. Instead of starting out with 1000 gp, they should get 20,000. And some useful armor.

 

[Babble]

At the moment it is hard to say how to win people back.
But PvE is certainly not the way as 99% of the games out there fight for the PvE crowd and Uo has neither the graphics nor the systems to compete.

They should go more like have a house, unique items, special pets, defend territory or so

 

[MalagAste]

So.... let me get this straight... you logged in and checked out the banks but it was around midnight...

So you say no one is there blah, blah, and you make excuses about how horrible everything is...

Yet I don't see where you did anything in New Haven where the new player quests are...

Often guilds hang out there to help new players. Of course they usually don't do that at midnight...

And you don't think you can get anything worth while or whatever because things cost so much but you don't seem willing to check out how hard or easy it is to ... OMG make things yourself or get them earn them on your own.

I get the impression that folk think they should be able to come back to the game after X odd years and just jump right back into the flow. Well I don't know what sort of games you usually play but this one constantly updates to keep things interesting. Therefore if you leave it's not like a soap opera... you can't just jump right back where you left off.

But with a little work and a bit of effort it would seem to me that most folk CAN figure things out and most folk who are willing to put in a bit of effort will find people who can help them.

I know I myself spend quite a lot of time not only helping new people but answering questions in General chat and in Help.


As for the rest I agree with others..... you get out what you put in... and the game is what you make of it. If all you want is to find negativity then that's all you'll see.

 

[RavenWinterHawk]

The economy is fine.
Looting gold off mosters isnt the best.

Loot the objects and sell them.

If your trying to make a living farming gold from monsters, thats a waste.

Now a days its killing to get items. If you get somethign good, you sell it for few 100k or 30 million. Just depends.

Look at this way. I used to give new player 10k to help out YEARS ago. Now Ive been known to give a few million. Its all the same.

 

[Luvmylace]

For my part ,I do as I have always done, a returning vet can get help on Cats from me and other players .There are a few of us actually happy to help and enjoy promoting UO. I will set you up with a small house and 1 mill gold while you learn .The Luna Library offers all the areas you need to get to and I have taken several vets into the Underground helped them with the first quest and got them acquainted with the beginning of SA. The annex across from it holds the new SA library and also any new event info as it becomes available . It's not about farming gold as much as it is about adventuring (like the first time you played uo).I am more than willing to help build a suit to keep you alive for that purpose. If it is PVP you crave there are a few guilds and factions for that. To learn it all in one day is not possible. It would help if you spent time reading UO Guide and Stratics for the new information .Trying to absorb and do everything at once will just drive you out of your mind in no time and on to another game.
The chat can be useful in asking for help besides being annoying ,but you can ignore the people that ruin it.
Don't lose interest or condemn it in one day .Find enthusiastic people who are contagious in their zeal and learn from them. Come to Cats for a tour you can find me in the library or call me in chat.

 

[UOKaiser]

Bottom line this game is what you make it. Last week I met a guy and he had been playing for a couple hours. I took him to moonglow because didn't know how to get to Papua. I took him there and helped navigate the teleporters and entrance to t2a. I asked him what he was going to do there and he said tame an ostard. So I told him he should go to the Vesper entrance. He had never heard of Vesper. So I took him there and showed him around and took him through the hidden cavern to t2a.

So I invited him to go treasure hunting since a couple guildmates were all ready to do a level 6 map. He went and got his ostard and when ready he let me know. Oh my he had fun. He had so much fun. I thought it was hilarious when I offered for him to take the 30k gold. He was in shock and took all the gold. I offered to use my bag of sending, but apparently young status can't use them. So I offered for him to give me the gold and I would return it afterwards. He didn't say anything at first, but didn't want to let go of the gold.

So he started dropping all this loot stuff he had collected in the 3 or so hours he played a tamer. I offered to take the gold and give it back to him later. He was still overloaded and I was telling my guildmates in guildchat that he was not going to have anything to do with letting that 30k gold go. Anyway after about 5 minutes of this he finally gave me the gold and I sent it to my bank.

The next chest I offered my other new guildmate to take the 30k gold and this fellow got the pirate hat. Anyway he looked pretty cool in this new arty pirate hat and was real excited about it. However he started taking a bunch of loot out of the chest and spawned a bunch of creatures.

I thought young status couldn't die once on the first chest his health went to 0 and yet didn't die. So on this one somehow he died and somehow we couldn't rez him in time to keep the pirate hat. I don't know what happened since my computer crashed at that point and took me 5 minutes to return.

Anyway we took him to the bank and I gave him the 30k. Then I offered him to join our guild and he has.

Yesterday, I made him a 1335 Luck tamer suit with all 70's and 6MR, 100 LRC and some other properties on his jewelry. Took me about 2 hours to make the suit for him all imbued up and each piece 140 luck.

Anyway, My point is if you enjoy meeting new people and showing them the game and helping them adventure this game is for you. If you don't like adventure...leave now. Don't forget to sail the High Seas at launch...I'll be there.

-Lorax

p.s.

This game has about 10 more shards than when I started and what are there five or six moongate facets. I could hardly expect anyone to be sitting at the bank. Don't you think maybe people are out doing stuff???

p.p.s
I just counted there are 28 servers now and I started there were 5.

Wonderful story. You did everything almost perfectly into introducing a new player except 1 thing. Though you correctly allowed him to have fun you made a small but huge mistake there. This part "Yesterday, I made him a 1335 Luck tamer suit with all 70's and 6MR, 100 LRC and some other properties on his jewelry. Took me about 2 hours to make the suit for him all imbued up and each piece 140 luck."
You just gave him end game status. As the day before he was happy with 30k gold and felt that it was a advance to his future in UO. You just gave him the end game of UO. I hate imbuing because of this reason. He won't stick around long. Unless they work hard on getting to the end game they will not appreciate the game itself. So once he fights all the monsters in UO and realise he just can't get anything better he will decide he ended UO and move on to next game unless he's a PVP. Sad but true.

 

[Restroom Cowboy]

Kind of hard to judge anything if you compare apples to oranges.

1) There is literally twice the landmass now as when Skrag left.
2) There is literally twice the content now since Skrag left.
3) There are more in game events than ever, since Skrag left.
4) There is more developer interaction since Skrag left.
5) People have come and go since Skrag left.
6) People are actively testing out the new booster, which Skrag more than likely has not even discovered.
7) People are returning from school and summer activities...more than likely Skrag left at a population peak.

Seems to me, opinionated Skrag is once again opinionated. Hard to give a commentary on a game without questioning things or keeping an open mind.

 

[[JD]]

I was just makin a joke Galen cause you seeemed to be pretty hard on him. I don't know either of your situation and I'm not about to get in the middle of it... didn't catch the part about he did this at midnight either. It was probably a ghost town, far from what the game was back in the day. My offer still stands, come to sonoma and i'll imbue anyone a suit

Anyway, without getting into specifics, there is a LOT for any new or returning player to find out about this game... informed players, experimentation, and stratics is probably the best place to start. But many players may not know about stratics.

 

[WhityJinn]

Hey, Skrag-

http://vboards.stratics.com/uhall/205876-classic-shard-2-a.html

 

[Skrag]

Not that you don't have some very valid points in that population has indeed dwindled, but you cite MIDNIGHT as when you checked out the bank, according to your stratics post. Why don't you go there at say 8 or 9 pm?

I checked just now and there's maybe 10 or 12 people. Better, but it's clear that the giant screaming crowd that used to be strewn all over the front of Brit bank just a few years ago is a thing of the past.

Kind of hard to judge anything if you compare apples to oranges.

1) There is literally twice the landmass now as when Skrag left.

There could be infinite landmass, but people can only ever be "banksitting" or "not banksitting" and as long as they only sit at one bank, you can use it to judge population.

6) People are actively testing out the new booster, which Skrag more than likely has not even discovered.

When I try to log into the test shard, nothing happens. The 'entering britannia' window vanishes and I just stare at the blank login screen. Using the oldschool client currently.

Anyway yeah, other games you can pretty much jump in whenever and be back up to speed in very little time. You can hit 80 in WoW, run dungeons for a couple weeks to get some nice gear, and be in raids getting the best gear shortly thereafter.

But WoW sucks, so I'm resubbing to UO. A couple of you toolboxes want to make this into "hater versus fanboy brigade" but too bad. I have some "free money" coming in via paypal soon, I'll probably just buy a bunch of gold.

But yeah really, why can't I log into High Seas Test?

 

[Restroom Cowboy]

No reason to hate, just peturbed sometimes by first impressions.

As far as your question regarding the new content, uo.com should have a link somewhere to DL the beta client...that is the only way to currently test it.

 

[Skrag]

Thanks!

 

[Restroom Cowboy]

Thanks!

NP...enjoy

 

[hawkeye_pike]

Bottom line this game is what you make it. Last week I met a guy and he had been playing for a couple hours. [...]

Nice story! I must say, similar things happen to me regularly, too. The funny thing is we do not even actively recruit guild members. Every now and then someone comes to find us. Recently some players who returned after 3-10 years showed up. We offer them all the help we can give, and that's how it should be.

With little cost other than time you can imbue them a great suit and weapon and help them get started. Offering advice and basic help is the least we veterans should do. This game has become quite complex, and all those features can be very overwhelming for a new/returning player. Explaining the basics of the armor and weapon system alone takes at least an hour.

I wish EA would put more effort into making this game more accessible to new players.

@Skrag: It is really difficult estimating the population of UO. The thing is that nowadays there are so many things to do in UO, maybe 20 times as much as 10 years ago. So yes, people may be banksitting much less because there always are things to do. The best way to meet people is to join a fun guild.

 

[popps]

There could be infinite landmass, but people can only ever be "banksitting" or "not banksitting" and as long as they only sit at one bank, you can use it to judge population.

Well, not necessarily......I mean, as compared to the past, people now uses other ways to sell their wares or look for what they need like search sites, the global chat as well as dropping runes.

What I am trying to say, is that less people nowadays is likely to sit at a bank spamming their sales or buys, many prefer other ways which save time to them.

Hence, looking at a bank not necessarily gives an estimate of the population present on the shard at a given moment. Players can well be scattered all over.

 

[SchezwanBeefy]

You keep complaining you can't make enough gold but...
You can easily go into the abyss and farm ingredients to sell on a vendor in Luna. You mentioned natural dyes are very expensive, and you can easily get some seeds from creatures to start growing and making your own to sell.
The game has changed a lot, but you sound like you're just complaining more than trying to do something about it. I know several people who have gotten free gear from nice people when they just start. You could probably ask someone in Gen. chat if they'd be willing to help you make a suit as you're a returning Veteran with not a lot to offer.
Just saying.

 

[hawkeye_pike]

You can easily go into the abyss and farm ingredients to sell on a vendor in Luna.

You make it sound bad. "Farming" sounds like a repetitive boring treadmill-task. And I doubt that Skrag has a Luna vendor, or that he will have one in the near future.

Otherwise your hints are correct. There are ways to make gold, and even by simple monster hunting you can easily earn 50k in an hour.

 

[Aurelius]

I agree with you on this. However, I think it would be very difficult (if not impossible) to solve the inflation problem. New players should receive a more valuable and useful starter pack. Instead of starting out with 1000 gp, they should get 20,000. And some useful armor.

As part of 'Call To Arms' they are meant to ...

"Players creating new (non-trial) accounts will receive a "New Player Token" giving them access to 20,000 gold, a premium armor set, weapons, and increased skill gain for all venturing party members"

There's been a bit of discussion about just how 'premium' the armour is though

 

[SchezwanBeefy]

You make it sound bad. "Farming" sounds like a repetitive boring treadmill-task. And I doubt that Skrag has a Luna vendor, or that he will have one in the near future.

Otherwise your hints are correct. There are ways to make gold, and even by simple monster hunting you can easily earn 50k in an hour.

If you are getting ingredients from the abyss, you will make more than 50k in an hour. If you don't want a Luna Vendor (which is easy to get), then just mention you're selling imbuing ingredients in chat for a cheaper price.

 

[Harlequin]

If you are getting ingredients from the abyss, you will make more than 50k in an hour. If you don't want a Luna Vendor (which is easy to get), then just mention you're selling imbuing ingredients in chat for a cheaper price.

Very true. Imbuing is the great equalizer in more ways than one.

Besides great gear (up to 90% intensity without using special ingredients), the special ingredients you can farm for are really easy to get for the amount you can sell them for. They spawn on all levels of the mini champ mobs, including the mongbats, rats, ratmen etc.

Just run away when the heavy stuff spawns and wait for other players to come help deal with them.

 

[Warpig Inc]

You read up on what interest you and set goals related to defeat. No one should think in months they will be dancing over a PVP god's corpse or solo looting one the latest bosses. There are vet and crusty UO players that would have issues if any player was an equal in less then a year. UO is like a farm and there is always something to do. Chat has done away with sitting at a bank. They are now a common meeting ground for trading. Bedtime on a school/work night not a population count time.

UO is at a great time for returning or new players. Not having to wait years or spend RL cash just to place/own a 7x7 house is what stands out to me. Living out of your bankbox and a couple of boats was my biggest pain. Then having a Marble Workshop near the water with two boats anchored, Ah good Ol'Days.

 

[canary]

As part of 'Call To Arms' they are meant to ...

"Players creating new (non-trial) accounts will receive a "New Player Token" giving them access to 20,000 gold, a premium armor set, weapons, and increased skill gain for all venturing party members"

There's been a bit of discussion about just how 'premium' the armour is though

What, you don't like being turned into a Brittle, glowing Pumpkin?

 

[Tazar]

There could be infinite landmass, but people can only ever be "banksitting" or "not banksitting" and as long as they only sit at one bank, you can use it to judge population.

Historically, maybe... but one factor changed recently.

In times past, many of those "bank-sitters" were really not there and were only sitting in an active place (like the bank) to burn off murder counts. With the recent introduction of "Forged Pardons", I believe that the need for bank-sitting count-burners has been reduced.

 

[copycon]

In times past, many of those "bank-sitters" were really not there and were only sitting in an active place (like the bank) to burn off murder counts. With the recent introduction of "Forged Pardons", I believe that the need for bank-sitting count-burners has been reduced.

While I agree with you that there were some people doing that, most often they were dead.

I think what the OP is referring to is the constant barometer that Brit Bank provided way back when that showed the level of activity on the shard, or lack of.

That barometer still rings true on most other non-EA shards that I have experienced, and I think the introduction of "Luna" may have broken that bond. To be honest, I don't know what "Luna" is, but I know what it sounds like, and it sounds like most that were standing around Brit Bank back then have now moved to "Luna". For what reason? I have no idea. But it shows.

 

[northwoodschopper]

While I agree with you that there were some people doing that, most often they were dead.

I think what the OP is referring to is the constant barometer that Brit Bank provided way back when that showed the level of activity on the shard, or lack of.

That barometer still rings true on most other non-EA shards that I have experienced, and I think the introduction of "Luna" may have broken that bond. To be honest, I don't know what "Luna" is, but I know what it sounds like, and it sounds like most that were standing around Brit Bank back then have now moved to "Luna". For what reason? I have no idea. But it shows.

the obvious answer for luna is the fact that every npc service is mere footsteps away from the bank, and a moongate to boot too. some you can even access with your bank box open. and the luna shopping mall surrounding the bank. the ultimate convenience, for better or worse.

they tried to do that with west brit bank, but only managed to make it look like a bad novelty store.

years ago, most banks had some sort of population. mainly west brit, vesper, and moonglow, but the others had their regulars. now most of the towns feel pretty pointless outside of any events.