Ryzom

I just started a harvester/crafter. I know I could do these skills with my fighter/mage, but I've found it's too hard to give up 100 sp for that right now, and I can't find crafters anymore to make anything, and I've always been a crafter in other games, so I figure I'll be the crafter for my little guild.

Anyway, I started out by leveling up my fighting so I wouldn't be ganked constantly by gingos and ragus, then I leveled up my crafting quite a bit using missions (up to 48 armor and 36 melee weapon). Then, I decided to start working on my foraging. I'm at something like 26 now after spending at least twice as much time as I spent on crafting.

It's been slowly getting better as I level and can purchase new skills. But, I know now how long it takes to harvest materials. It can sometimes take me 10 minutes to find a spot to harvest (right now I'm trying to get enough materials to make 2 suits of heavy armor, so I can see what it will be like when I get to the mainland and have to make armor for real). Then, each time I harvest, even if I just want 1 mat from that node, I have to wait until the timer is up.

It's a huge culture shock. I went from playing a fast-paced game when fighting, casting, or crafting, to an extremely slow, tedious game. I find it difficult to believe that harvesters get exp any faster than melee characters, and even if they do, if the problem was with the exp rate, and the exp cap is supposed to regulate the exp rate, why was the fundamental purpose of the skill changed in order to fix it? Why not adjust the exp cap?

At least when you're harvesting you're limited by how often you can get that 3k exp. When fighting or casting the only limit is how fast your group can take down the baddies, which can be super fast.

As a new crafter, I'm not disappointed at the decrease in leveling speed. I've already accepted how extremely long and boring this is going to be. I'm going to have to deal with how long and boring it is to get all the mats to make those suits of armor anyway, so the rate of exp I get while doing that isn't my biggest concern. My biggest concern is that those skills were something I was looking forward to in order to be able to harvest higher quality materials. Yeah, powergamers might not care about that, but HARVESTERS do. Saying harvesters deserve a nerf because of powergamers (who will find and exploit any fast exp in any line, probably your favorite next) is, IMHO, ridiculous.

Thanks for all the great input on this topic so far, all of you, both pro and con. When I started this thread, I figured that it would get some attention, but I must say I'm a bit surprised at how many people have joined in so quickly. Two thoughts do strike me from what I have read so far.

First, I think some people misunderstand how the specializations were used. There has been a lot of talk about "power leveling" and the specializations--mostly from the non harvesters I might add. I can safely say I haven't power leveled my character’s harvesting. I have harvested from day one and am barely over level 100 and do it more than some who are approaching 200 now. Why? Because I harvest to get mats to craft with, not to get harvesting XP. And as the game stands, pulling max quantity is about 1/4 as efficient as pulling 1 mat in the shortest time possible. As a crafter, I bought specializations for every item I use to craft with. Since I make both weapons and armor, that is nine specializations. And that is a lot of wasted SP. Oh, and by the way, I can only see one use for the new way specializations will work—more power leveling and exploiting. Just throw them in at the last minute in my second action and quickly raise the quality of what I'm pulling. So those of you looking for retribution on the power levelers probably aren’t going to get it with this.

Why are you looking to punish other players anyways? Why is someone else's success so threatening? Doesn’t our shared success make the game more interesting and fun for everyone? OK, back the topic at hand…

Second, my biggest gripe with this latest nerf is the poor judgment is shows from the developers. They have promised us a lot with this game. At the end of beta, we were told just wait, all that content is just waiting for you inside the retail box. That was obviously not true. This game is the same game it was at the end of beta. The devs are way behind on providing most of the selling points on the box and on the site (more bait and switch?): RAIDs, storyline, outposts, guild conflict...everything that makes this something other than a grind. Frankly, meeting those promises is where I expect the devs to spend all their time coding. They should be ADDING CONTENT TO THE GAME. Instead, the only thing they seem willing to do is identify parts of the game that people do enjoy, and break them. That is insane.

Part of Nevrax's rationale is understandable. It goes something like this: without content, the only thing keeping people in the game is leveling. If people level to quickly, they will reach their max and then leave the game. This will deprive Nevrax of their monthly subscription fee. So, if it takes six months to reach max, that is five months of fees. One month, no fees since the first month is free. Well, these emergency measures to slow the pace of leveling are driving people away. My guild's two best crafters/harvesters have retired from the game in the last week, one of them last night after the latest patch. And from what I've heard, we aren't the only guild experiencing this loss. I offer an alternative: if people level to quickly, add new levels to the game. Provide new things for players to do, new places to go...you see where im going with this...

Refunding SP when nerfing skills, to my mind, is one way for the devs to maintain the good will of the gamers in spite of the current short comings in the game. It shows concern for the players and concern for the time they have invested in the game. So does providing complete patch notes and posting timely information about changes they are considering making in the game. We are not children that need to be scolded and punished for not behaving exactly as the developers intended or could foresee. We are, most of us, adults looking for an entertaining diversion from the inanities of real life. Please treat us in a manner that recognizes that.

While I generally agree with everything you've said Mekos, I think the levels that I've been able to gainthrough added XP, the higher level mats I was able to pull, and the increased dapper I was allowed to get due to the QL has already MORE than paid for the SP I put into Mat Spec. I don't need it back. I would certainly caution any NEW harvester from spending points on these skills, but I don't see the need for a refund. It was quite over-powered to begin with, and we have enjoyed the benefits of this for quite some time...

I guess, essentially what I am saying is this - we've already recouped our SP put into the specs by the quick levels we have received (capping XP at nearly every pull), so I don't think the devs should 'take any more time away from generating content' by refunding SP

Mookse

korin77 wrote:Unlike other races, there are no ql 100 and ql 150 mats in trykerland to help with the xp. Its either a slow grind on lvl 50 mats, a slow grind on ql 100 or 150 mission mats that provide no resources whatsoever. Or a slow grind in the borders with lots of DP.

Korin, there are q100 craftable mats in TrykerLand. It's just that they are not in the most obvious place but it makes sense if you compare the layout of our country with the other ones. I am pretty sure of where to find the q150 and the q200 too.

mookse wrote: I guess, essentially what I am saying is this - we've already recouped our SP put into the specs by the quick levels we have received (capping XP at nearly every pull), so I don't think the devs should 'take any more time away from generating content' by refunding SP

Mookse

First off... I agree with Mekos.

Not refund SP will upset many players who invested in the skill. If they are going to take away the reason people invested in the skill and add something which is really useless, then yes they should refund the SP. You need to remember that they are drasticly changing harvesting in this patch. Every 10 levels you will have a new quality skill to buy. Who knows what will happen to that lvl 100 harvester once they put this patch in, you might find yourself only being able to pull q50 since all your SP is in other places.


Till they tell us exactly how they will handle changing the entire skill line, we really do not know what to ask for.

Mekos ... it is very obvious you thought out all of your posts.

I have to come to Nevrax's side in this though (I am as frustrated as everyone about some issues in game but I understand that is a part of being in the first wave) retail brings alot of different systems and actions that no beta will ever catch. You can plug 100,000 people into a beta and launch and still get bugs.

Why is this? Not everything is shown in beta ... and new content and balance issues come out from the start as people who did not beta find different ways to test the system. Yes unfortunately there are some who for some obscure reason exist for no other reason but to exploit a game. That being said I am not saying anyone who was using the specs were exploiting ... they existed in that capacity and they were used as such. What I am saying is that new bugs and holes appear. Unfortunately the dev's are now tasked to fix those. The new content and bennies get set aside until those can be fixed.

The question to ask and has been stated numerous times throughout the forums is this ... would you rather build the game on a very weak cornerstone and have it become possible unplayable to everyone down the line OR give the devs time to fix the bugs and make a very very stable and solid platform to add that new content to?

I know I would rather have a stable, playable game and that is MHO.

As has been mentioned there are games that have been out for years that have the same bugs they had at launch. Let us all give the devs a break to make this game we all cherish the love it needs before we go club them over the head .... What do you say?

Note that this thread got just superflous.

http://ryzom.com/forum/showthread.php?t=3912 (german)

In short: according to the german community manager there will be with patch 1 a complete reset of all stanzas and skills.

Thanks Shrike ... been on the wait to see what Patch 1 does wagon since yesterday ... now everyone can cool their cannons.

Edit: Cerest can we get this in English ... I do understand some German but I think the community overall would appreciate it.

I would like to thank my higher power, and the devs too, for that wise decision to refund at the next patch.

Praise the lord,
Meek

Mekos wrote:Thanks for all the great input on this topic so far, all of you, both pro and con. When I started this thread, I figured that it would get some attention, but I must say I'm a bit surprised at how many people have joined in so quickly. Two thoughts do strike me from what I have read so far.

First, I think some people misunderstand how the specializations were used. There has been a lot of talk about "power leveling" and the specializations--mostly from the non harvesters I might add. I can safely say I haven't power leveled my character’s harvesting. I have harvested from day one and am barely over level 100 and do it more than some who are approaching 200 now. Why? Because I harvest to get mats to craft with, not to get harvesting XP. And as the game stands, pulling max quantity is about 1/4 as efficient as pulling 1 mat in the shortest time possible. As a crafter, I bought specializations for every item I use to craft with. Since I make both weapons and armor, that is nine specializations. And that is a lot of wasted SP. Oh, and by the way, I can only see one use for the new way specializations will work—more power leveling and exploiting. Just throw them in at the last minute in my second action and quickly raise the quality of what I'm pulling. So those of you looking for retribution on the power levelers probably aren’t going to get it with this.

Why are you looking to punish other players anyways? Why is someone else's success so threatening? Doesn’t our shared success make the game more interesting and fun for everyone? OK, back the topic at hand…

Second, my biggest gripe with this latest nerf is the poor judgment is shows from the developers. They have promised us a lot with this game. At the end of beta, we were told just wait, all that content is just waiting for you inside the retail box. That was obviously not true. This game is the same game it was at the end of beta. The devs are way behind on providing most of the selling points on the box and on the site (more bait and switch?): RAIDs, storyline, outposts, guild conflict...everything that makes this something other than a grind. Frankly, meeting those promises is where I expect the devs to spend all their time coding. They should be ADDING CONTENT TO THE GAME. Instead, the only thing they seem willing to do is identify parts of the game that people do enjoy, and break them. That is insane.

Part of Nevrax's rationale is understandable. It goes something like this: without content, the only thing keeping people in the game is leveling. If people level to quickly, they will reach their max and then leave the game. This will deprive Nevrax of their monthly subscription fee. So, if it takes six months to reach max, that is five months of fees. One month, no fees since the first month is free. Well, these emergency measures to slow the pace of leveling are driving people away. My guild's two best crafters/harvesters have retired from the game in the last week, one of them last night after the latest patch. And from what I've heard, we aren't the only guild experiencing this loss. I offer an alternative: if people level to quickly, add new levels to the game. Provide new things for players to do, new places to go...you see where im going with this...

Refunding SP when nerfing skills, to my mind, is one way for the devs to maintain the good will of the gamers in spite of the current short comings in the game. It shows concern for the players and concern for the time they have invested in the game. So does providing complete patch notes and posting timely information about changes they are considering making in the game. We are not children that need to be scolded and punished for not behaving exactly as the developers intended or could foresee. We are, most of us, adults looking for an entertaining diversion from the inanities of real life. Please treat us in a manner that recognizes that.

The thread might be superflous, but this post is not.

Thanks for making some very good points Mekos.