I disagree with you Bone.
A few months ago, the decay timer was 15 days, and it was very good. Me and my friends were playing every weeks, around 4 to 6 days a week. I spent 200 hours building our base, in an isolated area, a huge thing. After a few months, one of my 2 friends could not play anymore for personnal reasons. Then, a few weeks later, me and my other friend went on a exam period and he didn’t played anymore, but was planning to go back in 2 months. I kept playing, 2 to 4 hours a week, to keep our base safe. Then came the week where i had al my exams. I didn’t played for one week, and on the 8th day, i went back on the server, nothing was left, all gone. It literraly broke my heart. My base, that i built alone, after so much hours, disapeared. And i was playing regulary, not just login in to keep the decay timer up.
And yes, I met nice peoples on the server that i helped, but i could not ask them to help me cause before the exam week, i didn’t saw them in game.
On the official server that i was in, we had about 10 people playing, so we didn’t have ghost towns.
I strongly disagree with all you’ve said. The fact that someone is refreshing is decay timer annoys you and i can understand why. But if they are doing it, it’s cause they don’t want to give up all their hard work and cause they are planning to come back. If you have time, good for you, but it’s not the case for everyone.
You should have to pay Funcom to hold your stuff on Official Servers longer than 1 week.
I’m starting to think there would be a unique business opportunity for people in your position. People should let you pay them to watch your stuff (Cause obviously they hold that level of value to you).
If you had pets and were going on a vacation without them would you make accommodations for them or just hope in 2 weeks when you return you still see them alive and waiting for you?
Bottom line, If you want an exception to be made for the decay mechanic you should pay for it. This is the best and only true way to keep it from being abused by “refreshers.”
BTW, if the game is soooo much fun for you when your building then losing your stuff to decay should be viewed as an opportunity to play the game more when you rebuild it. And if your schoolwork is sooo consuming that you cannot possibly login for 10 min to “refresh” your base then you probably should spend more time on your schoolwork anyhow.
This!!!
I dont know the servers the “decay is to long” people are playing on, but srsly… What do you do? Run around looking at buildings?
As I said, I was walled by a troll and there were >5 bases surround mine. With the 2 week decay timer and all are gone (within the 2weeks decay time!!).
Other people made a pillar-highway east of the Den, where many animals are → also gone…
And most thing which amazes me, are PvP people complaining about that… Like, srsly? Just blow that crap up… On officals is no “no offline raiding” rule.
Of course, I should pay more money to keep my progression.
I’m not ready to pay more to keep my stuff, if it’s gone, it’s gone and that’s it, it’s just frustrating to see it.
What you’re saying for the pets is true, and that’s why i also specified that all i could have done to have someone refresh my base was not possible.
I don’t see the problem with “refreshers” because, as i said, if they are “refreshing”, it’s cause they will come back on the game again, if not they just would not care.
Yes, building is fun, but that doesn’t mean that i’m willing to start from the bottom, because building is fun, the farm to build what i had was enormous, and less fun.
Don’t talk about my work if you don’t know what is actually happening in my real life. I could not log in for the exam week because i could not physically do it. Like my friend that found a job, he actually enlisted in the army so yeah, it’s pretty hard to play right now.
When i read what you’re saying, 2 weeks for the decay timer is an abomination, but, a few months back, it was 2 weeks, not only for holidays and such. They decided to change it, and i think that it was a mistake.
The only reason that you don’t want that is cause of those “refreshers”. But if they are that much annoying and if there is so many of them, you should just change the server you’re playing on.
I will not say anything else. Your arguments are bad and are not really making sense to me. Again, you have time, good for you, it’s not the case for everyone.
You answered to HonkyLips saying “Or is it just you, your wife and your 3 kids that matter in the world?”, I ask you the same type of question : “Is it just you and your life that matter?” even tho I already know the answer…
Well using your logic…
I don’t see a problem with the decay timer as it is currently because I don’t have any problems logging in before my digital possessions disappear.
Not being able to play the game on a server you choose to play on is not my problem, its yours. Maybe you should read the server preferences before you start playing on one…
And if you don’t want people to talk about your work quit using it as an excuse for your shortcomings… I wouldn’t have even known your work was an issue if you hadn’t told me it was. Everyone has a life, but you don’t see everyone complaining that life is the source off all problems Conan. Work out your issue’s and when your caught up Conan will still be here for you to spam your buildings.
Worrying about your base decaying on a PvP server should be the least of your worries and for the sake of culling clutter on PvE, 7 days is just fine. Anything longer can be achieved just on a player owned server and those don’t necessarily have to be private.
Every server which isnt official is private…
Yes and no, contextually speaking, private doesn’t have to involve being withdrawn from the public. You can own an unofficial server and have it publically accessible.
Its still a private server… This has nothing todo if the server is public accessible or not.
The admin can still abuse his power. And that is the main reason enough people will never play at such a server.
Then rent your own server and don’t be a bad admin. Besides, it’s not like unofficial servers struggle to populate.
I dont want to advertise
I dont want to be even an admin, because then people will come crying to you
And this game has already way to much servers, compared to the amount of players…
You don’t have to openly be admin or even maintain the server if you don’t want to.
You first >_>
Besides I’m stuck at work and it’s dead. 
Me too 
I will… in >3-4 hours. Still work, but soon on the way home 
The thing is, I play mostly daily… But I am still no fan of the 1week decay timer. 2weeks was really nice
Fact is, if decay time gets the 15days (from vacation period) implemented as normal decay, more ppl will play the game.
Where is this OFFICIAL SERVER "No offline raiding rule??? And the Bully-ing … Some of these guys are borderline or actual Psychos!!! They fall just short of stalkers and arrest-able offenses. I also have sleepless nights.These types of players do not look at this as a game.AND YES THEY DO have the time to invest in the horror!! They followed me to PVE servers and box me in, decay my buildings with acid. I am a 56 yo Grandmother playing with my grandson-from out of state… We have caused no trouble. But-they hassel real PEOPLE! Why is there no recourse??? And I am Dam***d if my buildings get damaged and decay faster than a window from 7days to hours…
Wrong.
Fact: If decay timer is 15 days more people will only login every 15 days to “refresh” their builds.
Zombie servers with 1 or 2 active players at any given time.
If you want to preserve your builds beyond the current decay timer you should be paying Funcom rent.
This already happens, so the difference is minimal, and this is not a problem in PvP, in PvE maybe keeping the 7 day decay if ppl prefer that way. FC would know by pool.
I don’t pay for extra services and for this kind of benefits, I already do it for DLCs, if I’m going to pay $$ for FC for anything in the game besides that, it would have to be in a way more polished state, better optimized, less buggy and glitchy, and mainly, with actual servers in good performance AND admins to keep hackers away.
I suspect this may be part of the reason Funcom hasn’t entertained the idea of monthly fees. Once you are charging money for that sort of thing, it sets up the expectation of a certain level of service.
For example, I myself wouldn’t be opposed to “paying rent” on an official so that my buildings don’t decay if I get in a car crash and am out for a couple weeks. However, if I’m paying rent on a server for my own stuff, what’s to stop a griefer with more money than morals from doing the same thing? If their main source of enjoyment is bullying others, they’d surely find such an investment of money worthwhile.
At this point then, what would I be paying for? To have a permanent base that’s walled in on a server that’s bricked over? No, of course not! As a renter I’d rightly expect that the “landlord” would do something about the problematic player if they want to keep cashing my checks. And suddenly, Funcom would find themselves in the position where they’re being held to task to provide frequent moderation (including figuring out who is being honest vs. lying) to players on 1000s of servers — a task well outside the scope of what they could likely even hope for gPortal (or another host) to accomplish.
Realistically, the ability for people to pay for private servers that they can administer as they see fit is likely a small company’s best bet against that sort of a scenario. That’s not to say I wouldn’t mind some peace-of-mind on Official servers, but within the constraints of what we have to work with (no admins, no limits on building, no destroying others property on PvE servers), the current setup is sort of understandable.
That said, I’d be ok with options such as:
- compromising at a 10-day decay timer
- adding a new clan level below recruits for Guest Stewards (cannot build, cannot destroy, cannot access storage, but can open doors and refresh bases)
- allowing clans a certain amount of “vacation time” per quarter for situations that fall outside the official holiday periods
I’m playing on my own private server. One reason is the decay system on the official server. So I unterstand the problem.
A good solution could be a “activity meter” like the purge meter system.
A clan or a solo player fills up the “activity meter” with its activities. This extends the decay time from the base value up to three or four weeks. If there are no activities, the decay time starts.
So permanent active player can have a greater break.