Want new players? Start marketing it! Increase Silan lvl cap!

[rakehell]

You could do both. Cap the level at 30-35. That allows players to start seeing the choices as the skills branch. I think that's important.

And you could also cap the time in Silan at one month before you must decide to pay to continue.

Using a double cap allows casual players a fair amount of time to level up one character (remember it's much harder if you've never played Ryzom) and allows power-gamers time to level several if they wish.

I really don't understand the bias against new players getting ranger armor or other mission rewards in Silan. You want new players, don't you? The mainland is hard even with all rewards from Silan. I'm on Cho in Fairhaven - I often don't see anyone at all, at most 1 or 2 other players. I can't level healing. I have to be very careful when fighting because there won't be a rez... It took 4 DPs to learn that last one.

[jamela]

We already had the argument about the severity of the level cap on the free trial when it was introduced (I don't think there ever was a cap before, by the way, sorry Acridiel .)

I do think that giving free trial players a little more of the game after learning the basics would be a good thing. Just a taste of the branching skill tree, like up to level 25, would allow quite a lot more levelling playing time, if a player tries to explore all of the branches.

Something I worry about with the level cap is that, when they hit that barrier and get the message that they can no longer progress, some newcomers may not realise that it only applies to that skill, and not all of the others too. And with the cap being so low that it can be reached so soon, they have had less opportunity to learn, or be informed, that that is the case. Can anyone tell us the exact wording of the message given when the cap is reached?

The suggestion of an even cheaper subscription start is an excellent one, in my opinion. £8.50 for a month is a very reasonable sum of money to part with to release the full game, but it is significant when someone has only played for a few hours one weekend, hit the cap and is not quite sold on the game. A token sum such as £2 for the first couple of weeks of the full game, say, would weed out all of those who really just want to play for free, but is an insignificant sum to someone who is interested but just wants to see some more before committing to a monthly subscription.

[hazira]

It took 4 DPs to learn that last one.

What?!!? Just four?

[tengheau]

I'm on Cho in Fairhaven - I often don't see anyone at all, at most 1 or 2 other players. I can't level healing. I have to be very careful when fighting because there won't be a rez... It took 4 DPs to learn that last one.

Gah, I *hate* stories like this, because it is close to what I went through. There *are* people in the lakes but they are often in Enchanted Isle, Fount or the Dew Drops. That Region chat doesn't extend across all regions of a zone is infuriating because they could be 15m away and due to the limits of the chat channels they couldn't hear your call for a rez.

If you need or want any help send an in-game email to me. I would be happy to see if we could get you treked to Yrk or Pyr where there are more folks or get you better outfitted for survivability. I love the lakes, but to level healing you are going to need a team and for that at the moment on Cho you are going to need to be in the Desert or the Forest.
Or in a guild of course. If like me, you don't much like the overhead of your average MPORPG guild , I know of several low-obligation/high practicality/just-plain-fun-focused guilds around.

Anyway, I still have a stash of Christmas cats* on a character near FH, they are all yours for the asking.

Calevin,
Master Guild Chat Spammer,
Elementals of Atys,
Cho


*being Catalysts, which when active double your xp.

[valithan]

I have to say i didnt think about that and i agree with it, still i believe current free trial just doenst offer enough to keep most people interested. But about that pvp arena, who use it on Silan? I have a toon on it and i never see people fight in arena tbh.

meyer, sude and i (terzi) used and invited some people to fight on pvp arena.. well it was fun.. i guess some csr should organize little events on newbie island to atract people

[rakehell]

...
If you need or want any help send an in-game email to me. I would be happy to see if we could get you treked to Yrk or Pyr where there are more folks or get you better outfitted for survivability. I love the lakes, but to level healing you are going to need a team and for that at the moment on Cho you are going to need to be in the Desert or the Forest.
Or in a guild of course...

I'll do that, but since I made that post I've joined EoA. Two or three members brought me a ton of cats, some heavy armor, & better amps. That's helped a lot. Planing my escape route BEFORE I get in trouble helped even more. I'll talk to you about a trek to Pyr soon.

[zarozina]

It they remove the lvl cap, what shal we do with our stockpiles of q50 cats?

[0balgus0]

It they remove the lvl cap, what shal we do with our stockpiles of q50 cats?

Well if they can remove lvl cap on island, then they should be able to remove lvl cap on q50 xp cats and allow us to use them for lvl 200+ skills! *dreams*

[dcrispo]

If I remember my time on Silan by lvl 20 you were pretty much done with the trainers and the next phase was Chiang's final missions before leaving the island and these missions required you to be Lvl 30 is either magic or melee.
Since going from lvl 20 to 30 was just redoing most of what you've learned already the present cap makes alot of sense and prevents the usual "wanna play for free" crowd from hanging around much longer. Prior to the addition of the Mainland map on log-on the most asked question was how big it was and thats been answered. If by lvl 21 someone is still unsure of what a future on Atys has instore for them, then what can anyone do? All that raising the cap will do is to allow the play for free crowd more time. The players that come to enjoy the gameplay and want to subscribe usually cannot wait till they are ready to head to the mainland. So it would seem to me this argument is more from those wanting more free time then anyone else. For them I say either put up or shut up since there are tons of free games online for you to spend time on.

[portios]

I recently did the free trial and came very close to not subscribing because i really felt 20 levels in a game with 250 just didnt show me enough to decide. I caped all 4 basic skills in a couple of days and effectively my trial was over. I made a second toon because the first one was in Cho and that place was dead. The new character was also caped in 2 to 3 days and again i felt the trial was over. Eventually i decided to bite the bullet and join because all and I really mean ALL the MMOs out there right now suck horribly but if there had been just one half decent MMO i would not be here right now. Ryzom was my last hope. I think from my personal expericence in n00b island a lvl cap of about 35 would have been far better, if only because it will take 2 weeks or more to the average player to cap all the 4 skills.

I am personally against level caps and permanet free trials, I feel that a 14 day trial with no level caps would make far more sense. people could put enough in to a character, even make it to the mainland in 2 weeks and then feel compeled to subscribe because they have seen more and are more attached to their character. If they dont sub o/