Closing Continents

[Antonine]

There's been talk about this already but this is just a plea for all continents but one to be closed for the time being even if that means everyone having to pick one character to move to East Continent.

With only 500 or less players, and even fewer active ones, I find myself autopausing disturbingly regularly just because there's no enjoyment to be had in the game unless you're at the top or have time to roleplay (which I don't) largely because, with the exception of a few realms, everything seems to have gone quiet.

We're now seeing problems like not being able to gather together enough mobile CS to siege a city due to low player density and attempts to compensate for that kind of problem just end up ignoring the root cause.

So please, please can everyone just be moved onto one continent where the upheaval of all the new arrivals will be enough to keep things active and interesting until geography changes or whatever can be worked out.

That's my request anyway 

[Dante Silverfire]

I feel like the game is stuck in the awkward position of certain realms on different continents being the only reason some players stay around. That allows the other continents to have more characters than they otherwise would have. If you get rid of all but one continent you might make the problem worse. So much of the game involves history. Get rid of the history and you lose so much.

The ideal solution to me is to have some sort of system which naturally has an emergent wild lands. Either as a single continent or on every continent, have the size of the playing area naturally grow or contract based upon player density. This could be implemented with larger rogue spawns or some such along the edges of the map forcing everyone towards the middle until an equilibrium of player density is able to both defend the monsters and still have functional realms. As player strength grows they can reclaim lands. As player strength wanes, the lands are reclaimed by rogues.

The biggest issue is that the current continents aren't designed for this sort of system. In fact, it's not even necessarily a system which is best implemented with continents but more of a Pangaea type environment. Where the total possible land area might be the size of All of the current continents but the starting area only 1/4th the size of a current continent.

For reference: I'm referring to something similar to early stage Dwilight but instead of having realms separated by geography, everyone would start clumped together.

[Vita`]

Well....

We devs have been in discussion and as I've mentioned to some players already, some bigger changes are coming between now and the end of the year. However, not everything is quite able to be announced as limited volunteer time means being careful about what we commit to.

But I can share that we do intend to adjust Dwilight's monsters to be more based upon noble to region density. And for character limits to be changed. And for large realm penalties to be improved and additional ones added. Relevant announcements in more detail for these and others will be forthcoming at the appropriate times, but this should whet your appetite for now. There are still some server move issues we must handle first.

We'd love to have a more dynamic region count like you describe, but a) it would essentially require closing or reworking all current continents, and b) everyone on the frontier of that sole continent would have to bear in mind that they would be in constant danger of being overwhelmed if the density drops, while those in the core would be insulated, creating a potentially serious balance issue with only one continent available to the player. Not the best player experience, especially for the additional work input.

[Zakilevo]

At this point I do not think it is wise to penalize large realms. Large realms are actually worth playing now that small realms are too small to function.

[GundamMerc]

At this point I do not think it is wise to penalize large realms. Large realms are actually worth playing now that small realms are too small to function.

Dwilight would like to disagree with your notion.

Also, I would highly disagree with moving to East Continent, that's hardly the best continent for the number of people it'd be holding. Dwilight would probably be a better one if the western side were returned.

[Dante Silverfire]

Well....

We devs have been in discussion and as I've mentioned to some players already, some bigger changes are coming between now and the end of the year. However, not everything is quite able to be announced as limited volunteer time means being careful about what we commit to.

But I can share that we do intend to adjust Dwilight's monsters to be more based upon noble to region density. And for character limits to be changed. And for large realm penalties to be improved and additional ones added. Relevant announcements in more detail for these and others will be forthcoming at the appropriate times, but this should whet your appetite for now. There are still some server move issues we must handle first.

We'd love to have a more dynamic region count like you describe, but a) it would essentially require closing or reworking all current continents, and b) everyone on the frontier of that sole continent would have to bear in mind that they would be in constant danger of being overwhelmed if the density drops, while those in the core would be insulated, creating a potentially serious balance issue with only one continent available to the player. Not the best player experience, especially for the additional work input.

Two things:

1. Why is just Dwilights monsters the only one being reworked? Shouldn't all continents have a similar change if it promotes value on at least one of the continents?
2. I don't think that the frontier issue is necessarily a bad thing. Everyone starts on the frontier, and then secured their borders as core regions. The incentive for pushing the frontier would simply be that new nobles come along and might want to forge a new destiny. Starting new realms along the frontier promote opportunity with difficulty. Also, I wouldn't propose that it only effects the frontier regions. The idea would be to balance it out by making sure that core regions have chances for instability. If a region has no lord for more than a week, chances of rogues showing up and the region going rogue would rise significantly. So you couldn't have non-dense central realms holding more regions than they should. It would definitely be a different style of game than we currently are used to,but it might be necessary to adapt. Finally, it doesn't have to be restricted as the only continent. It was just one idea amongst many. I do think all continents could benefit from such dynamic region count controls though. If applied to current continents, you'd naturally have size reduction as so many realms hold way more regions than they even properly have staffed with lords.

[Indirik]

The entire population of AT and BT could be absorbed into EC with no problems. EC alone used to hold over 1000 characters. It might be a little crowded, but that's a good thing.

And I agree that choosing islands is needed now.

[Zakilevo]

BT and FEI should go first.

[Antonine]

I like BT and I like FEI. My characters have huge history on both. But I agree, they should go first. Amongst other things, consider what a difference it would make if EC suddenly had to deal with a group of nobles determined on founding New Arcaea, a group of Sartanians trying to revive the Church of Ibladesh, Thalmarkinians running amok, etc. Yes losing history would be a wrench but I think that most players would rather play a fun game where their history can be used as an excuse for conflict in their new home than a stale game where there's lots of history to remember but not much going on.

[Zakilevo]

Proably should sink AT as well. I don't know why that continent is still up when it has been stagnant for years.

[Dante Silverfire]

I do think one of the central problems is that there seems to be some sort of denial that if we just adjust some things or create mechanics that influence denser realms that the game will magically fix itself.

It's been on a slow decline for a long time. The game as currently designed is suited for a noble base 3-5x as large on each continent. There is no easy fix to that. Closing continents or freezing all continents and starting a new continent based on a current map are solutions which need to be on the table.

It might not be the ideal solution or what we like, but things just keep getting worse as time goes on (in terms of active characters)

[Zakilevo]

I think the best solution for solving BM's fundamental problem is applying character death through battles and age to everyone.

[Dante Silverfire]

I think the best solution for solving BM's fundamental problem is applying character death through battles and age to everyone.

That would certainly help. At least it'd be one valuable aspect of a solution.

[Anaris]

Aging is a counterproductive mechanic. Any halfway realistic implementation penalizes activity, and incentivizes old characters to sit at home and do nothing.

This is true whether or not there is death from old age.

What would be more helpful would be a mechanic that incentivizes activity, and penalizes sitting at home doing nothing...but without actually penalizing players who are not active enough to play very frequently/heavily.

[Zakilevo]

Letting people leave forever won't help with any changes. When a ruler character dies, it brings many changes. If you give more options to allow characters to be killed, it will probably give more reasons for people to go to war or write RPs about as there will actually be something to write about instead of writing some random thing that pops in your head. Anyway this argument has appeared numerous times so I won't bother repeating it.

It is hard to implement a mechanic that incentivizes activity while not penalizing inactivity. Providing any kind of incentive makes less active players worse off compare to active players and that is completely acceptable since if you are putting less hours into something, you won't get as much done as someone who puts a lot more hours.

Activity alone is not going to solve the problem. People will lose interest in the game over time no matter how well you make the game. That is why you need to bring new people to the game instead of trying to keep those you have forever. Even those who stuck by the game since the beginning are leaving.

Sure getting rid of few islands will help the game live a bit longer but I am not sure we can truly solve the player decline in anyway at this point.