Newbie Character Count

[Lorgan]

I've recently convinced a friend to start playing the game and from his reaction it seems that what is bothering to new nobles the most is the slow pace. This is something I personally don't have much of an issue with since I play 4 characters of which two are deeply involved in their realms and two I play semi-actively. Of course it does take some time to establish your characters and get truly involved but then still a new player who can play only 2 nobles is going to quit because of boredom faster than one who can play 4 characters immediately, I would think.
Now, it can take a long time for a new player to get a little busier.

So what I'm saying is that in terms of player retention and making the game attractive not only to seasoned gamers like the DF community but also to new players who aren't familiar with this sort of game, it'd be better to give them as much to do/follow/get involved in as soon as possible. Which could be easily accomplished by allowing everyone to play 4 characters from the start.

Especially since there's not many games out there that are as slow paced as battlemaster and it takes some time getting used to for most people.

[Gustav Kuriga]

I fully support this.

[Zakilevo]

+2

Yeah. 2 or 3 nobles won't get people interested. They can get unlucky and be placed in two inactive realms in a row. There are people who do not want to reveal their personal information and even they should get at least three.

[Azerax]

You can play a turn in 15 minutes if you take your time.  Encourage them to read their realm forums and the help forums.  If they are new to this type of game then they are probably not role players, so even a couple active nobles won't peak their interest.

What keeps me to this game is the fact that I can do my turn in 5 minutes if I have to.  This is also a game where your wit and scheming can do wondrous things.  This is not a game for the impatient.

Have your friend make an adventurer - that will spice things up a bit.

Also, have your friend post some public messages asking what they should be doing - there are some large wars happening now.

I don't think that speeding up the pace of the game is going to solve anything - let's just help get him more involved.

Best regards,

[Norrel]

Most realms are awful. When I started, I was lucky in that one of my starting characters was in a good place. Most people, I'm afraid, are not so lucky. Giving them more characters means they get a better spread and a better chance of striking gold.

[Bael]

The reason that I continued playing right in the beginning, when I was almost turned off by the poor graphics and slow pace, was because I got what I thought of as a good gold income (about 60 gold) and an opportunity to increase it by increasing the size of my estate. Otherwise I might have chucked the whole thing. Especially when my friend who recommended it and was starting to play again bailed after about 3 days lol.

I actually only created my third character after about 2 weeks, because I wanted to learn more about the game before committing too many characters. It is a steep learning curve - will have more characters make it harder or easier? I'm inclined to say harder, perhaps.

[Penchant]

 We have some new people joining Carelia, but there is no room for them as in, no estates for them to take. I suggest there to be a message thats warns them about joining a duchy without estates will be much less fun or someway for realms or duchies to say they don't have room for more players. (You join the realm, but IIRC when you make a new noble its the duchy you choose to join.)

[Gustav Kuriga]

The reason that I continued playing right in the beginning, when I was almost turned off by the poor graphics and slow pace, was because I got what I thought of as a good gold income (about 60 gold) and an opportunity to increase it by increasing the size of my estate. Otherwise I might have chucked the whole thing. Especially when my friend who recommended it and was starting to play again bailed after about 3 days lol.

I actually only created my third character after about 2 weeks, because I wanted to learn more about the game before committing too many characters. It is a steep learning curve - will have more characters make it harder or easier? I'm inclined to say harder, perhaps.

I'd say it makes it easier, but we should be talking to an actual new player, because so much has changed and we've only had to take it a bit at a time, lessening the learning experience some. I say easier, because more characters gives you more situations, more people to talk to, and thus more people to possibly help you.

[Tom]

The problem is not of character count. The problem is how welcoming or not the game is.

With the new message system, we will introduce a new global channel to help newbies out. That, for one, should be a big help.

[Forbes Family]

I would fully support a way for realms to advertise their capacity for new nobles. Carelia may not have estates but Strombran has some available and we are looking for new nobles.  The thing is I don't think that new players have any way of knowing this.

[Peri]

The problem is not of character count. The problem is how welcoming or not the game is.

With the new message system, we will introduce a new global channel to help newbies out. That, for one, should be a big help.

I believe the issue Lorgan raised is more about involvement rather than the learning curve. That is, unless a newcomer is quite lucky it is true that a brand new character will hardly be involved in any of the (likely) several layers of realm activity, since it is not that common to have realm-wide interesting discussion ongoing.

Regardless of how well the newcomer understands the game, if he/she is eager to experience it having only two characters living at the bottom of the feudal hierarchy will likely give him very little news to play with, and might push him to quit thinking "this game is boring". Yes, the pace is declaredly slow, and one can argue that while a newbie is busy figuring out how the game works he might not need that many inputs, but we all know how important is the first impression of a game.

In the end this has much more to do with how a realm is structured and how much the older characters living there try their best to retain newcomers than with game mechanics, but it proved -at least for me- to be quite difficult to motivate newcomers sometimes.

[Cren]

This is a problem with newcomers. If they join a pretty inactive realm, they get bored soon and quit the game altogether. They need to get to know that many realms are out there where situations are different (said something similar to a newbie on BM fb group).

[Cren]

Also 4 or 2, it doesn't matter much. What if one has really bad luck and all 4 fall in inactive realms, hmmm?

[Gustav Kuriga]

Also 4 or 2, it doesn't matter much. What if one has really bad luck and all 4 fall in inactive realms, hmmm?

That's less likely with 4 than 2. Simple statistics there.

[De-Legro]

It is also not just about "inactive" realms. Some very active realms have a great deal of their activity in the higher parts of the game. If you aren't part of the right message groups etc you aren't going to be part of it. This is the problem much of the "involvement" in realms can be for solely for established characters in the realm. We need to ensure there is something interesting for new players to do in realm regardless of what the realm is currently up to.