Allow tribes to expand please.

[Mactavendish]

I know that totem decay is a big issue with many.

But the simple fact is that although you want the players that made all these 1 man totems all over the place to return and have a place to call home, What about the players that have been playing and PAYING all along?

Take for instance My tribe Pawnee.

Its radius is 159 and now can no longer grow due to an abandoned 1 man totem across the river from us. This 1 man has not had any active player in game since release.

What can be done about these?

If you look in your Database, and see that there are totems that have not had an active player for 10 month, don't you think it reasonable to remove them?
If they get interested in the game again they can always buy a sub and look for a new spot.
It is what I would expect to have to do if I had left so long ago. Most games have some method to reclaim this type of thing after a period of inactivity.

At least then you would not be limiting your active paying customers, with hopes that some person that stopped playing long ago MAY come back.

[inhabit]

I agree with this that there are too many abandoned totems however i think this is a tricky one to deal with.

For instance they are effectively deleteing their account and making them start again from any work they have spent collecting resourses and building etc (not skills etc though).

In the same fashion how would people feel who are in large tribes that have alot of inactive members and they members were effectively removed from the game, therefore shrinking your oversized tribal area, i'd imagine the actives would be very unhappy.

Thats the issue i see atm, you cant delete one, and not the others.

I dont really know what the solution to this is, but if buildings had damage points added that would be a start if your tribe land was to shrink.

Paying your sub=reserving a plot of land is the way i see it

[MrDDT]

I know that totem decay is a big issue with many.

But the simple fact is that although you want the players that made all these 1 man totems all over the place to return and have a place to call home, What about the players that have been playing and PAYING all along?

Take for instance My tribe Pawnee.

Its radius is 159 and now can no longer grow due to an abandoned 1 man totem across the river from us. This 1 man has not had any active player in game since release.

What can be done about these?

If you look in your Database, and see that there are totems that have not had an active player for 10 month, don't you think it reasonable to remove them?
If they get interested in the game again they can always buy a sub and look for a new spot.
It is what I would expect to have to do if I had left so long ago. Most games have some method to reclaim this type of thing after a period of inactivity.

At least then you would not be limiting your active paying customers, with hopes that some person that stopped playing long ago MAY come back.


You might have a point if over 1/2 of your tribe wasnt inactive.

Tell you what, kick all your inactives out of your tribe first. Then when you get to the radius problem repost. Then you might have a point. Until then you are taking up WAY more land than you should with your tribe due to 1/2 of your members are inactive just like that 1 man totem.

I think they need to start putting in decay right away, and warn inactive people right away. Heck just warn them already without the system in place. Then they have a chance to do something about it. Mass email should be sent out to all the inactive people warning them that decay is coming and they could lose their totem if they dont do something about it.

[Mactavendish]

Don't presume that I would have an issue if this was done.

I do not feel it would be fair to shrink an active tribe if they have maintained active members since tribe creation. So no tribe still active would be affected anyway .. including you ddt.

I am also not suggesting any accounts be deleted.

I am suggesting that the totems be removed.

Seriously, why should people that do not pay nor play be allowed to continue to hold territory when it is obvious to all that they are not interested in this game enough to pay for a sub or login every so often?

I am partly thinking of this as showing appreciation to your loyal players and not rewarding players that could care less.

And before you start declaring what other people will do or how they feel, the evidence shows clearly that those that made all these 1 man totems, not only don't care about this game, but also many of the biggest tribes that have left, have for whatever reasons, also chosen not to participate in how things have progress to date.

Again, I ask, WHY should those players be allowed to hold land if they have not played in MANY months and don't have an active sub?

It would be very easy to send emails to all non-playing members that in 2 weeks, if you do no't reactivate a sub to relaime yout totem it will be removed and all resources left in you personal inventory on your main character.

[MrDDT]

Once you have all the inactive members from your totem removed you have some what of a point. But still even then, these players are waiting for promised content, and promised time to come back.

You are asking for these totems to be removed so your 50%+ inactive tribe can grow BIGGER? Kick all your inactives you will have LOTS of room to grow.

[Mactavendish]

Promised. funny word to use here.

Promise: A declaration or assurance that one will do a particular thing or that guarantees that a particular thing will happen.

The only promise we have actually been given by Notorious Games is that the game will change based upon player feedback, and that they will give free play time to players that have been charged when other players were not.

Specific content was not promised .. it was planned.

This doesn't depend on how you want to perceive it, because it is an online game that has to abide by legal standards. They were careful to phrase it the way they did, especially because the game is designed to change when the player base likes or dislikes some feature.

I am really NOT playing at semantics. A promise and a plan are two very different things.

When it goes your way it seems like you agree it went according to plan, when it does not it becomes a broken promise. Sorry but the words are NOT interchangable.

Anyway, for someone that prides themselves on logic, accuracy and detail, it's a funny word to use here since it is neither accurate, logical or honest.

[MrDDT]

Things were promised. Planned is like "Hey we plan to have some more content". Promised is "We will" or "We have" or "We do". Like "We have 80% done on all the system listed on our features page" that's a statement or a promise. Not "We look to have 80% done soon" or "We might have 80% done soon" or "We are trying to have 80% done", or "The plan is" or "The goal is.."

No need to debate this with you, they said they would give people time to come back to the game with more content, and they would send out emails warning. They said said they would give them about 6 months to do this.

[fatboy21007]

personally, i have been here since launch play almost every damn day, recruiting when i can. But in the end 99% of the tribe i created always ends inactive. This is not my fault, So if they shrink my tribe due to inactive, ill quit and be very pissed. I built my city by myself, collected all the resources, did everything. I deserve what i have, I earned it. And i wont stick around if i loose it. Its not my fault the game didnt hold their interest, every member in my tribe stuck around for months and some stayed till recently. They all have their own reasons for quiting or waiting for new content. However dont punish those of us old tribes that been here since launch trying , just because we cant control who sticks around.

This game has been plagued with this very issues since a month after launch, We all have tried to keep afloat but after 2 weeks-3 months always ends the same friggin way. However the 1 man totems are an issue yes, But they deserve a chance to return and see what the game has had happend. So heres a solution to your issue oak, We need a remove totem button, that way if another totem is in are way of growing, we can easly move are totem away from it so we can continue to grow. This will also allow so many other tribes to finally expand into tribe status. But dont punish those of us who has worked hard and keep trying, its not are fault.

[MrDDT]

I agree fatboy. How do you think others feel about that when they lose theirs? Without warning or very little warning?

Which is why emails should be sent right away to start this process of people to log in and check the game back out, and take measures to protect what they worked hard for.

Many tribes are inactive, and many have done more than you have.

[Asharad]

I agree with fatboy and DDT, I don't think tribes should shrink due to inactive members. HOWEVER...........

I think that any one-man tribe that has been inactive should be deleted immediately. Especially those one-man tribes with zero structures built. Then start working on warning emails for larger tribes, with plans for decay or whatever it takes to clean up the world.

[Jadzia]

I agree with fatboy and DDT, I don't think tribes should shrink due to inactive members. HOWEVER...........

I think that any one-man tribe that has been inactive should be deleted immediately. Especially those one-man tribes with zero structures built. Then start working on warning emails for larger tribes, with plans for decay or whatever it takes to clean up the world.

I agree. Inactive one-man tribes should be deleted, immediately, or perhaps 2 weeks after a warning email. If we bore with them for 10 months then 2 more weeks don't count, still it would give a chance to those players to decide what they want to do and would avoid the outcry of those players.

[MrDDT]

I agree with fatboy and DDT, I don't think tribes should shrink due to inactive members. HOWEVER...........

I think that any one-man tribe that has been inactive should be deleted immediately. Especially those one-man tribes with zero structures built. Then start working on warning emails for larger tribes, with plans for decay or whatever it takes to clean up the world.


I sorta didn't make myself clear. I was agreeing with fatboy that he put in a lot of work. Other tribes did as well. Even 1 man tribes. I think that if people logged in and saw their totem was gone, they wouldn't try playing again but just quit.

I see no difference from 1 man totems being inactive and in-actives in 200m radius totems.

All inactives should be purged. However, they should be warned with emails as Xsyon already said he would do.

Who is going to make the call on how many structures is enough to have it wiped away? I dont think devs should be making that call at all. Devs get put into the middle with totem choices, and bad things happen. Look at Apache.

[Asharad]

Who is going to make the call on how many structures is enough to have it wiped away? Me..........................

[Mactavendish]

why is it you guys never seem to have reading comprehension?

I never said anything about shrinking anyone lands.. however ddt mentioned that concept. I never said anything about a tribe that had built up their lands losing anything at all...

I did say that all the 1 man totems that were places all over by now inactive players should be removed. If they have any resources they can have them returned to their inventory.

I am all in favor of warning emails. And in favor of them being done immediately.

If a big tribe like Hopi of instance, gets a warning email I fully believe they will make sure to protect their investment. I never suggested they should lose anything at all.

And Please drop this shrinkage thing ddt. I don't want your area to shrink regardless of what I think of you. You have invested lots of hours in it and don't want to see anyone lose that investment. Nor do I want to see anyone efforts to grow their tribe stopped due to a lone 1 man totem that has not been active since launch.

So.. to repeat myself to make sure its clear ( of course you don't have to like or agree )

1. Send out emails to warn of impending totem decay on abandoned single man totems.

2. Give 2 weeks to respond to said emails. Email responses or re-subbing.

3. After the 2 weeks give start a 4 week decay timer on ALL inactive totems that were warned.

Only those that don't care will be affected. This is a game not a life. If they want to spend the money they will re-sub.. if not they have spoken with their wallets. Either way many of the 1 man totems will be gone.


DDT... there is a distinct difference between 1 man un-developed totems and built up areas made by multi-member tribe's like pandmic or New Quoahog. My suggestion only affect those that have chosen to not play here.. if anyon of thes totems have a player that is interested enough they will do something about it. if not .. so what?

[MrDDT]

Of course you dont want to shrink tribes, because then you would be effected and lose 1/2 your tribe radius. Im saying kick your inactives, first before you start throwing stones at others.

All inactives should be purged not just ones that you dont like or want there.



DDT... there is a distinct difference between 1 man un-developed totems and built up areas made by multi-member tribe's like pandmic or New Quoahog. My suggestion only affect those that have chosen to not play here.. if anyon of thes totems have a player that is interested enough they will do something about it. if not .. so what?


So you are ok with getting rid of the hard work of a solo player, but large tribes that are holding huge areas with 1 person OK to keep around?

[Asharad]

So you are ok with getting rid of the piddley effort of a solo player who dropped a totem and left, but large tribes that are holding huge areas with 1 person OK to keep around?

That's what I'm saying

[MrDDT]

That's what I'm saying


I can understand that however, who is to judge which is ok to stay and which is ok to go?

Heck for all you know some of these totems could be placeholders for larger tribes too. I know people are holding them with tar and other resources they want to keep. They not inactive either they just dont use that account right now. Has no effect, but you might not even get what you want.

So what is piddley effort? Is it a campfire only? What if they have a wall up? 2 walls? Who is ok to make this call? What if they did some terraforming with 1 wall and a campfire? What if they have 3 baskets?

[Jadzia]

I can understand that however, who is to judge which is ok to stay and which is ok to go?

Jordi.



Heck for all you know some of these totems could be placeholders for larger tribes too. I know people are holding them with tar and other resources they want to keep. They not inactive either they just dont use that account right now. Has no effect, but you might not even get what you want.

Now that's a serious reason to remove them immediatly. Unpaid accounts hold important spots ? Lol why should the devs allow that ? If those players want that spot then they have to pay.


So what is piddley effort? Is it a campfire only? What if they have a wall up? 2 walls? Who is ok to make this call? What if they did some terraforming with 1 wall and a campfire? What if they have 3 baskets?

You keep missing the suggestion Mac mentioned several times. Players who lose their land due to inactivity should keep all their belongings on their account. I'd say they should keep all of their built-up buildings and everything they owned, and if they return, they should be able to place these stuffs at their new spot. This way they would only lose their spot and the terraforming. This feature definitely requires programming, so it would be a long-time solution.

[MrDDT]

Jordi.


Now that's a serious reason to remove them immediatly. Unpaid accounts hold important spots ? Lol why should the devs allow that ? If those players want that spot then they have to pay.


You keep missing the suggestion Mac mentioned several times. Players who lose their land due to inactivity should keep all their belongings on their account. I'd say they should keep all of their built-up buildings and everything they owned, and if they return, they should be able to place these stuffs at their new spot. This way they would only lose their spot and the terraforming. This feature definitely requires programming, so it would be a long-time solution.


Yes like we want the devs to get involved with making choices on who is active or not? I mean look at tribes like Apache where devs got involved with putting someone into it again, its disbanded and lots of people are upset, lets keep devs out of those choices. How about keeping them out of the choices and just set the rules. The rules are there for a reason people use them and make choices based on them.

No one said they were unpaid accounts. I have a few paid accounts I dont use. I also use them as place holders. I can log them anytime I wish.

Terraforming is MOST of the time to build up a tribe area. Not sure if you have done any tribe building but most of the time spent in this game building up an area is terraforming.

[Jadzia]

A paid account is not inactive. Even if the owner never logs in, he should be counted as an active one. He pays for the service so he has the right to get it.

[MrDDT]

A paid account is not inactive. Even if the owner never logs in, he should be counted as an active one. He pays for the service so he has the right to get it.

Some accounts dont even have the option to pay right now because its not working. Which is why there is a problem.

On top of this, what if Oak's totem issue is caused by a player that is paying but doesnt actively play?

He will still be unhappy.

[inhabit]

I have to agree I'd be more pissed about losing the terraforming days/weeks/months or whatever rather than getting my items back as the game stands at this point.

The right to a totem starts off firstly with your sub, simple no sub no totem. Until decay is active noone should be deleted. As for mass emails if they want to they could but people still interested would mainly be checking in on forums from time to time I would have thought?

Tribe radius and how it works comes into this topic because we were talking about inability to expand a tribe due to 1man or really any size inactive tribe nearby. Think about if 2 large tribes are nearby one is inactive or has 1 person in they don't shrink the other active one can't expand.

A tribe who had 50+ at one time but now has 1 active should not have a divine right to 1 huge "safezone" (key word here).
Effort seems to be labelled with large tribes here oh they would lose land after all the effort they put in. Well how about the solo guy who has also put in a lot of effort and been active why should he be stuck in a small homestead and have to recruit to expand.

Basically the system needs reworked and until then they shouldn't use their god powers to remove people, it should be done through an ingame mechanic such as decay or zombies spawning inside an inactive tribe like has been suggested elsewhere. Noone should be allowed to decide oh i dont think you have developed you land enough..DELETE. Although its their game they can do what they like I suppose :)

Controversial one for you here :) - you blame the devs for making a game which wont hold peoples attention, i blame the tribe leaders for blindly mass recruiting without any thought into the future in a my tribes bigger than yours ego :P

[banden]

All this squabbleling is pretty much academic. The devs should focus on designing and implementing a system that is fair for everyone, not halfbaked solutions. The totem-radius-for-membercount feature was bad from the start. Mistakes have been made and you cant please everyone, but all current issues with totems will be fixed once a proper system is in. Id say this should be nr 1 priority, as it is a rather pressing matter at this stage.

DDT, we can talk promises and plans all day long. At the end of the day, a developer reeeally cant promise anything. It ties up their hands and the devs on this game is tied up enough allready. A working totem system should be implemented as soon as possible and inactive players should get fair warning, 6 month is a ridiculous timeframe to put on gamedesign based on a "promise". 1 Month is plenty imo, from email to complete totem decay. I mean its not like these people are stranded on deserted islands with no hope of rescue, if they care about the time they invested and the game they played they will react to an email. What it really comes down to is, is it fair to ask these people to invest more of their money into this game at the state it is in now. Id say yes, and the rest would be up to the individual player. This is all that can be done.

[tomduril]

My believe (and thats a believe) is that clustering is still not available, which makes it virtual impossible to send emails to (my guess) 2000+ players to ask them to return. Without working clustering more than 400 players would literally crush the server (lag at the level we had at the start) - this said - I understand why devs and jorky are reluctant to ask people to either return or disbandon their space.

So if what I believe is true - the situation will stay as it is - cause they can not risk too many people "comming back" as it would result in chaos and high lag times (possible killing the game for those who are left and still active).

Or it could be that everything is wrong and your ideas would be good - and Xsyon would be ok with more people playing ... we`ll most probably never know ;)

[Shaggy]

inactive players should get fair warning, 6 month is a ridiculous timeframe to put on gamedesign based on a "promise". 1 Month is plenty imo, from email to complete totem decay. I mean its not like these people are stranded on deserted islands with no hope of rescue, if they care about the time they invested and the game they played they will react to an email.


I said it in the other thread and I'll say it here: this game will absolutely not survive if they give people more than a month. With all the shortcomings and misfires by the devs, they can't afford another big one like this. If these people really cared about their stuff, they'd either be playing still or at least respond to attempted communication. The game feels like a ghost town, and it doesn't help that the entire world is littered with inactive homesteads claiming all the decent spots. The devs need to just bite the bullet and begin the process of dealing with these totems or they're gonna lose the last remaining players they have left.

[Mactavendish]

If it turns out that the one man totem by me is a paid player I will no say another word.

What really seems odd to me is that ddt keeps defending players that have not been here in 10 month. This makes me feel strongly that he has inactive totems holding some resource that he is in fear of losing.

Such a strong reaction from him indicates to me he has something to lose.

If a totem is held by a paying customer, ( and you ARE a paying customer right ddt? ) then my suggestion does nothing to harm you.

It is all well and good that you want to be lord over all ... but abusing a billing error to hold resources that paying customers cannot have a chance to control is not good for the game either.

You say that some don't have the option to pay.. wow that is so sad that they are playing and NOT paying when I have to pay to play. You can see why that argument hold little interest to me right?

I have no way to know if you have paid accounts or they are all gifted to you. I do know that on the forums you still show as a guest.

So, really... what is it you are afraid of losing?

[banden]

... you know. Personal attacks dont really help your arguementation Oak. He might just be on the fence about keeping promises. Thats a virtue in a game developer... promises shouldnt be made in the first place anyway, they ultimately lead to disappointment.

[Mactavendish]

I appreciate what you are saying Banden. I hope you say the same thing to him as well, since his reaction to my comments have always felt like an attack to me.

I am really more trying to keep things transparent here. I have not mentioned anything that is not common knowledge.

Besides, you cannot "win" an argument with some people. What I am doing is more to be sure folks are not conned than anything.

[banden]

It doesnt seem like that to me. Im sure DDT doesnt need me to do whiteknighting for him but just FYI what hes been saying is that your tribe is artificially inflated by a lot of inactive players and that is completely right. It is in fact just as bad as inactive 1 man totems, what makes it different? It is still territory being held by inactive players. In both cases. You on the other hand have been argueing that yours is an active tribe... well this doesnt really matter does it? Your territory is still inflated. Should we remove all inactive members from your tribe then? You wouldnt want that, so we shouldnt demand inactive totems to be removed either.

So a decay system should be implemented as soon as possible and territory should be held by labor, not by accounts. Removing totems manually would be a waste of time and determining which should be removed and which should stay would cause all sort of other issues.

All this "did he make a promise" stuff is really an ethical problem. So forget about it, its up to Jordi. Personally Im a fan of Utilitarian ethics.

[Mactavendish]

Then I guess we are left with just waiting to see.

But don't be surprised when they do some advertising, it causes an influx of many players and this issue has not been solved, and this comes back up on the forums.

On a side note, what is good for the goose is good for the gander as they say.

I will adjust to any change that happens in game like I always have. If they decide to remove inactive accounts from even active tribes then I will adjust that too...
You won't see me whining about what I have built or what I may have to do to restore it. I have already had to do that twice, so it wont cause any problems to me.

It was suggested that I kick all my inactive to even have a valid point. However the person suggesting it surely would not do the same... so.. moot point.

This is a game after all.. this is not life. If people get pissed about some adjustment they need to make in a game, then they have no life, or this game may be their life.. and that is just sad.

I don't want to be the biggest tribe in this game... I am happy with the members I have. I recruit because as you add a few you lose a few.. that is just me playing the game.

I have maintained a very active tribe since it was created, by kindness and freedom to my members, the latter being something this game is attempting to provide to all players.

And before any of you think I don't care about the work folks have put into a tribe even a 1 man, think again... the tower on our land was started by a player named Testop... he no longer can play due to financial issues. I feel sure he will one day return. And when he does he will still have his place in the world due to active fellow tribe mates keeping his work alive until he returns. If he does not, we will finish his work and make sure folks know who did it.

If he was a 1 man tribe, first off he would never have been able to make it. Second, terraforming is not removed even when a player kills his totem so it is unlikely their "work" go away if they decide to return. shoot look at all the abandoned dirt walls all over the place.

This really is about whether or not a former player has enough interest to respond and come back.. if they don't so what? They were not here in the first place.

If they do show interest, they do not lose anything at all.

Also, these arguments about inflated tribe areas with inactive members keeping it larger than it would be in reality, is very hypocritical. NONE of the larger tribes can Honestly say they have NO inactive members. This includes anyone in these threads.

[Drubchen]

To summarise:

There are many totems with inactive players.

Some are small tribes that have no-one active.
Some are large tribes with a much smaller active group than earlier, and their zone is expanded beyond its normal boundary.

BOTH of these are holding onto space that other players might want to use, but cannot.

Taking this space away is frought with problems:
- People paid for it, and worked for it at some point, how can you now take it away from them?
- How can you leave land fallow, when its no longer in use and newer players want to make good use of it?
- How can anyone tell what is active and what is inactive - is logging in once every two months and doing nothing active? Is paying but not playing inactive? Is playing but not paying active? Is watching the game and waiting for zombies, cooking, epic Stegosaurus mount, or whatever inactive?

That is why some form of totem up-keep is essential: we are all placed on the same footing and it removes all doubt and argument - you work for it, or you lose it.

Rogen :)

[inhabit]

Also, these arguments about inflated tribe areas with inactive members keeping it larger than it would be in reality, is very hypocritical. NONE of the larger tribes can Honestly say they have NO inactive members. This includes anyone in these threads.

This is my point exactly, the devs cannot single out anyone it would have to be done population wide large tribes and all.
This is why i think it will be best done using a yet to be developed ingame feature like totem upkeep etc as people have mentioned. small abandoned tribes will fade out and large tribes will work to maintain their area

[Deacon]

Well, I happen to be a member of one of those 'inflated' tribes. But until they give said warning/email to previous customers who didnt get a refund and quit, no one should lose property....one man or 50 man. Once payment system is fixed, and emails sent, and warning time passed.....start removing inactive accounts from game world...including the 50 man tribes. If you dont have all members actively 'paying', whether they play ot not...they should be removed, and tribe radius recalculated. That's the only way to be fair.

On a side note...when expansion areas hit, tribe with inactive members will be tied to one spot...not able to move into greener pastures so to speak. So ...start contacting your memebers....hehe.

Thanks
Deacon

[banden]

Well, I happen to be a member of one of those 'inflated' tribes. But until they give said warning/email to previous customers who didnt get a refund and quit, no one should lose property....one man or 50 man. Once payment system is fixed, and emails sent, and warning time passed.....start removing inactive accounts from game world...including the 50 man tribes. If you dont have all members actively 'paying', whether they play ot not...they should be removed, and tribe radius recalculated. That's the only way to be fair.

On a side note...when expansion areas hit, tribe with inactive members will be tied to one spot...not able to move into greener pastures so to speak. So ...start contacting your memebers....hehe.

Thanks
Deacon

Well, you wouldnt need to purge anyone once the totem system gets done, because territory wouldnt be tied to membercount anymore. Thats kinda the point. :)

[Mactavendish]

I would love a new totems system in place that solved the problem by paying to upkeep it or lose it.

I am ALL for that! :)

Bring it on as it would mean we would grow anyway!

[Derek]

I don't want to be forced into another time sink just to keep my totem. We already have massive time sinks for crafting and construction.

[Jadzia]

I don't want to be forced into another time sink just to keep my totem. We already have massive time sinks for crafting and construction.

I agree with that, I'm not fond of daily chores in games. So a better solution would be imo if we could 'buy' land expansions for the totem, and once we bought it it belongs to the totem. If the tribe leader unsubscribe the leadership goes to the next tribe member in rank. As long as there are payed accounts in the tribe the totem is up and healthy, when there are no subscribed members anymore the totem start to decay.

[China]

I agree with that, I'm not fond of daily chores in games. So a better solution would be imo if we could 'buy' land expansions for the totem, and once we bought it it belongs to the totem.

Buy it with what? Isn't that what Banden is saying? Pay for your area with an up-keep fee?

[MrDDT]

A real resource sink is needed in this game. There is zero currently in the game.
Not sure what people are saying there is "another" time sink to keep a totem. I'm not sure what is a time sink at all yet, let alone one with a totem.

[Jadzia]

Buy it with what? Isn't that what Banden is saying? Pay for your area with an up-keep fee?

Buy it with resources, special items or whatever that is found in game. I believe Banden is talking about an upkeep fee, which has to be payed regularly, daily or weekly perhaps. I'm talking about a one-time purchase, like you put thousand (whatever item) into your totem and your land expands with say 20 meters radius. No regular upkeep which may become a chore, only a one-time payment. Once the land is yours you don't have to worry about it, it will be yours as long as you (or any of your tribemembers) are subscribed.

[MrDDT]

Buy it with resources, special items or whatever that is found in game. I believe Banden is talking about an upkeep fee, which has to be payed regularly, daily or weekly perhaps. I'm talking about a one-time purchase, like you put thousand (whatever item) into your totem and your land expands with say 20 meters radius. No regular upkeep which may become a chore, only a one-time payment. Once the land is yours you don't have to worry about it, it will be yours as long as you (or any of your tribemembers) are subscribed.


Problem I have is this. You will still have unused totems.

You can have a 200m totem radius with 1 active member. Not sure I like that.

[Jadzia]

Problem I have is this. You will still have unused totems.

You can have a 200m totem radius with 1 active member. Not sure I like that.

Not unused, just big areas for few or even 1 player. But that is available for everyone if they can/willing to pay the price. As long as we have enough space in game (new zones we are awaiting you!) I don't see a problem with that.

Shrinking a totem area when members leave the tribe or the game would cause HUGE problems. Already built buildings-walls, terraformed areas would fall outside of the smaller area, and that would hugely piss off the active tribemembers.

[NorCalGooey]

Which is why you need a totem upkeep. The rate of upkeep is determined by total members, active or inactive. This will encourage people to trim the fat and get rid of their in actives because it will actually BENEFIT them. The tribe will have to pull less of a load individually because they will have stopped having to pull the weight of the in actives.

I'd like to see a system where upkeep can actually grow the boundary. It doesn't matter how many people you have, if you can get x amount of upkeep by yourself in the same time that 5 people can, you should have the same size boundary as them.

If a tribe of 20 can put in more upkeep than a tribe of 100, then they should have more boundary space than the tribe of 100. However, the tribe of 20 would have to do 5x the upkeep of the tribe of 100 to get the equivalent size boundary.

[MrDDT]

Not unused, just big areas for few or even 1 player. But that is available for everyone if they can/willing to pay the price. As long as we have enough space in game (new zones we are awaiting you!) I don't see a problem with that.

Shrinking a totem area when members leave the tribe or the game would cause HUGE problems. Already built buildings-walls, terraformed areas would fall outside of the smaller area, and that would hugely piss off the active tribemembers.


So once a tribe pays the X amount for max totem size they can keep it forever no matter how many actives (as long as its at least 1 member)?

Well looks like tribes will control HUGE areas of land. 200m x however many they want to pay the first cost. You think you have a problem now finding a space? Unless you make the first cost something epic (which would take weeks for 80 member tribes to get) I dont see this happening.

Just doesnt sound like a good idea, and you will likely be right back at this spot you are upset about now. Only worse.

[Jadzia]

The cost should rise exponentially. First expansion (like 5 meters radius, just an example) is easy, but the 10th is something you call epic, which would definitely takes weeks or more for a big tribe to gather, and perhaps a year for a solo player. Again, we are talking about huge lands now, not the beginning ones. This way I doubt it would cause problems.

[MrDDT]

You could still have 10 "clans" holding 90m radius all over the place with very little costs.

Its a problem no matter how you cut it without having an upkeep. I really dont see around getting upkeep without contested totems, which I know people wont like either.

Plus you are talking about tribes waiting weeks just to get a totem, even with 80+ people? That's not a good idea either.

[Jadzia]

No. The basic land should be free (like a homestead area, and the first expansions should be very easy to get for an 80 members tribe. They wouldn't have to wait for weeks to get a totem, they would get it instantly. They would have to work for weeks or months if they wanted to expand their land into a really big one.

Holding the land wouldn't cost anything, but to get it would. The bigger the land the bigger the price. It shouldn't be easy.

[Book]

Could keep it simple to start...

Subscription active?
You have to do maintenance on your property. Replace bricks as they break with age, maybe there's weeds growing through your stone floors, fresh coat of paint on wood structures before winter, get your firewood squared away, etc.
Your totem, however, is okay. If you have real life interfering with your game life (how rude), you'll have your totem to come back to and your buildings may well be in disrepair. This naturally means your baskets inside those buildings could eventually be in peril as well. But Sub paid, land owned.

No active subscription?
You have decided you no longer wish to be a Citizen of this great land of Xsyon. No citizenship, no land ownership rights. Pre-determined amount of time that NG finds acceptable and buh bye totem. Citizenship has its perks.
Amount of time as a ballpark range I'd have in mind... anywhere from 1 month (1 billing cycle) which in that context seems kind of short if you hope to see someone back ----- to maybe 3 months (1 in game year) which in that context seems like more than enough time to forfeit land ownership rights.

Just thoughts in progress here, don't no one go getting upset.

[banden]

Not unused, just big areas for few or even 1 player. But that is available for everyone if they can/willing to pay the price. As long as we have enough space in game (new zones we are awaiting you!) I don't see a problem with that.

Shrinking a totem area when members leave the tribe or the game would cause HUGE problems. Already built buildings-walls, terraformed areas would fall outside of the smaller area, and that would hugely piss off the active tribemembers.

Can we agree that the goal of a new totem system should be, that the largest number of active players get to use the most land?

If they cant pay the upkeep then they clearly over extended themselves and they will have to either recruit or hire people to help or lose the territory. What the idea here is to have a system where activity = more land, because that way the largest number of people get to use the most land, thats the way it should be.

A one time fee for a totem would simply not work. I dont see how this will be any different than how it is at present actually, people can still throw down totems and go inactive regardless of whether there is a price or not. Like DDT says, eventually it becomes a land grab where everyone is grinding mats anyway to throw down totems before the others get it. What you would end up with is a situation where it is impossible to get any good land without having to attack someones territory, which is sort of difficult when you dont have any ground to start on.

Upkeep (and that is indeed what I am advocating) will not only ensure that we get rid of all the tribelands that arent actually supported by their tribe (because of all the inactive members). In the future it will ensure that old bloated tribes who arent that active anymore doesnt hog up the land and you can bitch and moan all you want about all your hard work, if people cant be bothered to maintain it, then they should lose it.

[Jadzia]

Can we agree that the goal of a new totem system should be, that the largest number of active players get to use the most land?
Actually I don't agree with that. I don't think it should be based on numbers in any way. It should be based purely on effort and activity. Even a solo players should be able to get the most land even thought it would take 2 years for him. Still, the opportunity should be there. Dedication and effort should pay off, not numbers. That's only my opinion of course.

People can't just drop a totem and go inactive. If they don't pay the subscription fee their totem would decay fast. A subscribed player is not inactive imo...perhaps he can't play due to real life issues, but shows his dedication toward the game by paying the sub. That person should have his totem and area saved.

My main problem with an upkeep is that it can very easily become a daily chore and causes problems when someone can't play for 1-2 months but still pays the sub. A high upkeep is a nightmare and kills the fun of the game.

[fatboy21007]

i like jadzia's idea. its like all other games. You want more land work for it. But Look people, Nobody wants a friggin job in a game to keep what they worked hard on. Least with her idea you keep things tough while allows people to upgrade land. As it stand people will spend a good 6 months- year on stuff in this game and xsyon is addin new stuff in here ever friggin month. Also lands will be expanding soon which is X4 times the size of the current game zones, In dumb dumb terms, thats fuckin huge. Which means if u wanna bitch bout land, well dont, will be a ass ton of it everywhere. Also i want you all to know this, and remember it, it has been said since the begining. This game isnt gonna cater to a giant playerbase, 100-500 max is his aims. He wants a certain audence here. Theirfore you wont be seeing 1k-3124892384243kkk people ingame. If ya dont like well donno what to tell ya.

I seen alot of indy companies doin this latley as some folks in this world just enjoy making a game so that others likem can enjoy it also. So stop trying to turn xsyon into a second job, this game will never hold full active tribes that long, and the pop will always go up n down, tribes will fill up and go inactive n repeat. Nothing we can do about it, Again this is the specific audience being targeted :-P. Theirs my 2 cents, cant deny it ethier, all true stuff.

[MrDDT]

No. The basic land should be free (like a homestead area, and the first expansions should be very easy to get for an 80 members tribe. They wouldn't have to wait for weeks to get a totem, they would get it instantly. They would have to work for weeks or months if they wanted to expand their land into a really big one.

Holding the land wouldn't cost anything, but to get it would. The bigger the land the bigger the price. It shouldn't be easy.


So you are upset because people are tying up lands now, but you will be ok with people tying up more land later as long as they put down some resources for it?

Very few people will be happy with a homestead. If you think there is a problem now (which I would think most people do) wait til 1 person can hold onto 200m radius areas forever. Heck I can see it now "There is no good places, I cant place my 200m totem"

I'm ok with the cost of lands, but you are asking 80+ people to wait long amounts of time (cant be short according to you), to place a totem. If its smaller amounts, then you have fear of no room at all for anyone.

I'm sure there is more of a middle ground. But what would it do? You are asking people to resource grind for first totems which have to be sorta hard else you run out of room. I see no reason to have that grind but not an upkeep grind.
IMO I think you should have both, and make both smaller. Ive already posted this idea. Most people agree with it. 22+ vs 2.
http://www.xsyon.com/forum/project.php?issueid=1230

My worry is that with your idea, that larger tribes will hold huge areas many 200m totems. Plus smaller players will feel like they need to start off with a large area. Leaving few areas. Then people get upset, for 2 reasons. 1) No areas, and 2) Huge amount of resources perceived to be needed to make a totem.
Sure they can get the "free" one. But really who is going to want to settle with a toy plane for free when they can get a 747 jumbo jet?

[Jadzia]

So you are upset because people are tying up lands now, but you will be ok with people tying up more land later as long as they put down some resources for it?

Very few people will be happy with a homestead. If you think there is a problem now (which I would think most people do) wait til 1 person can hold onto 200m radius areas forever. Heck I can see it now "There is no good places, I cant place my 200m totem"

I'm ok with the cost of lands, but you are asking 80+ people to wait long amounts of time (cant be short according to you), to place a totem. If its smaller amounts, then you have fear of no room at all for anyone.

I'm not upset at all. I'm more than happy to see occupied lands by active people. My problem is to see lands occupied by players who have been totally inactive since April.
We don't have problems with the active tribes' lands. Everyone has problems with the inactive ones.

You don't understand what I'm saying ? Anyone could place a totem instantly. Again, instantly. Then he/they could expand it step by step to the size they want. And we have plenty of room even now (if they removed the inactive totems that is) and we will have a huge land after the launch of the new zones. If only active players can hold lands then there is no problem with lack of room.

Say I'd like a 747 jumbo jet as well. But I can only afford a toy plane. So I don't really have an option to own a jumbo, it will be the same in game.

[MrDDT]

I'm not upset at all. I'm more than happy to see occupied lands by active people. My problem is to see lands occupied by players who have been totally inactive since April.
We don't have problems with the active tribes' lands. Everyone has problems with the inactive ones.

You don't understand what I'm saying ? Anyone could place a totem instantly. Again, instantly. Then he/they could expand it step by step to the size they want. And we have plenty of room even now (if they removed the inactive totems that is) and we will have a huge land after the launch of the new zones. If only active players can hold lands then there is no problem with lack of room.

Say I'd like a 747 jumbo jet as well. But I can only afford a toy plane. So I don't really have an option to own a jumbo, it will be the same in game.


Sorry to confuse words on you, problem to me = upset. Else there wouldnt be a problem.

If every player in the game had a 200m radius totem with an active account, you would have more "problems" than you do now.
If placed perfectly you would only have room for just over 800 totems. That's not many, and many locations (over 1/3 of the map) cant have a totem. So you cut that down by 1/3 just from the lake.
You are down to 533 totems.
Now you factor in other issues like people not perfectly placing totems, and founders isle etc. You are well under 400 people.

See the problem?

Let me guess, we need more zones per 400 people that sign up? Haha

[banden]

i like jadzia's idea. its like all other games. You want more land work for it. But Look people, Nobody wants a friggin job in a game to keep what they worked hard on. Least with her idea you keep things tough while allows people to upgrade land. As it stand people will spend a good 6 months- year on stuff in this game and xsyon is addin new stuff in here ever friggin month. Also lands will be expanding soon which is X4 times the size of the current game zones, In dumb dumb terms, thats fuckin huge. Which means if u wanna bitch bout land, well dont, will be a ass ton of it everywhere. Also i want you all to know this, and remember it, it has been said since the begining. This game isnt gonna cater to a giant playerbase, 100-500 max is his aims. He wants a certain audence here. Theirfore you wont be seeing 1k-3124892384243kkk people ingame. If ya dont like well donno what to tell ya.

I seen alot of indy companies doin this latley as some folks in this world just enjoy making a game so that others likem can enjoy it also. So stop trying to turn xsyon into a second job, this game will never hold full active tribes that long, and the pop will always go up n down, tribes will fill up and go inactive n repeat. Nothing we can do about it, Again this is the specific audience being targeted :-P. Theirs my 2 cents, cant deny it ethier, all true stuff.

Id like a link to where he says how many people he want. I sure havent seen him say anything like that, and if he did then incidently hes also wrong to aim for that. Lets be clear that currently 50 people is about as many people online at one time as we can get, even with 50 people you can go into the wilderness and never see a soul, when I go out today, the only people I will see is people I know live there and is online, it feels very empty and it doesnt feel very MMO. Lets be clear that the world is not crowded by people right now, its crowded by totems. So the area we can get will be quadropled (because of some people whos been pressing to get it now, this will happen sooner than good is) even if we get 8 times as many old/new players into game as we have now, this massive area will still feel quite empty. Now add in the ability to drop a bigger totem for a one time amount of materials that doesnt decay. Homesteads can suddenly control 4 times as much area as now and just like at launch a lot of people who started solo back then decide to do it again because its so easy, so they grind the "reasonable amount of mats" it takes to get a totem and lets say they dont mind grinding the mats for a big totem so they now have a 200m radius tribe land... and then they decide that they didnt really want to play it anyway... or they cant afford the sub... or they have studies to attend... whatever. What is going to make that totem go away? If it doesnt decay eventually, how is this situation any different than now? Inactive people should not be able to hold territory, we agree on that... I think.

Jadzia, what would even make the current totems go away? If there is no decay? My standpoint is that over enough time, everthing should decay if not maintained.

So you dont like the idea that you have to grind for upkeep? Incidently noone is saying that grinding items for upkeep is the only way to go. Lets say for example that you have to pray at your totem(s) to maintain them. The bottomline here is that totems have to be able to decay or we will end up right back here in a year or two.

Added after 24 minutes:


Actually I don't agree with that. I don't think it should be based on numbers in any way. It should be based purely on effort and activity. Even a solo players should be able to get the most land even thought it would take 2 years for him. Still, the opportunity should be there. Dedication and effort should pay off, not numbers. That's only my opinion of course.

That was what I was saying, well mostly. Active people should be able to take more land than less active people and inactive people shouldnt be able to hold land, period.


People can't just drop a totem and go inactive. If they don't pay the subscription fee their totem would decay fast. A subscribed player is not inactive imo...perhaps he can't play due to real life issues, but shows his dedication toward the game by paying the sub. That person should have his totem and area saved.

I feel very strongly that decay should not be tied to paying your subscription fee. An upkeep system would work better.


My main problem with an upkeep is that it can very easily become a daily chore and causes problems when someone can't play for 1-2 months but still pays the sub. A high upkeep is a nightmare and kills the fun of the game.

I doesnt necessarily have to be items for upkeep. The main thing is that totems have to be maintained or they will decay.

[Shaggy]

Here's my two cents:

Seems like many people are in agreement that totems should require upkeep to maintain a certain size, with that being balanced with the amount of players it should reasonably take to produce the costs of upkeep. Hopefully if a smaller more hardcore tribe wanted to swing it they could get by with squeezing some extra upkeep out of a smaller amount of players.

My idea for upkeep is that it should be based on resource distribution. Some resources are more prominent in certain areas than others, right? Make a totem generate an upkeep "cost" on it's own based on the exact location where the totem was placed and what resources are prominent enough nearby and within reasonable exploration distance. Maybe the distance from the totem that the algorithm uses to develop a list of potential resources for upkeep could also scale with the number of players? That way larger tribes might have to travel farther to get their upkeep costs in order (one would expect a larger tribe to be able to reach farther). Whether that's one specific resource or a certain type of resources (various STEEL scrap metal vs nails for example) would be something lots of testing and careful thought should be able to sort out. Maybe the totem should have an upkeep "deadline" once a week/bimonthly/month/whatever based on the current size. If the players put in a surplus of that upkeep continuously over time, the radius should grow, as well as the upkeep cost. If the deadline is not met that month, then the next month is the decay month where the decay process begins to take place. After this second month of not maintaining the cost of upkeep, the totem should be removed and all belongings within go up for grabs. Larger tribes should have their decay time scaled *SLIGHTLY* higher but not by much (not at a 1:1 ratio by any means).

I think a system like this would encourage a tribe to stay active to hold their size and location. Just think of the possibilities... say large tribe A wants to overtake large tribe B's area with an expansion totem. Tribe A starts attacking carts and players carrying resources back to tribe B in an effort so shut them off from resources needed for upkeep. I think the radius would need to cap out at a certain point based on the number of players, but that cap should certainly be higher than it is now to give those who wish to put more time into such a thing a reason to do so. Hopefully you guys get what I'm trying to say, but who knows..... I have been going through season 2 of Walking Dead for the last 4 or so hours so I'm a little tired =P

[inhabit]

My worry from the whole upkeep/buying land thing is that will it become just another tedious task, that diverts you away from actually playing the game you want to be playing whether that be, PvP, crafting, terraforming etc.

I dont think anyone has suggested numbers/volumes of material or how many minutes praying would be adequate to keep decay away.
I dont have the answers to this but what proportion of your gaming time are you expecting players to give up to this?

[Shaggy]

That I have no idea.... too early/late for that sort of thinking :P It shouldn't be a huge time sink but they should definitely have to work for it.

[Derek]

My worry from the whole upkeep/buying land thing is that will it become just another tedious task, that diverts you away from actually playing the game you want to be playing whether that be, PvP, crafting, terraforming etc.

I dont think anyone has suggested numbers/volumes of material or how many minutes praying would be adequate to keep decay away.
I dont have the answers to this but what proportion of your gaming time are you expecting players to give up to this?

I agree. I just don't want this to be another task that takes up a good portion of my gaming time. I've already got to put up with this ridiculous energy drain rates where resting takes up 25% of my gaming time. Then you add this upkeep task and now I'm probably up to 40-50% of my gaming time spent resting and doing chores. fun...

This is where NPC hirelings would work great. You get few NPC's to gather materials and repair/upkeep you lands while you craft/pvp/build or whatever you think is fun. To keep it balanced these NPC's can be killed by other players while out gathering. There could be a cooldown in place for when they will respawn at your totem. You could task members of your tribe to patrol the area and protect the NPC workers. Just a thought.

This actually solves the issue with inactives and upkeep. If you don't log in, you can't direct your workers to gather and repair.

[banden]

My worry from the whole upkeep/buying land thing is that will it become just another tedious task, that diverts you away from actually playing the game you want to be playing whether that be, PvP, crafting, terraforming etc.

I dont think anyone has suggested numbers/volumes of material or how many minutes praying would be adequate to keep decay away.
I dont have the answers to this but what proportion of your gaming time are you expecting players to give up to this?

Leveling the crafts in this game is allready rather tedious so I agree that making people craft more stuff to upkeep totems would be bad, but this is more because crafting is tedious, thats a different issue, there are other threads for that :). At present we craft a lot items just because we get skillups for them right?

I had this idea a while back that totems could be fueled by offering crafted items at the totem. How much upkeep the totem would recieve would be determined by the quantity of materials used and the quality of the finished item.

upkeep for Quality:
Junk= 0
poor= 0.5
low= 1
Moderate = 2
High = 4
Very high = 6
Master = 8

Upkeep for quantity
1 mat = 1
2 mat = 2
3 mat = 4

This is a very rough guestimate of what would work, I really have idea how much item 1 up keep should give you. But lets do a thought experiment ok?

Its monday and the upkeep on my totems are running out, damn... So i have to go get some items I can use for offerings so i can keep them going. So I go grab my cart and I have 2 possible ways of getting the stuff I need, I could go craft or I could down to a trade hub and barter for it. Trading would be costly and i dont have a alot to trade with so I decide I want to craft. Now again I have some choices, I could go gather stone to use for bricks or I could go gather a vider variety of materials to make cloth items or leather or tools. I have pretty good resource and masonry skills so I decide to make bricks allthough I would get more upkeep for my time out of getting cloth items because they use larger quantities of materials but my skills in cloth arent so good so the quality of the finished item would be a lot lower than the bricks.

Upkeep for 1 very high quality brick: 6+1= 7
Upkeep for 1 low quality cloth item with 3 mat: 1+4= 5

Its important for me to make absolutely clear that this system is not supposed to be another tedious job. Lets say you have to use 1-2 hours every week to make sure all your totems are fueled and this would even be a team effort for larger tribes, so some times you might not even need to worry about it.

[WillBingham]

As far as decay/upkeep of totems pay close attention to what Darkfall has...... You are in the middle of something (in game or IRL) and you remember (or get notification in game) that you have to pay taxes on your cottage/house/villa/keep. Now you have to stop what you are doing and go pay your taxes. If you do not pay your taxes you lose your cottage/house/villa/keep. Trust me you do NOT want this to happen. Should you have to interupt your real life to go take care of something in game? Or, as Jadzia stated "perhaps he can't play due to real life issues". Should a player lose what they have worked for in game due to LIFE happening. Or should they be given time or notification (e-mail) to rejoin the ranks of participating players. Just a few random thoughts.

[banden]

I dunno how it is in Darkfall but I know how POS towers work in Eve online, and thats the model I like, I lived solo in wormhole space for awhile and keeping my tower fuelled was something I didnt really have to worry about that often. I had a large quantity of fuel items in my hangar and the fully stocked tower could run for weeks without needing a refuel.

If LIFE does happen (Its a myth!) you can have your totem(s) fully stocked with weeks of fuel. Also, who says that keeping a homestead going solo should be easy?

[Mactavendish]

Very interesting how this thread is developing.

It has gone from vehement criticism of my basic idea to accepting that 1 man totems ARE a problem, and that the general consensus is that if you don't pay you should not have land.

I am very glad that my post got this much dialog going. :cool:

Books simple idea to me is a great starting point.

If you have an active subscription, even if you leave for 4 months, you lose nothing. All items in game should decay to some degree, buildings much slower then weapons, tools more than weapons and baskets decay fastest of all items. This would add reason for decay and maintenance, and also promote trade and exploration.

Of course the billing system needs to work properly, and warning emails would have to be sent, and removal of any inactive totems never re-subbed or email responded to.

But really, how should tribal land expansion be done?

Basing it solely on membership means that ( as it is currently ) There are a few BIG tribes with a lot of members but few actives. I easily see why this concerns folks with large areas and lots of work in their tribal lands. This is a problem to the current player base.

I do agree with the ideas that have been put forth about expansion should be tied more to efforts made not members joined. So, what could be tried?

Too much and folks will just move on to another game that is more fun and less like a job. To easy and we are right back were we are.

1. Base upkeep on number of members.

For instance, 500 bricks per member ( active or not ) per quarter. So, for a tribe with 65 members in their list, that's 32.5k bricks every 4 months . If maintained within the 4 month period radius does not change. If not, it drops 5 meters per 500 bricks short of the 32.5k they need for upkeep. It could also expand 5 meter out for every 500 bricks over the 32.5 k they need.

This would only negatively affect a tribe if they didn't do their upkeep. Even if they only had 5 actives, if they really wanted to keep the radius they have, it would not be a burden to maintain. This would also allow those tribe that are "waiting" to maintain their areas without having the entire tribe to login.

This idea is about taking responsibility for what they want to own. If you do not want to pay or maintain what you have built up, you should make way for others that do .

[Jadzia]

I feel very strongly that decay should not be tied to paying your subscription fee. An upkeep system would work better.

Why ? I'd like to hear your reasons.

Bandon, we try to find a solution for 2 problems:

1. Dealing with inactive totems
2. Controlling the size of a tribe area

I like your suggestion about praying for upkeep. That's easy, not annoying (if it doesn't take too much time). But how would you deal with players who are unable to play for 1-2-3 months ? Punishing a paying customer by losing his land is not a very smart financial decision imo, and I doubt any developer would choose that.
How does your suggestion deal with the 2. problem ? If its easy to maintain a totem how you solve the question of owning a big area ? Everyone can own the max amount of land for kinda free, or it would still be based on member number (which is a very bad system imo) ?

So your suggestion answers a part of the first one, but not the second.

My suggestion
for #1: Totem decay when a player unsubs. As long as the player is subbed the totem stays up without upkeep.

for #2:
one time purchase of land expansions. I mean you can pay for like every 5 meter radius expansion once, and after that it is yours as long as you pay for the game. Its kinda like upgrading the totem, every level of the totem comes with a bigger radius. The higher level the totem is the more costly is the upgrade (exponentially growing).

If we try to find 1 solution for these 2 problems, I'm afraid we will necessarily end up with a huge and very annoying upkeep.

Edit:
One more question, bandon. Your other suggestion about fueling up a totem....what if a player stores stuffs enough for a 3 months upkeep in his totem then unsubbes ? Will his totem stay there for that 3 months or not ? ( I believe it shouldn't. )

[banden]

Why ? I'd like to hear your reasons.

Bandon, we try to find a solution for 2 problems:

1. Dealing with inactive totems
2. Controlling the size of a tribe area

I like your suggestion about praying for upkeep. That's easy, not annoying (if it doesn't take too much time). But how would you deal with players who are unable to play for 1-2-3 months ? Punishing a paying customer by losing his land is not a very smart financial decision imo, and I doubt any developer would choose that.
How does your suggestion deal with the 2. problem ? If its easy to maintain a totem how you solve the question of owning a big area ? Everyone can own the max amount of land for kinda free, or it would still be based on member number (which is a very bad system imo) ?

So your suggestion answers a part of the first one, but not the second.

My suggestion
for #1: Totem decay when a player unsubs. As long as the player is subbed the totem stays up without upkeep.

for #2:
one time purchase of land expansions. I mean you can pay for like every 5 meter radius expansion once, and after that it is yours as long as you pay for the game. Its kinda like upgrading the totem, every level of the totem comes with a bigger radius. The higher level the totem is the more costly is the upgrade (exponentially growing).

If we try to find 1 solution for these 2 problems, I'm afraid we will necessarily end up with a huge and very annoying upkeep.

How will you handle decay in a big tribe if its tied to subscription? Whose subscription determines when your totem decays? The cheifs? Everyones combined subscription?

Id be careful doing anything with subscription because it can be abused by having many accounts, yea it costs money but some people dont mind that if they can get a competitive edge.

1# Praying isent that much different then say... making bricks is it? I like the idea with quanity and quality better because it has actual value, while praying is just afk time. Im of course assuming that crafting is made less clicky and tedious eventually, it has been discussed.
If you have to go afk for 1-2-3 months with no hope of ever during that time logging on and restocking your totems, then you shouldnt have a solo homestead. Your own fault for trying to do something you cant handle.

2# By distance of course! I forgot about that, I got caught up in laying out my idea I forgot about size. First totem you throw down has 25 m radius, just like now, but it has a low upkeep that could maintained by 1-2 players. The upkeep of the next totems will increase dependant on the distance to the main totem, easy enough.

[China]

Although I agree with some form of "totem upkeep", I believe If upkeep on a totem requires finished mats, it will only become one more "grind", not fun in my book.

So I've been thinking - what if we could kill 2 birds with one stone? The Xsyon community still has not come up with a "monetary system" ie, putting a value system in place that could affect the entire population and not just local or regional and give us a scale to determine worth of items crafted or resources gathered etc. The following does not have anything to do with decay of buildings, walls, resources etc. That still should remain a seperate issue.

So here goes my idea -

We have certain resources that we can find in game that have no use, or no future use that we know of to create items and that can easily be an exchange commodity and is scavengeable.

A) Dollars (quarters & pennies being a subset of dollars)
B) Bottle Caps
C) Beer Tabs

The Value could be determined as such:
$1.00 = 4 $ .25 and/or 100 $.01
1 Bottle Cap = $ .10
1 Beer Tab = $ .05

First Xsyon determines the size, purchase price & monthly upkeep costs on 1 - 5 man homesteads/Totems, 6-10 man Totems, 11 - 20 man Totems etc.

When a new player enters the world, he receives 1 1/2 the amount it costs to place a one man totem. Should he/she place his totem and then decide to move it - they would loose 75% of the cost of that totem. In order to expand the totem, a new player must join the tribe, and depending on which size category that particular totem falls into, it would adjust the cost & upkeep expense and what the new tribe member has to pay inorder to join. Should the new player leave the tribe, he/she would receive the 25% refund,

Having a monetary system in place - you now can start determing the value of things created, labor costs, mat costs etc. You have a time sink & resource sink without grinding, and a much more flexible system that gives players choices on how they want to play the game. For instance, when I played SWG, I didn't become any kind of a crafter, but instead I became a trader (buying low - selling high) in order to support myself.

I can see all sorts of scenarios that the above idea could create, be it either tribes assessing taxes on members, ways different members could earn monies to pay their taxes, even making one tribe more economically viable by having low member taxes. Well I could go on and on thinking up new scenarios.

I'm sure there are problably some holes in my idea, and that there are many things that need to be fleshed out - but maybe it will give us a new way to look at the dead totem and totem expansion issue.

Shoot holes thru it or add to it.

China

[Mactavendish]

I only have 2 issues your idea China

1. I have over 20k in dollars alone. I am sure if we all pooled the "money" we would have well over 50k.

This is great for players that have been around a long time and places any new player or tribes at a distinct disadvantage.

2. This also mandates a form of currency not decided upon by the players.

This may or may not be a bad thing, but the entire game is designed around having the players provide the quests, interactions and even the currency.


Using resources that take effort to produce, puts all players on an equal footing. It also allows the choice to be entirely in the hands of the individual players.

You want to build up a large area with a castle and a moat? Gotta work for it.

Want to just have a simple hut in the mountains to store loot from raiding? Not so much work.

Giving a player so much in a game that is about survival is just ridiculous.

If you want a totem it should cost you something in the game world... after all we are playing a game here right?
Not interested in the game atm, no prob.. you don't get anything and lose what you have.

I am NOT a crush style player, nor a pk'er and not all that interested in combat pvp.

And yet I am all for this.

I would expect a PK/crush/dominate player would want to be able to control larger and larger areas if they could... and in this game even they need to craft to have the highest HP... SO, what is the real issue here?

Do folks want big things for no effort? You folks really want an easy button?

If so why are you playing this game? if anything this game needs to be harder NOT easier.

Bottom line: pay to play, and the rewards go to those that work hardest to get them.

[MrDDT]

Very interesting how this thread is developing.

It has gone from vehement criticism of my basic idea to accepting that 1 man totems ARE a problem, and that the general consensus is that if you don't pay you should not have land.



Its not just 1 man totems, its tribes holding huge areas of land with very few people with no cost to them.

Having 159m radius with 5 actives is not fine.


Leveling the crafts in this game is allready rather tedious so I agree that making people craft more stuff to upkeep totems would be bad, but this is more because crafting is tedious, thats a different issue, there are other threads for that :). At present we craft a lot items just because we get skillups for them right?

I had this idea a while back that totems could be fueled by offering crafted items at the totem. How much upkeep the totem would recieve would be determined by the quantity of materials used and the quality of the finished item.

upkeep for Quality:
Junk= 0
poor= 0.5
low= 1
Moderate = 2
High = 4
Very high = 6
Master = 8

Upkeep for quantity
1 mat = 1
2 mat = 2
3 mat = 4

This is a very rough guestimate of what would work, I really have idea how much item 1 up keep should give you. But lets do a thought experiment ok?

Its monday and the upkeep on my totems are running out, damn... So i have to go get some items I can use for offerings so i can keep them going. So I go grab my cart and I have 2 possible ways of getting the stuff I need, I could go craft or I could down to a trade hub and barter for it. Trading would be costly and i dont have a alot to trade with so I decide I want to craft. Now again I have some choices, I could go gather stone to use for bricks or I could go gather a vider variety of materials to make cloth items or leather or tools. I have pretty good resource and masonry skills so I decide to make bricks allthough I would get more upkeep for my time out of getting cloth items because they use larger quantities of materials but my skills in cloth arent so good so the quality of the finished item would be a lot lower than the bricks.

Upkeep for 1 very high quality brick: 6+1= 7
Upkeep for 1 low quality cloth item with 3 mat: 1+4= 5

Its important for me to make absolutely clear that this system is not supposed to be another tedious job. Lets say you have to use 1-2 hours every week to make sure all your totems are fueled and this would even be a team effort for larger tribes, so some times you might not even need to worry about it.



This isnt good like this IMO, because new players value is almost worthless then. They will feel like they cant help or dont help much at all.

Master QL resources are unlimited and very very easy to get.

A lot of these ideas have already been hashed out. Here in the suggestions.

http://www.xsyon.com/forum/project.php?issueid=1230

I like some of these ideas people are putting out that are very close or the same of what's already been said.

[Mactavendish]

DDT.. even with dezgards idea a dedicated 5 man team could maintain a 200 m radius tribe area.

If you don't like that... what specifically would you suggest that is better?

It's all well and good to say you don't like something, but tell us what you think will work better.

I don't for a minute believe you have no inactive's in your tribe.. so your complaint applies to your tribe as well..
( none of us but the dev's can tell how many active subs any tribe has so please stop spouting guessed at numbers )

But you know, that is not really the point anyway.

The point is that paying subs only should have the "right" to have a totem, and that most here feel that there should be a cost incurred to own land.

[MrDDT]

Although I agree with some form of "totem upkeep", I believe If upkeep on a totem requires finished mats, it will only become one more "grind", not fun in my book.

So I've been thinking - what if we could kill 2 birds with one stone? The Xsyon community still has not come up with a "monetary system" ie, putting a value system in place that could affect the entire population and not just local or regional and give us a scale to determine worth of items crafted or resources gathered etc. The following does not have anything to do with decay of buildings, walls, resources etc. That still should remain a seperate issue.

So here goes my idea -

We have certain resources that we can find in game that have no use, or no future use that we know of to create items and that can easily be an exchange commodity and is scavengeable.

A) Dollars (quarters & pennies being a subset of dollars)
B) Bottle Caps
C) Beer Tabs

The Value could be determined as such:
$1.00 = 4 $ .25 and/or 100 $.01
1 Bottle Cap = $ .10
1 Beer Tab = $ .05

First Xsyon determines the size, purchase price & monthly upkeep costs on 1 - 5 man homesteads/Totems, 6-10 man Totems, 11 - 20 man Totems etc.

When a new player enters the world, he receives 1 1/2 the amount it costs to place a one man totem. Should he/she place his totem and then decide to move it - they would loose 75% of the cost of that totem. In order to expand the totem, a new player must join the tribe, and depending on which size category that particular totem falls into, it would adjust the cost & upkeep expense and what the new tribe member has to pay inorder to join. Should the new player leave the tribe, he/she would receive the 25% refund,

Having a monetary system in place - you now can start determing the value of things created, labor costs, mat costs etc. You have a time sink & resource sink without grinding, and a much more flexible system that gives players choices on how they want to play the game. For instance, when I played SWG, I didn't become any kind of a crafter, but instead I became a trader (buying low - selling high) in order to support myself.

I can see all sorts of scenarios that the above idea could create, be it either tribes assessing taxes on members, ways different members could earn monies to pay their taxes, even making one tribe more economically viable by having low member taxes. Well I could go on and on thinking up new scenarios.

I'm sure there are problably some holes in my idea, and that there are many things that need to be fleshed out - but maybe it will give us a new way to look at the dead totem and totem expansion issue.

Shoot holes thru it or add to it.

China


I like this idea, and I dont think it would be bad at all. I do however, think basic resources (rocks, sand, etc) would work better, as they ARE used in other things and will help drive a market.

Using items that have no in game value other than upkeep for a totem will help create an economy, however, its will also force people to do scavenaging (only way other than trade to get those items). You could still trade to get them, but better will be to use items that have dual uses.

This will also help tribes that have been around a while not have a huge advantage because these resources were used before and still used, adding them to upkeep costs will mean they dont have huge stock piles of these resources.

I'm not shooting down your idea, I'm simply saying I believe it would be better to use basic resources that are used in many things.

Added after 8 minutes:


DDT.. even with dezgards idea a dedicated 5 man team could maintain a 200 m radius tribe area.

If you don't like that... what specifically would you suggest that is better?

It's all well and good to say you don't like something, but tell us what you think will work better.

I don't for a minute believe you have no inactive's in your tribe.. so your complaint applies to your tribe as well..
( none of us but the dev's can tell how many active subs any tribe has so please stop spouting guessed at numbers )

But you know, that is not really the point anyway.

The point is that paying subs only should have the "right" to have a totem, and that most here feel that there should be a cost incurred to own land.


Paying subs should have the right to a totem.
They shouldnt have a right to hold 200m radius with no cost or effort. It's not fair to anyone else.

This isnt about me. If they kicked all the inactives out of my tribe I would be more than happy with that. As long as they gave them fair warning.

5 man tribe holding a 200m would be very hard, and if they go inactive for a short amount of time. They would lose a lot of land.

You ask me what is better.

Ive been talking about this for months. My idea is here.
http://www.xsyon.com/forum/project.php?issueid=1230

[China]

I like this idea, and I dont think it would be bad at all. I do however, think basic resources (rocks, sand, etc) would work better, as they ARE used in other things and will help drive a market.

Using items that have no in game value other than upkeep for a totem will help create an economy, however, its will also force people to do scavenaging (only way other than trade to get those items). You could still trade to get them, but better will be to use items that have dual uses.

This will also help tribes that have been around a while not have a huge advantage because these resources were used before and still used, adding them to upkeep costs will mean they dont have huge stock piles of these resources.

I'm not shooting down your idea, I'm simply saying I believe it would be better to use basic resources that are used in many things.

2 pts.

First point - hauling sand, rocks etc is a mighty heavy currency, not to mention what a grind (grrrrr). One of the reasons that light transportable paper IOUs came into existance in real life, and why Xsyon, which purports to be sorta "reality based" should adopt a currency for the game. And, I like it that you can give something silly like beer tabs & bottle caps a value.

Plus - I can just see this conversation taking place:

Tribe Leader: Hey Joe, it's time for Totem upkeep - pay up your 100 sand buddy."
Joe: Sure Leader
(thougt bubble over Joe's head----------> Heh...I'd rather go hunting, what's he going to do if I don't grind out that 100 sand, kick me out and loose tribe area ...naaa, he'll just get the sand himself.

Second point - Sand, rocks etc are a non-ending renewable resource and cannot be manipulated and therefore is susceptible to inflation, which could make sand/rock 1/2 as valuable as the previous month or players so sick of a grind they begin leaving the game. With an established currency Xsyon will be able to manipulate the amount of dollars/beer tabs & caps in game, they will be able to keep the economy from over-heating or becoming sluggish. More players - circulate more dollars/beer tabs & caps. Fewer players - slow down circulation.

New Tribe Leader - member conversation:

Tribe Leader: Hey Joe, it's time for Totem upkeep, I need $100.
Joe: No problem, here you go...I sold 16 raccoon skins last night to Tribe Money Pot.

China

[MrDDT]

2 pts.

First point - hauling sand, rocks etc is a mighty heavy currency, not to mention what a grind (grrrrr). One of the reasons that light transportable paper IOUs came into existance in real life, and why Xsyon, which purports to be sorta "reality based" should adopt a currency for the game. And, I like it that you can give something silly like beer tabs & bottle caps a value.

Plus - I can just see this conversation taking place:

Tribe Leader: Hey Joe, it's time for Totem upkeep - pay up your 100 sand buddy."
Joe: Sure Leader
(thougt bubble over Joe's head----------> Heh...I'd rather go hunting, what's he going to do if I don't grind out that 100 sand, kick me out and loose tribe area ...naaa, he'll just get the sand himself.

Second point - Sand, rocks etc are a non-ending renewable resource and cannot be manipulated and therefore is susceptible to inflation, which could make sand/rock 1/2 as valuable as the previous month or players so sick of a grind they begin leaving the game. With an established currency Xsyon will be able to manipulate the amount of dollars/beer tabs & caps in game, they will be able to keep the economy from over-heating or becoming sluggish. More players - circulate more dollars/beer tabs & caps. Fewer players - slow down circulation.

New Tribe Leader - member conversation:

Tribe Leader: Hey Joe, it's time for Totem upkeep, I need $100.
Joe: No problem, here you go...I sold 16 raccoon skins last night to Tribe Money Pot.

China


First Point. Yes its heavy, its not meant to be used as the main form of trade, its meant to be used as resources for upkeep. Many different ways to get these basic resources. Not just sand but other things. Instead of money only 2 ways. Scav or trade.

Tribe Leader: Hey Joe, it's time for totem upkeep - up your 100 sand buddy"
Joe: Sure Leader.
(Thought bubble over joe's head Heh I'd rather go hunting, whats he going to do kick me out of I dont give him 100$? Nawh he can get the $ himself.)

Applies both ways.



Second point- Sand and rocks are never ending. So are scav items. Plus the cost of upkeep keeps the value, time gathering vs upkeep will make it keep its balance. Which is what you need for basics.

Convo.
New Tribe Leader - Member convo

Tribe Leader :Hey Joe ites time for totem upkeep need 100 sand.
Joe: No problem, here you go. I sold 16 raccoon skins last night to other tribe members and players.

With money ONLY being used for upkeep. Players with single totems that need very little money will have no reason for this money. Yet they would for other things, like sand, rock, grass etc.

[China]

I only have 2 issues your idea China

1. I have over 20k in dollars alone. I am sure if we all pooled the "money" we would have well over 50k.

This is great for players that have been around a long time and places any new player or tribes at a distinct disadvantage.

2. This also mandates a form of currency not decided upon by the players.

This may or may not be a bad thing, but the entire game is designed around having the players provide the quests, interactions and even the currency.

1) Not that great of an advantage - infact maybe only a fair one since you have paid & played the game for a long time. But, how long is that 20k - 50k going to last you, if the cost per member of your tribe is $1000 a month?

2) I have always believed that it was a mistake for Xsyon to allow the players to decide on a currency. The reasons being:
A - You have to have a central government or bank to regulate a fiat currency, otherwise you get the mafia.
It is all about the "Golden Rule" - He who has the gold rules.

B - Without a unprejudiced central bank or government you get a very unlevel playing field. (Personally can you imagine ddt getting the monoply on the currency? - Me neither...heh)

China

[MrDDT]

1) Not that great of an advantage - infact maybe only a fair one since you have paid & played the game for a long time. But, how long is that 20k - 50k going to last you, if the cost per member of your tribe is $1000 a month?

2) I have always believed that it was a mistake for Xsyon to allow the players to decide on a currency. The reasons being:
A - You have to have a central government or bank to regulate a fiat currency, otherwise you get the mafia.
It is all about the "Golden Rule" - He who has the gold rules.

B - Without a unprejudiced central bank or government you get a very unlevel playing field. (Personally can you imagine ddt getting the monoply on the currency? - Me neither...heh)

China


I dont see a problem with giving tribes the choice in picking what they want for currency. However, I dont see how you can make one working off dollars, pennies, bottle caps work without having some system in game that uses them.
Screws, bolts, nails, rocks etc all have use in game and I can see them being picked pretty easy.

If they make totem upkeep use dollars, then that would give value to them and allow it to be used all over, for most people. Which allow it to work pretty well. I would rather see totems take real things. Like you want to upkeep your totem area? Use resources found in the world.
You want to build a totem? Well why not do it like other projects. Using mats that would work.

Dropping dollar bills into a totem doesnt make much sense in this type of world setting we have.

[Mactavendish]

At this point I don't even know what you are arguing about.

To quote you from the thread about Dez's idea on totem decay...

MrDDT: "I'm not sure how Xsyon plans to put it in, but I surely hope they change it so that inactive tribes will lose area control, and active tribes can gain them."

I agree that only active subs should hold the land, and that inactive tribe should lose control.

In this case Jordi has made it so that the tribe leader "owns" the totem and thus the land.

The idea you like is Dez's. And that idea would still allow a lower number than tribe membership to control a large portion of land. You are in favor of his idea, but don't like any alternatives that do much the same thing only less painful.

The decay idea Dez put forth is a bit harsh, but I could still work with it and I can say without any doubt that if it took place our tribe would be able to maintain an even larger area then we have now. But then again we have a very dedicated group of great players willing to put forth the effort ... it's what they do primarily to play here anyway.

If we got rid of all totems where there has not been any active members in the last 6 months, and only after they have been given ample time to respond to emails or re-sub, MOST of this issue disappears.

[MrDDT]

At this point I don't even know what you are arguing about.

To quote you from the thread about Dez's idea on totem decay...

MrDDT: "I'm not sure how Xsyon plans to put it in, but I surely hope they change it so that inactive tribes will lose area control, and active tribes can gain them."

I agree that only active subs should hold the land, and that inactive tribe should lose control.

In this case Jordi has made it so that the tribe leader "owns" the totem and thus the land.

The idea you like is Dez's. And that idea would still allow a lower number than tribe membership to control a large portion of land. You are in favor of his idea, but don't like any alternatives that do much the same thing only less painful.

The decay idea Dez put forth is a bit harsh, but I could still work with it and I can say without any doubt that if it took place our tribe would be able to maintain an even larger area then we have now. But then again we have a very dedicated group of great players willing to put forth the effort ... it's what they do primarily to play here anyway.

If we got rid of all totems where there has not been any active members in the last 6 months, and only after they have been given ample time to respond to emails or re-sub, MOST of this issue disappears.


I want to remove # of players being a factor in tribe size. Make it amount of activity. Not player # activity but activity.

If 10 people work their arse off for a 200m totem area. I see no problems with that.
Heck if 1 person does nothing but trade and grind resources to pay for a 200m totem area. Im ok with that.

What Im not ok with is buying a huge chunk of land at any cost and it never being smaller unless they quit the game. If you have no upkeep. Then tribes with a few extra accounts can have huge areas of land with no upkeep.

Then you can keep all your inactive and active members in your tribe and not be effected.
If you want to hold a huge area, more members playing will help you get the resources to do that. More inactive members will not help you do that.

You want to get rid of "inactive totems" well all Im saying is if you do that, then you need to remove all the inactive accounts out of tribes too. Because they are holding to much land using inactive members. Its not fair for solo players to lose a totem placement, but large tribes with few active members holding huge chunks of land with 1 person.

I like alternatives that make sense. But punishing solo players because you dont want to lose some land. Isnt fair and I wont agree with it. Its not a good option.

[Mactavendish]

Ok. Then I will be the one to compromise and say let the totem upkeep mechanic be the same mechanic that removes the inactive single man totems...

Send out email stating that totem decay/upkeep is going to be turned on. Tell all players and former players what the upkeep will be per tribe member and the date it will start.

If they want to keep their totems, ( 1 man or 160 member NO difference ) Then they need to login and put down the first months upkeep.

Active tribes will have no issues, ones thinking about coming back, just might.

NG does not remove any totems, the system for totem decay does, based upon players interest in keeping it.

Nobody punished and the end result is the exact same in most cases... win/win/win

[MrDDT]

Ok. Then I will be the one to compromise and say let the totem upkeep mechanic be the same mechanic that removes the inactive single man totems...

Send out email stating that totem decay/upkeep is going to be turned on. Tell all players and former players what the upkeep will be tribe member and the date it will start.

If the want to keep their totems, ( 1 man or 160 member NO difference ) Then they need to login and put down the first months upkeep.

Active tribes will have no issues, ones thinking about coming back, just might.

NG does not remove any totems, the system for totem decay does, based upon players interest in keeping it.

Nobody punished and the end result is the exact same in most cases... win/win/win


Sounds like a great plan, only issue is the timeline. If you want it done, and decay happen before old tribes have 6 months to do it, then there are issues because Xsyon said they would give a longer warning.

I think 6 months is to long always have. However, he told them something he should keep to it.

[inhabit]

cough** they also specified an actual date for new lands a while ago and that didnt happen, talking about word!!**cough :)

[Mactavendish]

Keeping your word is laudable, but often not doable.

"Hey ddt, you gonna come over and help with these bricks?"

ddt:"sure thing!" 10 minutes later ddt's child sprains his wrist playing skyrim and he must go to the doctor.

"aww man.. that ddt NEVER keeps his word "


stuff happens.

What I am about to say I truly believe. flame away if you must.

They should do what is in the best interest of the paying customers. PERIOD.

Explain the reason, state the facts and move forward.

[MrDDT]

Keeping your word is laudable, but often not doable.

"Hey ddt, you gonna come over and help with these bricks?"

ddt:"sure thing!" 10 minutes later ddt's child sprains his wrist playing skyrim and he must go to the doctor.

"aww man.. that ddt NEVER keeps his word "


stuff happens.

What I am about to say I truly believe. flame away if you must.

They should do what is in the best interest of the paying customers. PERIOD.

Explain the reason, state the facts and move forward.


You do know that others PAID for the game right?

[Derek]

I still think NPC hirelings is the way to go. This does 3 things:

1) The player has to actively log on and tell their NPC's to gather and repair to maintain upkeep.
2) The player is left free to do what he/she wants to do (trade, PvP, craft, socialize) while the NPC tackles the boring task of gathering 100 rock or sand or 100 of whatever.
3) A fun new PvP tactic is introduced. Go slaughter your rival tribe's NPC gatherers to hurt them where it counts.

Everyone loves the companion system in SWTOR. Why not try something similar in Xsyon.

[MrDDT]

I still think NPC hirelings is the way to go. This does 3 things:

1) The player has to actively log on and tell their NPC's to gather and repair to maintain upkeep.
2) The player is left free to do what he/she wants to do (trade, PvP, craft, socialize) while the NPC tackles the boring task of gathering 100 rock or sand or 100 of whatever.
3) A fun new PvP tactic is introduced. Go slaughter your rival tribe's NPC gatherers to hurt them where it counts.

Everyone loves the companion system in SWTOR. Why not try something similar in Xsyon.

We dont even have NPC vendors. I surely dont want hirelings. Thats just me.

[Mactavendish]

Paid to get into beta or download the game is a simple choice ...

Nobody forced them to spend that money so I don't think it automatically entitles them to plop a totem , hold land that others cannot use, and then walk away to come back when they feel the game is right for them.

The difference I am talking about is having a current paid sub when this goes live.

[MrDDT]

Paid to get into beta or download the game is a simple choice ...

Nobody forced them to spend that money so I don't think it automatically entitles them to plop a totem , hold land that others cannot use, and then walk away to come back when they feel the game is right for them.

The difference I am talking about is having a current paid sub when this goes live.


Huh? They still paid for the game as promised they would get a warning before all their hard work was gone. It would be like if he told you they were not going to wipe the game. Then wipes it so that a few people now playing can "catch" up.

I'm talking about the warning he said he would email people. Why is this a hard concept for you to understand? Is there a problem with doing what he told them he would do?

[Mactavendish]

Nope not hard to understand you at all.

Give them the warning.. give them 6 extra months to play if they re-sub, shoot even stop billing us that have paid for the last 6 months.

What I don't understand is your extreme worry for people that left 9 months ago.

sure a small portion may just be waiting to come back when content is "right".

but many will not ever be back, as they have moved on to something else.

Let's try and work with the players we have and the potential one's to come .. not the folks that have already demonstrated their choices.

[MrDDT]

Your point = Screw people that havnt played lately because I people want XYZ now.

My point is = Keep the promise and email the people giving them the warning. Because they were told XYZ.

You think the few people (yes way few) we have now is more than the people waiting as promised? Sorry to let you down, but many more people are WAITING as promised than are currently playing.

I see no reason other than to appease the NOW NOW NOW types to not give them the warning as promised. Its not extreme. Its called morals. Companies have it, and people have it. Its upholding your word.

[Book]

Have we heard anything from the legions of people waiting on supposed promise? I mean, are you sure they still care?

Also, having totem upkeep associated with in-game activity only rather than active subscription is pretty much pushing a lot of customers out of the game. The more casual players who have busy real lives and look forward to when they get a bit of free time to themselves to play a game...

These are folks who pay $15 a month but use very little of NG's resources. Free money. Little use of server time, little use of bandwidth, etc. but the same amount of money coming in every month. Why in [insert deity here]'s name would anyone want to alienate those folks?

Why so much concern with people who are supposedly waiting until the game becomes whatever it was they hoped it would be (darkfall 2.0 in many cases) and so little concern for actively paying customers, even if they don't have 20 hours a day to play a game?

[MrDDT]

Have we heard anything from the legions of people waiting on supposed promise? I mean, are you sure they still care?

Also, having totem upkeep associated with in-game activity only rather than active subscription is pretty much pushing a lot of customers out of the game. The more casual players who have busy real lives and look forward to when they get a bit of free time to themselves to play a game...

These are folks who pay $15 a month but use very little of NG's resources. Free money. Little use of server time, little use of bandwidth, etc. but the same amount of money coming in every month. Why in [insert deity here]'s name would anyone want to alienate those folks?

Why so much concern with people who are supposedly waiting until the game becomes whatever it was they hoped it would be (darkfall 2.0 in many cases) and so little concern for actively paying customers, even if they don't have 20 hours a day to play a game?


Very good points.

These types can do 2 things.

1) Solo it doing homestead, which would use very little upkeep resources.
2) Join a tribe, and the other more active members help keep the tribe active. When they do play, they have fun and play with other tribe members and help where they can.


It's not about playing 20 hours a day or not. Its about they PAID for a game. That game had major issues. Xsyon (you know the lead dev?) told them they wouldnt lose their stuff, accounts, toons etc. They could come back when the game had more of the issues worked out and content for them. He would give them a warning email 6 months before they started to lose it.

So how we are here, where content is starting to sound like what it was meant to be at release. So the emails should go out. Give them warning so they can choose to come back or not.
All these people paid for the game. They helped keep the servers up that you are currently playing on. Without the support of these people that bought the game and DID NOT ask for a refund. Who knows where the game would be now.

Praise these people. I dont think they should be punished. They did nothing wrong but do what they were asked to do. Wait a bit, their stuff would be on hold then get a chance to come back.

[Shaggy]

DDT, don't you think 6 months is not something this game can afford? Hell, it's been what, 7-9 months since release? I love this game man and I feel ya on defending those people, but 6 months is a bit of a stretch. If someone paid for the initial cost of the game, plopped a totem, stopped paying the sub, and haven't returned for over 3 or 4 months they are not coming back and have no right to be upset their stuff is gone. I think he shouldn't just do a system wide deletion of these totems, but rather implement some sort of feature that requires them to be reasonably active to hold their territory. Give a warning that this feature has been put in place that allows them to save their territory if they wish. This is a game that depends heavily on land and resources, both of which are claimed all over the world by inactive totems that haven't been touched or logged into in months. New players come into the game, see the dead areas everywhere, and log right back out. It happens every day and you're honestly kidding yourself if you think otherwise.

My advice to Jordi: whatever you do, do it quick and get it done with so this game can progress. Ignoring this issue and dragging it on for 6 months or even 3 or 4 months is a HUGE mistake, and this game cannot afford to not progress.

[MrDDT]

DDT, don't you think 6 months is not something this game can afford? Hell, it's been what, 7-9 months since release? I love this game man and I feel ya on defending those people, but 6 months is a bit of a stretch. If someone paid for the initial cost of the game, plopped a totem, stopped paying the sub, and haven't returned for over 3 or 4 months they are not coming back and have no right to be upset their stuff is gone. This is a game that depends heavily on land and resources, both of which are claimed all over the world by inactive totems that haven't been touched or logged into in months. New players come into the game, see the dead areas everywhere, and log right back out. It happens every day and you're honestly kidding yourself if you think otherwise.

My advice to Jordi: whatever you do, do it quick and get it done with so this game can progress. Ignoring this issue and dragging it on for 6 months or even 3 or 4 months is a HUGE mistake, and this game cannot afford to not progress.


I agree with what you are saying that he needs to make the choice now and get it started.

Who is to make the call of what is effort in the game? I mean does he have to goto every totem look at every account and say "Yep this one had been putting in enough effort they can keep it".

I see no difference in a solo totem and a member in a tribe that are inactive growing the radius. Dont punish solo players because they are not in a tribe of 50 people (or were not).

I know you think these people are leaving because of these "dead" totems, but they have a right to that land. These players would be upset even if they didnt have dead totems and they were being actively used.

Remove all inactive accounts from ALL tribes not just solo totems, butonly after giving warning is what I'm saying.
6months being too long? Yep. I said it then I'm saying it now. However, he said this to them. Where was all the people backing me when I said it then? See back then it were players unhappy with the game. Going to go inactive. Now its the other way. I dont believe its fair to them, just as I dont believe its fair to us to have to have suffered through it for months. But I dont think its right for these people to come back to missing totems and land they worked over lost because players NOW want their spots.

They left with the word that they would be warned BEFORE decay. At the very least they need a warning. 6 months sucks and I didnt agree with it then, however, thats what they were told.

[Jadzia]

Ok. I took the time and searched for that famous 'promise' DDT keeps mentioning. Here it is:

We will implement totem decay for abandoned homesteads and tribes in the future, but this will take into effect only for players that have been completely inactive for a long period of time (6 to 9 months for example). All players will be informed of this before it is implemented.
link: http://www.xsyon.com/forum/showthread.php/2522-Official-Answers-by-week/page2

Effect on players that have been completely inactive for a long period of time (6 to 9 months for example) - This is already fulfilled. Most of the inactive players left more than 6 months ago.

All players will be informed of this before it is implemented - They will be informed before totem decay gets implemented. Its not a promise to get another 6 months of potential inactivity AFTER the warning email.

I hope this clears it up. Jordi hasn't promised another 6 months of inactivity time at all. Thankfully.

[MrDDT]

Ok. I took the time and searched for that famous 'promise' DDT keeps mentioning. Here it is:

link: http://www.xsyon.com/forum/showthread.php/2522-Official-Answers-by-week/page2

Effect on players that have been completely inactive for a long period of time (6 to 9 months for example) - This is already fulfilled. Most of the inactive players left more than 6 months ago.

All players will be informed of this before it is implemented - They will be informed before totem decay gets implemented. Its not a promise to get another 6 months of potential inactivity AFTER the warning email.

I hope this clears it up. Jordi hasn't promised another 6 months of inactivity time at all. Thankfully.

I think there more to it, but hey Im all for it. Ive always said 6 months was to long. I just dont want to see people who have been told to wait it out and check back later to have things just missing when they come back.

[Jadzia]

How will you handle decay in a big tribe if its tied to subscription? Whose subscription determines when your totem decays? The cheifs? Everyones combined subscription? Id be careful doing anything with subscription because it can be abused by having many accounts, yea it costs money but some people dont mind that if they can get a competitive edge.

Since we are talking about a system where the size of the tribe area doesn't depend on the number of members, this is not an issue. The land belongs to them as long as there is 1 active (paid) subscription in the tribe.



If you have to go afk for 1-2-3 months with no hope of ever during that time logging on and restocking your totems, then you shouldnt have a solo homestead. Your own fault for trying to do something you cant handle.

Now that is a very very bad attitude toward a player who had to leave for some months but he is so dedicated to play the game that he keeps paying his sub fee even for his inactive months. This would make the company to lose a lot of money and would be insane imo.



2# By distance of course! I forgot about that, I got caught up in laying out my idea I forgot about size. First totem you throw down has 25 m radius, just like now, but it has a low upkeep that could maintained by 1-2 players. The upkeep of the next totems will increase dependant on the distance to the main totem, easy enough.
Yes...so we are back to a high and irritating upkeep, which makes the game a chore and no fun....

[MrDDT]

Since we are talking about a system where the size of the tribe area doesn't depend on the number of members, this is not an issue. The land belongs to them as long as there is 1 active (paid) subscription in the tribe.


Now that is a very very bad attitude toward a player who had to leave for some months but he is so dedicated to play the game that he keeps paying his sub fee even for his inactive months. This would make the company to lose a lot of money and would be insane imo.


Yes...so we are back to a high and irritating upkeep, which makes the game a chore and no fun....


Still you have some problems with this.

1) Every 400 people you will need a 10x10 zone area for them. 400 people isnt much.
2) You still have a resource grind, sure its a once time cost but according to you its "irritating" and a "chore" to get mats. So dont see how a 1 time is any diff than a upkeep other than once at a large amount or many times at a small.
3) You have a first come first server only type of totems. Whoever gets it first will always have it without fear of losing it.



If you think gathering mats is a chore, sounds to me like you dont want a sandbox game. Because if that's the case just doing anything will be a "chore". Want to do bonecrafting? Chore. Want to do tailoring? Chore?

Why not have a 1 time cost for those skills too? You get 1000 cloth, and click once and BAM you have 100 skill. No decay in skills either. Because thats a chore.

[Shaggy]

If you think gathering mats is a chore, sounds to me like you dont want a sandbox game. Because if that's the case just doing anything will be a "chore". Want to do bonecrafting? Chore. Want to do tailoring? Chore?

Why not have a 1 time cost for those skills too? You get 1000 cloth, and click once and BAM you have 100 skill. No decay in skills either. Because thats a chore.


This. (ten characters)

[Jadzia]

Still you have some problems with this.

1) Every 400 people you will need a 10x10 zone area for them. 400 people isnt much.
2) You still have a resource grind, sure its a once time cost but according to you its "irritating" and a "chore" to get mats. So dont see how a 1 time is any diff than a upkeep other than once at a large amount or many times at a small.
3) You have a first come first server only type of totems. Whoever gets it first will always have it without fear of losing it.



If you think gathering mats is a chore, sounds to me like you dont want a sandbox game. Because if that's the case just doing anything will be a "chore". Want to do bonecrafting? Chore. Want to do tailoring? Chore?

Why not have a 1 time cost for those skills too? You get 1000 cloth, and click once and BAM you have 100 skill. No decay in skills either. Because thats a chore.

1. If he opens up the new zones the whole area will be bigger than that. And you count like everyone had the max amount of land...if it takes 2 years for a solo player to get I doubt that would be the case. Only the most dedicated long-term players would own that.

2. I didn't say gathering mats is a chore. I said upkeep is. When you own a land nothing forces you to expand it. If you don't want to gather mats for that you can just skip it. Upkeep is forced on you anyway. Plus if you do want to expand your land you can gather whenever you feel so...once in a month, daily, weekly, once in a year..as you like. Its not like you 'must' do it now, just like it is with upkeep. When you feel like hunting or fishing or just sitting beside the fireplace you still have to go out for gathering otherwise your totem starts to decay...you get the point. After a tiring day at work you log in just to have a little fun and chat with friends, to do whatever activities you like the most in game but you can't do that....you are forced to gather for upkeep. Personally I don't like when a game forces things on me. I'm here to relax, to have fun and not for another job.

If I WANT to do bonecrafting then its not a chore. If I'm forced to bonecraft when I don't feel like that then it IS a chore.
A sandbox game for me is about choice. I get to choose what I want to do and when I want to do it. Not the game forcing it on me, thats more of a themepark method.

3. So ? We have that anyway. As long as a player is active you can't get his spot, no matter if the measure of activity is based on upkeep or paid subscription.

[MrDDT]

1. If he opens up the new zones the whole area will be bigger than that. And you count like everyone had the max amount of land...if it takes 2 years for a solo player to get I doubt that would be the case. Only the most dedicated long-term players would own that.

2. I didn't say gathering mats is a chore. I said upkeep is. When you own a land nothing forces you to expand it. If you don't want to gather mats for that you can just skip it. Upkeep is forced on you anyway. Plus if you do want to expand your land you can gather whenever you feel so...once in a month, daily, weekly, once in a year..as you like. Its not like you 'must' do it now, just like it is with upkeep. When you feel like hunting or fishing or just sitting beside the fireplace you still have to go out for gathering otherwise your totem starts to decay...you get the point. After a tiring day at work you log in just to have a little fun and chat with friends, to do whatever activities you like the most in game but you can't do that....you are forced to gather for upkeep. Personally I don't like when a game forces things on me. I'm here to relax, to have fun and not for another job.

If I WANT to do bonecrafting then its not a chore. If I'm forced to bonecraft when I don't feel like that then it IS a chore.
A sandbox game for me is about choice. I get to choose what I want to do and when I want to do it. Not the game forcing it on me, thats more of a themepark method.

3. So ? We have that anyway. As long as a player is active you can't get his spot, no matter if the measure of activity is based on upkeep or paid subscription.


1) You would have to open up new zones every 400 people. I dont see that happening, and I dont even know if I would want that.
2) Upkeep = gathering. They are linked. (assuming you use that system which is what we are talking about) You are ok with something take 2 years to get but you are not ok with some upkeep? Ok to each's own. Sorry if I dont want to spend 2 years gathering resources for a totem just to have one. The Upkeep system doesnt have to about only 1 resource gathering. It can be many types of resources. Bones, rocks, scav'd items. Whatever. Plus you have trade. You are a master tailor? Trade others for totem resources for your tailored goods. No more "chores". Game doesnt "force" you to gather, with upkeep. It only says if you want X you must do Y. Its already doing this. You do this with training skills. You want to train skills, you must gather resources. You want to craft a basket? You must gather resources, train the skill, or trade for it.
The key to the upkeep is to allow it to have many different options. Which will allow people to also trade for them too. So if you are a bonecrafter you go out and get bones craft your stuff, trade it to others for the resources you use for upkeep.

3)You dont have that now. Right now people dont even need an active account to hold a totem, let alone play the game.

[China]

Ok. I took the time and searched for that famous 'promise' DDT keeps mentioning. Here it is:

link: http://www.xsyon.com/forum/showthread.php/2522-Official-Answers-by-week/page2

Effect on players that have been completely inactive for a long period of time (6 to 9 months for example) - This is already fulfilled. Most of the inactive players left more than 6 months ago.

All players will be informed of this before it is implemented - They will be informed before totem decay gets implemented. Its not a promise to get another 6 months of potential inactivity AFTER the warning email.

I hope this clears it up. Jordi hasn't promised another 6 months of inactivity time at all. Thankfully.

Good job Jadzia!!!

So much wasted time and breath on something that only existed in ddt's brain. Sigh

China

[MrDDT]

I knew there was more to it.

Good job Jadzia!!!

So much wasted time and breath on something that only existed in ddt's brain. Sigh

China



"2. How long is it going to take before the tribe is considered dead? We will solicit feedback from players before this is implemented, but my thought right now is about 6 months."


Which FYI is less than 6 months ago.
Dont you hate it when forums shows your right. Glad I read all the posts intead of what someone shows me once in a while.

[China]

I knew there was more to it.




"2. How long is it going to take before the tribe is considered dead? We will solicit feedback from players before this is implemented, but my thought right now is about 6 months."


Which FYI is less than 6 months ago.
Dont you hate it when forums shows your right. Glad I read all the posts intead of what someone shows me once in a while.


It was a thought. Not a promise as you have said over & over & over & over &.....Ad nauseam. If you acted upon all your miscellaneous thoughts, there would not be enough thorazine available in the world to delute them.

China

[Jadzia]

1) You would have to open up new zones every 400 people. I dont see that happening, and I dont even know if I would want that.
2) Upkeep = gathering. They are linked. (assuming you use that system which is what we are talking about) You are ok with something take 2 years to get but you are not ok with some upkeep? Ok to each's own. Sorry if I dont want to spend 2 years gathering resources for a totem just to have one. The Upkeep system doesnt have to about only 1 resource gathering. It can be many types of resources. Bones, rocks, scav'd items. Whatever. Plus you have trade. You are a master tailor? Trade others for totem resources for your tailored goods. No more "chores". Game doesnt "force" you to gather, with upkeep. It only says if you want X you must do Y. Its already doing this. You do this with training skills. You want to train skills, you must gather resources. You want to craft a basket? You must gather resources, train the skill, or trade for it.
The key to the upkeep is to allow it to have many different options. Which will allow people to also trade for them too. So if you are a bonecrafter you go out and get bones craft your stuff, trade it to others for the resources you use for upkeep.

3)You dont have that now. Right now people dont even need an active account to hold a totem, let alone play the game.

1. Again, you count it like everyone had the max size land. That won't happen.
2. You wouldn't have to gather for 2 years to just have a totem. It would be required to own the max size land. Rest of this point is only wordtwisting.
3. We are talking about possible future game methods, aren't we....so no matter which method Jordi chooses for measuring activity, we will always have a first come-first serve totem system. I don't see any problems with that. You were the first at that spot, so its yours.


We will solicit feedback from players before this is implemented, but my thought right now is about 6 months."
This is not a promise in any way, isn't it ? "My thought right now is about 6 months." Lol. I wouldn't base anything on that :) Not to mention that those tribes have been inactive for more than 6 months. And he wants to solicit player feedback...which he is getting right now. Literally everyone (even you) says that 6 months is way too much. Your only argument was that Jordi promised the 6 months AFTER the warning email. Well, he didn't.

[MrDDT]

1. Again, you count it like everyone had the max size land. That won't happen.
2. You wouldn't have to gather for 2 years to just have a totem. It would be required to own the max size land. Rest of this point is only wordtwisting.
3. We are talking about possible future game methods, aren't we....so no matter which method Jordi chooses for measuring activity, we will always have a first come-first serve totem system. I don't see any problems with that. You were the first at that spot, so its yours.


This is not a promise in any way, isn't it ? "My thought right now is about 6 months." Lol. I wouldn't base anything on that :) Not to mention that those tribes have been inactive for more than 6 months. And he wants to solicit player feedback...which he is getting right now. Literally everyone (even you) says that 6 months is way too much. Your only argument was that Jordi promised the 6 months AFTER the warning email. Well, he didn't.

1) Repeating.
2) Repeating again.
3) Your way of buy and forget, leaves no room to ever get it back unless they quit, without adding anything to the world. My way of upkeep. They would still have to be active members (not just sub'd but active in gathering or trading or crafting) to keep it.


Let me break it down for you.

Promise = "We will"
Thinking = "thought right now"

Read the "will" part then maybe you will understand where the promise is.

Added after 49 minutes:

Another quote just to nail the head into it.

" Are there any plans for totem decay in the future? I know it will need to be awhile (many people may come flooding back in after combat, etc). Just curious. Yes, but totems will take a while to decay. I think a minimum of 6 months, but this will be discussed with players before it's implemented. "

This one is vague not really saying a timeline.

"2- do you have an idea when we will be able to contest abandoned totems? There is no plan to have contested abandoned totems. (If they are abandoned, nobody will be around to defend them!). The plan is to set totems on a decay timer and if nobody from that tribe visits the totem within the time limit (likely a few months), the totem will be removed and all objects remaining will be up for grabs."

[Jadzia]

Read the "will" part then maybe you will understand where the promise is.
Ok. So: "We will solicit feedback from players before this is implemented"
Oh yeah, this is clearly a promise to give a warning email and AFTER THAT another 6 months of waiting time! No doubt, lol.

You know, it would have been much more elegant to say 'Ok, my memory tricked me, there was no promise'. The world don't fall apart if you lose a debate or it turns out you were wrong. But nevermind. I'm done arguing about it, everyone who can read can see what is the truth.

[MrDDT]

Its pretty clear.
First warning. Then decay. Glad your done, because its getting old saying the same thing. Posting links over and over again of what was said. Then debating what a promise is.

In any case. The OP is about removing 1 man totem without him losing his inactive. Clearly some bias there.

I see no reason why warning emails shouldnt be done right away.

[banden]

Busy weekend, but here come the replies Jadzia. :)


Since we are talking about a system where the size of the tribe area doesn't depend on the number of members, this is not an issue. The land belongs to them as long as there is 1 active (paid) subscription in the tribe.

Now thats where the problems start, because this will most certainly lead to terribly bloated tribelands, and the possibility of very few people controlling large areas, which is bad. Example time:

a tribe is established and immediately starts a recruiting frenzy, they get a lot of people and start to expand their territory, they start getting a lot of new land and for awhile things are great, but little by little people start leaving for whatever reason, this happens all the time in other MMOs and its fairly normal. In the end what we get is a homestead sized tribe controlling a very large area. There is nothing that regulates the size of this tribe so they just sit on it, keeping other people from using the land, the only thing they did to earn this land was recruiting a throng of noobs and encouraging them to expand, in the end this is only slightly better than how it is now but its not great.

Second example:

Tribe A wants to grief tribe B, so the tribeleader gets himself a second account. This account is then used to plant totems where Tribe B is trying to expand, the mats for the totems on the dummy account is traded over and the landgrab starts to take effect, tribe B is blocked from expanding as long as tribe A is paying the subscription fee, AND! The time it takes for the totems to decay after the account is cancelled, which was what? 3-4 months? Yeah, thats gonna get exploited to hell.

Land is not a priviledge, it must be earned and maintained!


Now that is a very very bad attitude toward a player who had to leave for some months but he is so dedicated to play the game that he keeps paying his sub fee even for his inactive months. This would make the company to lose a lot of money and would be insane imo.

Im a solo homestead player myself and I certainly wouldnt expect all my stuff to be just the way it were when I left it, but anyway if i had to go afk for 2 months then Id care precautions to make sure I didnt lose anything, that would be rather silly of me id think. We can again compared to Eve online, were it is really stupid to leave assets out in space for 2 months and expect that its still there, there is no need to coddle players, Im sure they are intelligent enough to ensure that they dont lose their shit if they go afk, just saying.


Yes...so we are back to a high and irritating upkeep, which makes the game a chore and no fun....

Again, land is not a priviledge, it should be earned and maintained. Besides, like I said in larger tribes its a team effort (solo or homestead tribes shouldnt be controlling large areas) infact the effort needed to maintain your land would be considerably less in large tribes if you do it right. Lets say thers one guy making sure that the totems are stocked, thats still just a few hours every week... for just one guy, maintaining an entire tribe!

Id be willing to accept your version Jadzia, if but ONLY if, at the same time totems can be attacked and destroyed. That would make it fair IMO. If someone else wants land that is not being defended they can attack the tribe and take it from them. The main thing is that totems can be destroyed and/or decay. I suppose you can call it a passive/active maintenance in the form of pvp defense.

[Jadzia]

Busy weekend, but here come the replies Jadzia. :)
Now thats where the problems start, because this will most certainly lead to terribly bloated tribelands, and the possibility of very few people controlling large areas, which is bad. Example time:

a tribe is established and immediately starts a recruiting frenzy, they get a lot of people and start to expand their territory, they start getting a lot of new land and for awhile things are great, but little by little people start leaving for whatever reason, this happens all the time in other MMOs and its fairly normal. In the end what we get is a homestead sized tribe controlling a very large area. There is nothing that regulates the size of this tribe so they just sit on it, keeping other people from using the land, the only thing they did to earn this land was recruiting a throng of noobs and encouraging them to expand, in the end this is only slightly better than how it is now but its not great.

This is a valid concern. I posted a suggestion a while back in another thread which I believe solves this problem, while don't force a boring and irritating upkeep on players. It at least gives options to choose from.

I copy it here.

Say a totem is upgraded to lvl 5, and at the moment of the upgrade it had 2 active members. As long as it has 2 active members they don't have to pay an upkeep. If one of the members become inactive the upkeep cost appears, accordingly to the totem level.

The owner has 3 options now:
- he keeps paying the upkeep
- he upgrades the totem alone, that way he proves that he can pay for it on his own so the upkeep disappears.
- he doesn't pay the upkeep because its too much for 1 player, so the totem downgrades automatically till the upkeep cost is accepted by the owner.

This way we avoid the annoyance of upkeep for active players, but it still helps to avoid huge lands claimed by inactive accounts.
And a tribe can keep their territory even if a member leaves, but they have to pay an upkeep. Or they can downgrade it if they don't want to pay.

[MrDDT]

Your option still has the problem of. Pay for 200m with 1 toon. You keep it forever, as long as 1 person is active they will have a 200m radius totem.
So still major issues with 200m areas being controlled by alt accounts.
So an 80 member 200m tribe that currently holds 200m Radius (125664 sq meters)
Would then be able to hold 200m x 80 (10053096 sq meters) which is about 30% of the current map.
All for a 1 time fee in game resource fee.

[Jadzia]

Your option still has the problem of. Pay for 200m with 1 toon. You keep it forever, as long as 1 person is active they will have a 200m radius totem.
So still major issues with 200m areas being controlled by alt accounts.
So an 80 member 200m tribe that currently holds 200m Radius (125664 sq meters)
Would then be able to hold 200m x 80 (10053096 sq meters) which is about 30% of the current map.
All for a 1 time fee in game resource fee.
Its not a problem if the one time fee is high enough (for a huge land, it should be cheap for a small one). And while I know you have many accounts, most of the players have 1...so I doubt a tribe would have alts for all of their members.

Alts can make problems with an upkeep system too anyway. If the upkeep is normal, and doesn't require a huge effort from a big tribe then they can easily afford to keep up more lands by solo alts. If the upkeep is so high that a tribe needs all their efforts to keep up their only totem then it totally kills the fun of the game.

Would it happen that a player upgrades his solo land to max with materials he got from friends (so he didn't work for it) ? Sure. But thats not a problem imo. Making good relationships is a big part of an MMO. My point is a level playing field for everyone, with the same options for every player, be it a member of a big tribe or a solo player. Both of them should be able to own the largest size of land, although it would be much harder for a solo player to get it. Still, he should have the option if he is willing to pay the price.

[MrDDT]

I think upkeep should be something like 10% to 15% of the tribe needs to pitch in each month.

I agree larger tribes should have to get more resources. Because of how the area system works. Per person you would still have to put in about 10 to 15% of your time to the tribe. I don't think its much to ask that you give 6 mins of a your 1 or so hours of the day of your play time to keeping your totem upkeep.

You say that people wont use alts? They already use alts. What makes you think they wont later? I dont know any game that doesnt use alts in this way. Which is why they tend to have an upkeep cost to keep the economy working, and people have to make a hard choice. Keep extra land we may not use while paying the upkeep. Or let it go, and save each month on upkeep.
Your system there is no choice, only one to have alt or not. Many people have alts.


My point is a level playing field for everyone, with the same options for every player, be it a member of a big tribe or a solo player. Both of them should be able to own the largest size of land, although it would be much harder for a solo player to get it. Still, he should have the option if he is willing to pay the price.

I couldnt agree more with this. Both systems allow for this, your system makes it so they would never lose it even if they were not active in game (but still have an active account), to allow others to use it. The other system helps econ, helps weed out in-actives. Heck I still have active UO account, tying up my land there. People used to hate it, it was one of the most upsetting things. They made it so instead of having 5 homes you could only have 1, not just 1 per server but 1 per account.

You can do it your way, and everyone knows what will happen. You have large tribes hording all the lands. They will just be split into many tribes. While homesteaders are left with choice, I can either make a small area that's left (because the resource costs are lower) or quit. They wont be able to get large lands because 2 reasons. 1) Large tribes have 80+ members getting them all, and 2) The resources are so hard to get it will take them months to get the land. (Or like you said years).

You would be worse off than you are now. Many more 200m totems and mostly in the hands of large tribes.

[Jadzia]

You know what, I just remembered that Jordi said totem decay will only effect inactive tribes. No decay ( and therefore no upkeep) for active tribes. So I guess all this brainstorming is kind of pointless.

[MrDDT]

You know what, I just remembered that Jordi said totem decay will only effect inactive tribes. No decay ( and therefore no upkeep) for active tribes. So I guess all this brainstorming is kind of pointless.

Not sure where you getting "No Decay" from, he says decay, and upkeep. (You must log in and visit your totem) is one of his ideas.
Visiting your totem is 1 form of upkeep.

I would like to see more than just visit your totem as I think it would be great to kick start the economy.

[Jadzia]

We will implement totem decay for abandoned homesteads and tribes in the future, but this will take into effect only for players that have been completely inactive for a long period of time (6 to 9 months for example).
I meant this. No decay, only in case of total inactivity.

[banden]

I hope he atleast skims through this post, there is a lot of constructive ideas here. I find that unless coupled with some kind of upkeep or a pvp mechanic to attack totems, 6 months will be a long time to have abandoned totems be disruptive.

[MrDDT]

I meant this. No decay, only in case of total inactivity.

I like the part where he will get player feedback on it before any of it is put in.


Banden, I dont expect PVP options to be put in for totems at all. Once contested totem areas are put in, then I expect that type of stuff. Would I want it? Yes. But I wouldnt expect it. So I try to keep it out of any ideas I have.

I think in the suggestions (where these topics are meant to be talked about) this thread here on totem decay/upkeep/options.
http://www.xsyon.com/forum/project.php?issueid=1230

You can see that clearly of the people reading it. (pretty good amount of people) They want something like that system.
I would like to see emails go out to all the old players, and see what that survey says. That as Jadzia has said before is one of the best ways to get the feedback that Xsyon has been saying he would get from players.

I strongly believe that the feedback from the emails will show more of same of what is already showing in the totem suggestion there.

[Mactavendish]

I too fully support emails and even a survey to find out the players views.

Then, I would expect him to implement what ever form of decay/upkeep that he feel they can actually pull off.

But I would strongly suggest they do something about any inactive totems that have been here longer than 6 months.

[Book]

You can see that clearly of the people reading it.


Just sayin'.

[MrDDT]

Just sayin'.

Which is why I want email poll like others have said also and Ive said before.

[Mactavendish]

Let us poll the active players to see what they think.

[MrDDT]

Let us poll the active players to see what they think.

Why not all the players that paid for the game?

I think active will still agree though, but I dont really see why only active and not email all the people like Xsyon said he would.

[Jadzia]

Why not all the players that paid for the game?

I think active will still agree though, but I dont really see why only active and not email all the people like Xsyon said he would.

That's an interesting question. The problem is, that inactive players have an opposite interest about totem decay. Since they don't play, they obviously want looong decay so their stuffs will stay as long as possible. They will regret this on the second day of their returning, and from that time they will demand a short decay time...but I really don't expect people to see through of their current interests.

[MrDDT]

That's an interesting question. The problem is, that inactive players have an opposite interest about totem decay. Since they don't play, they obviously want looong decay so their stuffs will stay as long as possible. They will regret this on the second day of their returning, and from that time they will demand a short decay time...but I really don't expect people to see through of their current interests.


Yes, but you can say that for the OP too. You can clearly see the bias there.

I expect most people to vote for their interests and what their opinions are. Which is why its a vote. I also believe that all paying players (not just ones playing) should have the right to vote.

[Jadzia]

Yes, but you can say that for the OP too. You can clearly see the bias there.

I expect most people to vote for their interests and what their opinions are. Which is why its a vote. I also believe that all paying players (not just ones playing) should have the right to vote.

Yes, but the game lives from the players who actually play and pay the subscription. Forming a game accordingly to the inactive players' interest and opinion is a very dangerous path imo.
Mac may be bias, but its because he has a valid problem...and all of us who play do. The one who don't play don't face with that, but they will when they start to play again.

[MrDDT]

Yes, but the game lives from the players who actually play and pay the subscription. Forming a game accordingly to the inactive players' interest and opinion is a very dangerous path imo.
Mac may be bias, but its because he has a valid problem...and all of us who play do. The one who don't play don't face with that, but they will when they start to play again.

The game lives from everyone that paid. Xsyon told the others long ago that he would email them with polls too.

Heck many people that play now only log in once in a while. Plus many people PLAYING now dont pay monthly. Dont blame others for not logging and paying because the systems are broken.

[Jadzia]

I'm not blaming anyone. What I'm trying to explain is that the inactive players may ask for long decay, but they will regret it when they return. So the actual playerbase (not only the current, the one in the future too) will always be very unhappy with the long decay, and it will only cater to the ones who don't play. So planning a feature which upsets the all-time active playerbase just to cater the ones who don't play is kinda silly imo.

Edit: its not like asking both the active and inactive players about other features, like if they want mounts or whatever. I'd love the whole playerbase (everyone who bought the game) to be asked about such things. Someone who doesn't play now can tell if he would enjoy such a feature in the future. The problem with long totem decay is that you only enjoy it when you are inactive, and at the moment you come back to the game it starts to irritate you.

[MrDDT]

Good point. I do agree with it.

[fatboy21007]

the New zones will be 4x the size of the current game map, So curren game map entire size then times it by 4, DDT youll need a good 2500-3k players to fill that with max totems, and If u think that will happend, then u got issues bud. personally if u make totems a chore, people quit, If people loose their tries radius due to the game not holding their interests but punishing their tribe leaders or those in the tribe still active, they will quit also because all of their hard work is pissed on. The only true solution to this is tribes and homesteads 100% inactive decay after 90 days. Thats fair in my book. They hell with this totem upkeep crap, we got work to do on everything else, This whole thread gives me a headache reading as it sounds like a 2nd n 3rd job. If 1 member of a 80 member tribe is active, then he gets leader ship, Then he can keep trying to recruit member to make his tribe active again. DDT you are new to the tribe leader world, I am not, been a leader since launch. No tribe and i dont give a rat ass wat stats ya got can hold 20 active for more then 2 months.

Always and i mean always ends with 1-10 actives. Its a never friggin ending task. So let us keep wat we spent since launch working up. I have been recruiting since launch, seen 50 join n 40 leave, it bounces up and down. Nothing no one can do about it. but punish us or create a new job of it, and we quit, then u get ur land and empty world. We earned wat we got. New zones will make even if are current pop got 100x bigger still seem barren and not see a soul in it. Yes itll be that big. So get off this whole upkeep crap, Jordi keep these pvpers their wars , then their is there upkeep . For me i earned my city, i built it, and i try to recruit and keep people around, cant help if they dont stay playing.

[MrDDT]

That size is a long ways off. Just so you know 3k people isnt a lot IMO if you have expanded the world that much.
There was easy 1/2 that many accounts at release.

Not sure where you getting 4x the size of the current game, because really its unlimited. They do plan on doubling the current size of the map soon.

With a resource system, current tribe leaders shouldnt lose any radius they would just need to feed it with resources. If they dont, then they should lose that area in my opinion. They have already kept a huge area with very very few active players. (Normally 1 to 5)

100x current pop would be over 5000 people. So not sure where you going with that.

[fatboy21007]

go read the fourms closely dude, He said the expanded zones will be x4 the current game map. Friggin huge. Now go spend 3 hours lookin through the fourm posts. If not, you have him on Skype go Ask. and so ur rite 5000, yes launch had 1k players, with in 1 month it was down to 200, we both know this game wont hold 5k mb 1500 at 1 point but Even you know jordi did not intend for a huge pop here. Again go ask him if ya dont beleave me. Also, too upkeep are large areas even with a active tribe is insane, u forget most people dont want a another job, so they will leave it on others too do. which then still ends up being 1-2 people doing it. Upkeep doesnt help any1 out cept add more jobs to peoples lives, atm that game has gotten alot more fun, people come home for work and now have fun things to do and enjoy them selves, we have a pop that stuck around since launc( not many, but still) loyal n still here. Add a job in here and people run off all over again. Leave the upkeep for waring totems. U want hardcore then put it on ur pvp totems and have at it. Sum of us are here for fun and to enjoy the game, we already work hard for wat we get, No since in killing are fun with a new job.

[MrDDT]

http://www.xsyon.com/forum/showthread.php/590-Xsyon-Updates-Archive?p=85988&viewfull=1#post85988

Sorry, its only about 50% larger than what we have not 100% larger. Not sure where you getting 400 zones from. He says in that link 50 new zones.

I can see this game holding thousands of people once they got the stuff going like archery, zombies, carts, contested totems, contested rare resources etc.

Well, I understand you are here for fun and not work. But a working economy is fun for many people. Having tribes with 200m radius with 1 person isnt something that will help the game at all, only hurt it. Leaving dead totems everywhere. If you are player that doesnt play a lot, you shouldnt hold a huge 200m radius totem. I dont see a problem with that. Have a small homestead that the resources are easy to gather and upkeep only a few mins.

I'm not sure what PVP and upkeeping your totem has to do with each other, but so far from what I understand warring totems will have no bonuses to being a warring totem. I dont really see that being a bonus to get anyone to play, let alone trying to say they have an upkeep to be a warring totem. Maybe the other way around, if you DONT want upkeep you become a warring totem.

Ive already explained how economy will be helped with adding totem upkeep. So you saying "Upkeep doesnt help any1 out more jobs to peoples lives" type of comment doesnt really mesh. Do you think it wont help the economy in game?

[Book]

I don't really know about this emailing thing... do people really want game design run by committee?

I mean, UI changes is one thing. Fundamental mechanics, I might rather leave that to the devs personally.

Feedback on tweaks sure, like there was for maintenance times. You don't email players to see if there should be or not be maint. times.

You take things into account when a segment of the population isn't satisfied but at the end of the day, we all bought the game from NG, not AcmePlayerDecidingClusterF Company.

[MrDDT]

I think he is getting more of a feel of what his fan base wants.

I agree overall most people make bad choices.

[banden]

Ok people have seriously got to stop with this "upkeep will be another job" arguement. It does not stick.

We allready craft huge volumes of items that are simply discarded, everyone who wants to progress beyond gathering professions has to do that. My idea works to create a sink for these items, it wont feel as bloody futile as it does now if those items can actually be used to fuel totems and it wont be ány different than it is now, anyone who is not capped out in every craft still make items that are ultimately just trash.

Last answers of the week, I asked if there were current any plans to make use of these items and they said "no, we had an idea but our database couldnt handle it". So how about this? Its 2 annoying flies with 1 swat.

It might be an idea if we post a comprehensive description of each our revised totem decay/upkeep ideas and then if Dezgard isent completly set on a solution he can gather inspiration from those suggestions. There is a lot of good wholesome brainstorming in this, for my part I would most of all just like there to be a system that is fair to everyone.

[Deacon]

Well, I certainly hope the 18 people left in my former tribe are notified...they're waiting for more of the promised features mentioned on xsyon site. They sit patiently in the wings, playing other games, until this one will meet their needs. They made the initial investment in faith only to be dissappointed, dont punish them for having high hope at the start. If they fail to come back after notification and set period of time, then yes, they probably wont be back and move on. Farming crops, animal raising and cooking were a few of their biggest wishes. Trees wont fill the bill for planting. Let's hope trees were just the start. This game is improving greatly, lets not start a bash fest on MMO sites because they felt cheated and then discarded. Give them a fair chance to come back and enjoy it.

[Mactavendish]

I am not sure I can agree with your perspective Deacon. The Psychology is all wrong.

Yes they had high hopes, but many expressed disappointment ( some extreme disappointment ) about what the game was even at that time. Perhaps it was lacking features, but the forums were abuzz with what was going on and how some things were not in and would take time. If they didn't understand that cooking/animal husbandry/farming was not in the game, then they had some how not read the forums or had an inflated hope.

We have seen similar things happen in many MMO's. None of this is new. People join a game, it's not what they expect, the don't like it or don't have fun, and they move on. To claim they are patiently waiting for content is more you wishing and less what they feel. UNLESS, you have personally spoken to each one and know for a fact they will return. Even then, they won't be back anytime soon, since they don't even talk about cooking or taming animals, and farming won't be in any time soon, since they have many other things in front of it on their list.

To me. many folks joined here without really researching the game. They just listened to a friend hype it up and were told things never stated on the webpage. They were told this game would be in a constant state of change, and that some features may not even make it in. So who exactly is punishing them? Was't it their own mistake?

Caveat Emptor Or "Let the Buyer Beware" applies here. It is well known in the marketing world that most people don't research anything. Jordi did NOT take that tactic at all! He openly told people what to expect, they just didn't pay any attention.

I would love to see those guys come back and have a great time here. But from a psychological standpoint I truly believe that ship has sailed.

If in a couple years they do come back, that is great... but to allow them to have a totem all that time is simply not fair to new players joining the game only to find that the best spots are taken by someone that has not set foot in game in 3 years. Don't these new players that also bought the game account deserve to have the same chances your buddies had at the start?

So, send emails out when totem decay is about to start, give them all a chance to re-sub, and if they don't, let it go.. they don't want to come back so please stop defending people that have already made their choices.


From the Features page ...

"Xsyon is an ever-changing world, the features of Xsyon are constantly being added, revised, removed, combined and balanced based on player reactions and feedback. Xsyon is not intended as a final and complete product, but as a living and changing world that evolves over time"

The next line says "planned features" ... Planned. NOT promised. The previous paragraph cancels the idea of any promises.

[VeryWiiTee]

I don't get why you're still on with this issue.. 14 pages long and neither have understood each other.. It's just really an impressive display of human retardation.

To get to the point.
I'll agree with Mact, inactive totems should get a warning and then a boot. I'm sorry, but EVERY OTHER GAME with some sort of housing feature has decay. If you do not pay upkeep your house disappears. Look at Aion's new housing system (except standard houses are just bought.), look at Vanguard.. I mean it's not something new that if you don't pay to play, you can't do your upkeep and if you can't do your upkeep your house disappears. Why on EARTH should it be different in Xsyon..? You can't pay to play? Then you can't do your upkeep. If you can't do your upkeep your totem disappears. There's nothing wrong with that. They didn't pay. They made the choice themselves by not paying.

To combat the whiny retards that doesn't like to lose all the precious shit they've gathered. They can get it back by visiting an escrow something feature (whatever do I care how it's made just as long as it is made.)
.. You don't like losing terrain. Don't get your own tribe. I you asked me any tribe disbanding their area should make the area slowly turn back into the original. :).

That Xsyon should warn before introducing a decay system seeing we have not had one up to now is another deal.

[Deacon]

NVM.....guess we're just jawing over nothin until we actually know what the devs intend, and we should ask the questions in developer zone, as I dont think they even read these sections.

[MrDDT]

"Xsyon is an ever-changing world, the features of Xsyon are constantly being added, revised, removed, combined and balanced based on player reactions and feedback. Xsyon is not intended as a final and complete product, but as a living and changing world that evolves over time"

The next line says "planned features" ... Planned. NOT promised. The previous paragraph cancels the idea of any promises.


You know the features page has changed right?

[Mactavendish]

Of course.

But I never saw the word promise back then either

[znaiika]

Would be nice to expend tribe directional not in radius, that way if someone else is on the way you won't have a problem to expand it, either to your right, left or whatever direction you choose.