This thread is now literally 20 pages long... wow.
If we took all the effort to write this an instead lent it to writing in-game letters and roleplays, maybe losing players wouldn't be that much of a problem. Granted I only have a character on one continent impacted by the catastrophes (Dwilight), but he nonetheless lost his city and duchy. But as a player, I loved watching the chaos of the Occidental D'Harans migrating, the Asylonian and Barcan exoduses, and the whimper of Niselur's demise. God it can be fun to watch something fall apart, right?
When there is a fall, there is a great potential for new things. Don't get hung up on what was lost OOCly - though I can totally understand it from an IC perspective! I just hate to see a lot of good players wasting their writing skills on Forummaster and not pressing for their characters' interests in Battlemaster itself.
This.
I think the Ice is - or at least is potentially - the best thing to happen to the game.
Too many people settled into long-term roles. Too many people settled into long-term plans,
with the need to then control everything and everyone around them to make sure their investment pays out. Too many ruts in the game.
You are not here to plan out the rest of your characters' lives and then try to maximize your plan. You are here to role play. Learn how to deal with things that come to you.
I think the devs ought to start making random catastrophes, famines, monster invasions, floods, volcano eruptions, etc & so on, a regular part of the game until players take that to heart.
I think the players are all leaving because the game is too static, and the players all sink into lethargy and stop caring enough to keep logging in.
