What's next?

[kyra]

Weapons changes. I am very excited about this and I think that is a much needed change. Outside of Lblades, axes, daggers, staves, and spears there isn't currently any reason to practice any of the other weapon classes unless you have one of the uniques. Mendable flails/lances?!?!

Imm-Driven Events. Are always a blast and one of my favorite things about this game. Some of my most memorable moments have come from imm-events and I would love to see them become a regular (bi-weekly/monthly) addition to the game.

Zone Changes. I am less fond of. Yes the world is quite large given the current playerbase, but unless you constrict the map down a massive amount you won't meaningfully impact the amount of cross-side encounters, on the contrary I would think that you'd make it worse by driving more players away. You have two main types of players, the PKers and the Smobbers/RPers. PKers don't really have much issue finding each other particularly with the implementation of the scouts in places such as gap and edmond's field, it is trivially easy to let people know that you're looking for a fight. As for the Smobbers, yeah, there is a bit too much peace of mind at the moment given the size of the map and the relative infrequency of deep-world DS/SS incursions, but I don't think that will be solved much unless we find some way to increase the playerbase.

New Players. Pretty much the only answer to much of the games problems in the long-term. Many of the proposed changes will do a world of good in retaining existing players and even bringing back some old-time players. But without finding a way of bringing in new players, be it through advertising or some other method, I doubt any changes at all will have a significant enough impact to delay the inevitable.

[isabel]

Lol @ Xylan

All of this sounds really exciting - I feel there have already been some really good changes, and this definitely looks fantastic. I also didn't think I'd want to come/stay - but the changes/attitude from the Imms has been just really warm and player-friendly and awesome.

Keeping fingers crossed for old Tower :p I know some imms would have put in tons of work to make the new one - but I really liked the simplicity of the old one.

[alima]

I agree with the sentiments about removing zones. I guess I'd rather see methods implemented for faster travel, more ways to initiate pk, etc, than to see zones disappear. There are a lot of interesting things around the mud and there are people who love exploring and smobbing and all those sorts of things.

[ecthus]

Let's judge the zone changes as they come.

Someone putting work into a zone is less important to me than whether it's a good addition to the mud. And there was a period in zone changes that were much more about adding connections willy-nilly than making interesting places to go to and explore, or fun places to PK.

One of the great benefits of cutting zones is there can be more attention to individualizing zones, making each of them feel unique, and making sure there's a reason to visit each of them. For instance, think of the "new" northern zones--deranged ogier and Korvak zones, and everything north west of Stronghold. These are all miserable zones full of aggros, visited as briefly as possible and for one particular reason (kill x mob), and mostly gone to in order to end PK rather than continue it. They're not distinct, they offer no strategy, they're not good for exp, and deleting them would make it easier to balance zones like Shayol Ghul and Blighted Pass. Or even zones like Dark Forest, which currently is little more than a move-suck as you go between Blands and Orch.

[Razhak]

I am really stoked about this new wind thats blowing upstairs. We need more interaction, more danger, less fences and picket lines..

It also made me realize that I (we) perhaps have given to little praise to those imms that have made our time here enjoyable with their unpaid efforts! Hereby my thanks and appreciation to you all!

Back to the topic on hand:

Weapon tweaks: has me all excited, especially making weapon classes more distinct and forcing people to choose between them (instead of going for jack-of-all-trade classes). Makes for more diverse and perhaps more exciting PK. We will see people experiment again with things, see new setups and new challenges. As long as changes are monitored right so that mishaps that turn out to be overpowered are checked and balanced in short order! Some much needed changes: field mending for lances and flails/chains/whips.

Zone changes: I for one have Always enjoyed our mud, also most zones that are around. There are indeed some filler zones out west and out sout-west (nort-west ashen, around dark fort, shadow coast and windbiters fingers, the whole of the illian-amador road area...). However removing them seems a bit over the top. I think removing some of the connections would serve well enough to tighten up the main map, with leaving the outlying zones open for the explorer types. For instance: remove the connection between Savannah and Rhahime + remove the connection between Longcut and Rhahime and you tighten up the Longcut/west TV plains/Caralain area again, while leaving the pre-existent zones intact for people who are willing to take the long route there. PKers will Always find eachother, especially with the new scout mobol. You might want to add 2-3 more at strategic places.

Also: DO NOT CHANGE THE GREATER BRAEM/4K/WB/CARALAIN AREA!!!!! (caps intended, big voice!): those are works of art in zone layout and connections! The same goes in my opinion for the zones north of FD. We all know what happened when someone tried to implement "new blight" ....

Imm-interaction: is much needed! Imm lead quests and mobraids are the best. Most of the time they are causes of horrible deaths and so on, but I Always had a blast Also making the mud more interactive, through direct imm intervention or through mobol, makes it more worth while to go out and do things. Someone mentioned the new tower as a bad zone, and I agree it is huge to an extent of madness.. but it containst soooo many little easter eggs, coding and mini quests that it is actually fun to be there and see which thing you can find/do which you didnt notice before (the library coding is really cool, as are the miniquests from mobs there).

There are several more matters that could use attention, some less suited for open board discussion, but I talked to Vampa about those already and he seemed very interested in player input, which was refreshing

All in all I am anticipating all these new (and sometimes actually old) things that are being planned!

[mythras]

It'd be interesting to see if there are any statistics on zone population over time. Highly unlikely, but it'd be a good metric to determine if a zone is actually used or is just there as a filler. If it's unused should it be there?

My perspective on world size is that it should correlate to the size and makeup of the playerbase; you totally need zones that serve only a segment of the playerbase, to make sure everyone has areas they can go to....but at the same time there needs to be a balance. If you can do more with less then you should. I personally feel that the job isn't done when there's nothing left to add, it's done when there is nothing left to remove.

Outside of that, I'm interested to see how everything progresses. I'm a fan of the current staff and I hope to see more changes coming.

[Neveyan]

Apart from some the sadness of now barren zones, I don't see why you need to remove them.

[Petra]

Apart from some the sadness of now barren zones, I don't see why you need to remove them.

Aside from potential lag, there are a lot of barren, unused zones that detract from the actual things that many people still want to enjoy in the game. The summary of the north SG zones succintly raises many of the problems. Ultimately increasing distance between things you actually want to do adds time, and detracts from enjoyment.

People who want to interact with others find those other people further away and don't cross paths often. People who want to PK find it takes longer to arrive at locations or meet the enemy, and when they do there are significant options for the enemy to just run around in football fields or around in barren areas. People who want to exp often have to travel through pointless zones to get there. Smobbers likewise have to travel increasing distances.

Concentrating a smaller playerbase means more fun.

[Vampa]

We’re going to be consolidating the playspace, making the world feel more intimate. You may see entire portions of the world disappear.

Sounds like deathmatch mud... thought this was NWIH list?

What about all the work dozens of people before put into world building and making this place what it is? Just erasing their contributions?
I'm one of the types that is only here because of the open world sandbox of RJ's world, delete that and...

Taziar

I'd like to tell you, don't worry. But I imagine you will anyway, and that's alright. See what happens, then weigh in. We're not shrinking the world solely by removing areas, we're making it feel more intimate, I chose those words specifically because in large part this has to do with mobility, and making the world more accessible more quickly (faster travel) than it does in shrinking it. However, the area you'll have available to play in will be much more 'dense' feeling. There will be a lot going on within it.

If you just like walking around in RJ's world like it's a park, you may be a bit distraught in the coming months. If you just like walking around in RJ's world like it's a theme park, if you play because you want to get sucked into the narrative that RJ created, you'll be quite happy. As to the work of those who came before, I've made sure to ask them if they're ok with what I intend to do with their work. No one has said no, and it has intrigued some enough to come back to play and help with the task. I do not believe that you will be unhappy with the change, however I know not everyone will be happy always. We will see, and I hope you do like what is to come.

[Firimei Lang]

I can quite understand the need for change. We need to evolve and we also need familiarity.

It will be interesting..