Templating.

IMO, templating, which requires an in depth knowledge of the game in addition to a basic understanding of mathematics seems like a fairly insurmountable obstacle to new players. Plus once they figure out their temp they have to get the items, and in any decent temp you're looking at at least one item that costs 50+ plat. The fact that any single item in the game costs more than 10 plat is ridiculous.

Anyway, that's my opinion. What do you guys think are the main challenges facing new players? With all these changes being made to help the noobs, clearly it's something on mythics mind.

 

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Money is what I'd say.


Templating being a huge issue that cooresponds with this. There is no real easy way to make money if you are new, or even returning, unless you buy it. You can't get the stuff everyone wants and would warrents a hefty price, like ML10 items, without buying the MLs. Artis and dragon scales being only more. Thus you are forced into a rigorous and unforgiving system that promotes mindless farming and grinding....just so you can actually enjoy the game even though you already did the leg work to hit 50.


Farming effectively to the point someone can actually enjoy the game in a relative time after hitting level 50 is hard, especially if you don't have a farmer and/or a bot.


Players should not have to make a farming character first, just so they can farm, farm, farm, farm, farm to make money. Then, make the character they want to play, level them up, buy all their crap once 50 only to still be squashed by high RR players.


Mythic needs a way for the casual player to catch up with the established player. I know about 30 people right now who refuse to give into this system and merely spend RL money for in-game money. (for the record I don't condone buying gold but I'd be lieing if I said, with this game, I haven't thought about it. I can definitely understand why someone would buy plat)


Even then they are spending 50-75 dollars just to template out 1 character. Hell, just think. If Mythic charged 20 bucks for a full template or something, following the f2p model to a degree, they'd make bank. I'd pay 20 bucks if it meant it was going to Mythic and I didn't have to deal with the money grind that is DAoC. They won't do this though and it is beyond me as to why not. That's Mythic though :\

 

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That's an interesting idea, I hadn't thought about that. Personally I'm against micro-transactions in general, but that's still a valid solution by all means.

I think an easier way would just be to beef up the crafting system again. Add a couple extra sc slots, raise the OC cap, make it so you can craft ToA bonuses (more than just the 5th slot bonuses), and improve the quality and variety of alchemy procs/charges/reactives etc. DAoC has an incredibly in depth and customizable crafting system and it's a real shame that they're not making full use of what they have.

My 2c anyway.

 

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people would still have to farm at least 20ish plat for that. For a new player, that isn't easy. Especially when MLs and Artis are concerned.


I am never opposed to beefing up the crafting system though so that would be rather nice.


Don't worry though, instead of this important issue being addressed we'll just see baseline hib stun removed and switched to root. Woot?

 

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I think there's a lot of things, and templating certainly plays into it. The main thing in my eyes, is this game is remarkably complex. There are too many timers, /uses, and ML abilities. For those of us used to it, it's not as big of a deal, but for people who started off with something like WoW where any idiot can be successful, it's overwhelming...and I personally do not think that it adds to the game experience in most cases, but whatever.

Furthermore, there are too many classes, and many of them just are not wanted. Sure it's cool...until you have one of those classes that you thought looked cool, but nobody wants in group because there's a perception that it sucks. Last week, for example, I was crafting in Camelot, and someone asked about staff friar specs. About three people told the guy spec rejuv if he wanted to get a group. He said that he liked the staff styles though, and he was told that without charge, det, and sto, AND having lower melee damage, there was no reason for a group to take him over a merc. He was told that if he wanted to stay staff, he'd better get used to soloing.

That's gotta be a huge turnoff for new people. They cant get a group leveling up because the vets all PL things or level themselves. So he works his ass off to get to 50, to only get told "your class sucks, respec heal bot or GTFO"? Why would someone stick around?

I know the "good" player will disagree with this, call me bad, and suggest that Hello Kitty Online might be more my cup of tea, but there won't be new people coming in until the game play is dumbed down considerably. Remember, your average person is pretty dumb, so a game as complex as DAoC has grown is not going to appeal to your average gamer, and is not going to be easy for them to pick up.

 

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No player community & lack of both PvE and RvR content compounded with difficult/archaic interfaces, longstanding bugs and other quirks and an endless supply of games coming out with a more believable sales pitch.

Stage 1 PvE: is pointless gold farming/power leveling.
Honestly what is the point of mob levels? It's not like killing the level 5 mobs is any different than killing the level 50 mobs. The only encounters with any meaningful AI seem to be "Epic" encounters and have absolutely nothing to do with levels/leveling.

Stage 2 RvR: is pointless RP farming.
Speaking of templates.. you see more "solo" templates posted than anything else anymore it seems like. When was the last time you saw a "guild" or heaven forbid an "alliance" that had a meaningful MO that impacted the global RvR scene? There are more people who belong to <10 person guilds than there are doing anything else because there is no benefit to joining a bigger one. It's too bad there's no exclusive content for guilds/alliances.

This game needs both and needs them both to work in a synergistic way.

 

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I agree that crafting should be improved to be more than a filler for the last 2-3 armor slots. However, 20p is not hard to make if that's all it took to finish a template.

I would NOT want to be a new player to this game, however, with some previous MMO knowledge and a helpful guild that knows the game the learning curve isn't near as bad.

I always LOL when people that have played for years are clueless to some of the mechanics, etc. of the game.

 

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Stage 1: Pretty much spot on here. Though, I imagine some people enjoy killing mobs, etc.

Stage 2: There should be more benefits to being in a guild.

Lot of solo templates maybe but not many solo's...

 

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should just give players who hit 50 a set of free gear that is important to your class that puts you at 75/75 and all resists capped. No ToA bonuses or anything though. Would allow peeps to get into the action. Bunch of other limitations with this gear also, like maybe slightly less AF, idk, just throwing out ideas.


or maybe have a built feature that gives sample templates and an item list of what to get that covers the minimums a player requires... ie. a list of all the armor/jewels that will get you good stats, resists, and toas.

 

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Maybe we could improve the epic sets again? Also add a new quest line for a set of jewelry that goes with it. Doesn't need to be too fancy, just so the necessities of each class are met and they're not running around with 10 heat resist. I like your idea of capping stats without any ToA bonuses. Throw in the procs on the epic sets and that'd be a decent set for a new player to mess with.

That doesn't fix the issue of how difficult or time consuming it is to get certain items, though. How do we feel about just letting everything (meaning including ML10 loot and other valuable jewelry) be bought with BP or other currencies? Maybe put a RR requirement on being able to purchase the best stuff or something?