Where are the Sages?

[Medron Pryde]

I run an adventurer and have lately seen an appalling lack of sages or wizards.

I've been moving around, looking for them, for weeks.  One (ONE) will show up every once in a while and instantly be gone again by the time my character arrives to talk to them.

This is making it impossible to even repair existing items as the sages are never there to talk to.

Can we please get more of these individuals spawning for the player to use?  At least the sages so we can keep the unique items working.  If this trend is not reversed soon, we are going to start losing one item after another in the packs of adventurers who are competing over who can click first at turn change to get to the one sage that shows up.

[Anaris]

It's a fine balance to strike. For a while, we've had too many running around, making it way too easy to make unique items (and especially too easy to make scrolls, with Wizards). We've been trying to reduce it, so that they're still something adventurers have to look for. It's possible we've gone a bit too far, and need to turn it back up a little.

Which island(s) have you been noticing this on? We can adjust them per-island, and we can also check to see if you've just been getting very unlucky.

[PolarRaven]

Probably too much work, but it would be nice if sages and/or wizards could operate independent of turn change.
It becomes a "click race" at turn change.  Maybe moving every X amount of hours, or X amount of hours after "used up" by advies.

The ady game is mostly independent of turn change as the hours accumulate all the time and actions are immediate, but any ady looking for sages must play a "turn" based game.

[Vita`]

Probably too much work, but it would be nice if sages and/or wizards could operate independent of turn change.
It becomes a "click race" at turn change.  Maybe moving every X amount of hours, or X amount of hours after "used up" by advies.

I think this is doable.

[PolarRaven]

Ok.  if this may be doable, I will transfer this threat to the feature request forum.

[Medron Pryde]

I play adventurer on Beluaterra.

It used to be that on each turn change I could hear rumors of four or six sages and wizards at each turn.

I understand if that's a bit much, especially the wizards.

Now I never hear about them in central Beluaterra anymore.  The only place I can find them is if I go to the northwest part of BT and then I'm lucky if I hear of one sage and maybe one wizard once every day or two.  And by the time I get to those regions, they are done of the adventurers and leaving.

I've had a unique item on my character for probably close to a month now and gotten ONE repair session on it which kept it from dying but isn't enough to get it back up.  And another noble is looking for adventurers to repair his item as well.  I had to tell him that I don't even know if I can repair the one I have.

I totally understand the idea of making them less common, but we have a certain number of unique items built up over time and it would be a real shame to lose them because the sages to repair them have simply been removed from the game.  If you're going to do that, I would suggest taking the wear and tear off the unique items and make the sages even more rare, but have them able to make new items IF they appear.

As it is, I've been wasting my time, doing nothing but waiting for turn changes so I would have full hours and no fatigue so I would have a chance of getting to a sage and talk to him before he leaves.  And being beaten day after day by other players who get on at turn change.  Which goes against the idea of BM as being a game you can log in at any time and play.  Right now, if you have an item needing repairs, it's all about the turn change, and if you can't log in at the turn change, you are going to lose the game.  And the item another player trusted you to get fixed.

If you want to keep them this rare, maybe make them not leave after doing two things.  Let more adventurers talk to them when they show up.  Seeing them always being gone by the time I arrive is getting discouraging.

And the fact that they never seem to show up at all in central BT means I have to travel to the NW to even get rumors of them to begin with.  We either need more of them showing up again or we need them to not walk away and pack up within minutes of the turn change.

The current setup is simply unsustainable for the population of unique items that we have on the continent.

[Anaris]

Now I never hear about them in central Beluaterra anymore.  The only place I can find them is if I go to the northwest part of BT and then I'm lucky if I hear of one sage and maybe one wizard once every day or two.  And by the time I get to those regions, they are done of the adventurers and leaving.

From the information I have right now, it looks like there is one sage in what I would consider central BT, one in west-central, and one in northeast-central. The others are all coastal at the moment.

If you want to keep them this rare, maybe make them not leave after doing two things.  Let more adventurers talk to them when they show up.  Seeing them always being gone by the time I arrive is getting discouraging.

From what you've been saying, I think this may be the best way to change things, if we find that a change is really needed (and it's not, again, just that you've been horribly unlucky recently).

The current setup is simply unsustainable for the population of unique items that we have on the continent.

Well, I think it's reasonable to question whether we should be trying to maintain the existing unique items, or making more of a chance for them to cycle through, and let some new people get items, rather than the old folks who are already there hoarding them all.