I’ve played since launch and nothing you described would be “fixed” by this. I don’t pay much attention at the moment but have they even reverted decay times back to 1 week or are they still set to two?
Anyway, my entire time playing has been on officials so I certainly don’t need you to explain changes in server populations, overbuilding, etc
Unless you make refreshing incredibly challenging, you won’t stop people from simply logging in to refresh and doing whatever menial task needs doing to refresh. And if you make refreshing incredibly challenging, you’re going to lose players anyway because they just won’t bother. And the players you lose will be the active ones as well who can’t be bothered to jump through hoops to be marked as active.
You will not change peoples motivations, and if they are motivated to do the least amount of work possible to keep their structures they will. Until, again, you make it so difficult you start making the game into an actual chore instead of something fun to do. And then, sure, you’ll have less buildings and less players for all the wrong reasons.
I don’t say this to be combative, but I certainly didn’t get that impression from the way you asserted that it’s only a problem when a certain player wants to build in a certain spot, rather than a more general problem with overbuilding and server populations
It doesn’t have to be “incredibly challenging”, it just has to be enough to make at least a portion of those people start questioning whether it’s really worth doing after a month or so.
@Taemien’s idea with BP challenges is a step in the right direction. Before the BP, I had a suggestion whose gist was basically to add an upkeep system where literally anything you have as a leftover from your normal play could be used as “upkeep fuel”.
Would either of those two ideas get rid of all serial refreshers? Nope. Would it get rid of a certain portion of them? Definitely. Would it be enough to let the servers “breathe more easily”? I don’t know for sure, given that we’re talking about G-Portal, but I would hope so.
Like I said, that motivation isn’t binary, it’s not “either I’m motivated or I’m not”. Some people are willing to do more, some less.
Right now, we have more buildings and less players, and I can’t say it’s for any “right reasons”, really.
OK yeah so let me be clear. I just threw an idea out there to a problem that I saw and wanted discussion. I’m not really vested in it but I always like throwing out something out there…I’m just saying the decay timer situation is an issue for all of the servers. I don’t care if my idea is correct as long as we are discussing the issue.
It was a good topic to bring up. Its an issue any server utilizing decay has.
Decay does a decent job at cleaning up pieces like campfires and bedrolls in the middle of nowhere. And the bases that are abandoned. It has its limits as people exploit the fact that they can just log in and log off.
What is sad is when people try to defend not playing at all as a playstyle.
Yep but how many folks can cast stones on that sin? I know I got 3 servers that ‘I’ll get back to’…usually after about 3 weeks I just pack up and let it all decay but there is always that lie that I tell myself that I can juggle 5 servers worth…I can barely juggle 2.
I’m currently playing on one server, and when I am not playing a particular character, I either cede the buildings to another clan for their use, or have them deleted before rerolling.
I won’t cast a mere stone, I’ll drop an 80mm mortar.
Which is why I mark each base on my map with a date and, if they’ve not reached out to me with a reason, I will have no regret about deleting inactive players after three (3) months.
I play in multiple servers, alone only in two. I jump from server to server to do errands! But in these servers I play with others I am not Farm & Build and I don’t “allow” it. I join only as member, not even an officer because I play for the joy of online gaming and support.
I don’t tell them what or how to build, but I always ask them to be caution and follow the rules the best possible. My participation in multiple servers logically will let my solo servers behind. There for I don’t build big, I don’t place away map rooms, or wheels and my footprint is always on a side and very small!
Some days i don’t feel like group on chat and I want to play for me, alone. For this, as you said 2 servers is more than enough.
Yet, not because I do it is right!
It’s not!
Something needs to be done!
And that’s what makes the difference. As I’ve freely admitted before, I used to be a serial refresher. Now I’m not anymore. It’s not about having to play every single day. It’s about not letting your builds sit for months on end, taking up space, not letting anyone use that space, and taxing the server performance whenever someone rides by.
Servers are currently seeing this amount of structures because of a large increase in player volume with this huge update coupled with the extended timers. It will organically settle down to normal, as it always has with major updates and summer timers. There is no need for a knee jerk reaction to make life in the Exiled Lands more laborious than it already is. Especially on the hopes, and it’s a big hope, that it will dissuade any substantial number of people simply logging on to refresh buildings.
This is very true too, very true! One of the greatest reasons, especially the first days, I stopped playing on official servers, it was because I simply couldn’t! A huge wave of old players return, or (hopefully) new players, it made the official gaming, mission impossible for me. In a session of 3 hours gaming, I was crushing at least 10 times and most of my gaming time was to go and collect my loot . So I started again to shout while I was playing, not having fun at all. So I searched for privates and no matter how much I hate gaming sessions without, stamina loss, or nights, or hunger or whatever the admins of private servers do to the settings, I could play without crush… and it was a great relief!
The last week seems to start stabilizing, so I am 99% on official servers again.
Still…
4 years in a server?
4 years with the same toon in this server?
We both know that this game is big, but not big enough to play 4 years in the same building with the same toon and logical not violate the rules.
So, there is no knee jerk here!
There is no gaming reason other for refreshing in a pve server for straight 4 years!
Even if you are the most unlucky player of the whole world, eventually in 1 year you will collect everything!
So what’s the real reason that you don’t quit?
Bragging is, no other reason.
Look I have a topples beri, Look I have a master thief from Sepermeru, look I have a captain from buccaneers Bay… Etc…
This is the reason, no other!
We can fool others, or even try to fool devs too, but we are so obvious, all of us!
I remain to my position, something needs to be done!
Of course it will. In fact, I already described in one of my previous replies what that “normal” looks like: a ghost town full of theme parks maintained by serial refreshers. An official PVE(-C) server with a vibrant community is an exception.
Sure, some will let their stuff decay, but most won’t, as long as the non-playstyle of not actually playing is trivial to maintain.
This is not a knee-jerk reaction at all. Serial refreshers have been a problem for a long, long time. I’ve brought up this same problem several times before, and offered suggestions on how to solve it.
As I’ve said several times in this thread already, we don’t need Funcom to make the “life” in the Exiled Lands, i.e. playing the game more laborious. On the contrary, they simply have to prod the serial refreshers into choosing whether to play in the sandbox or let others play in it, rather than just roping off “their” part of the sandbox.
To be blunt, the only knee-jerk reaction I’ve seen in this thread is “serial refreshers are not a problem, everything is just fine”.
If actively playing the game for a few hours a week is considered ‘laborious’ by some, then there is even more of a need for those structures to be removed.
If playing the game is ‘laborious’ then they are not playing the game anymore. If playing the game isn’t fun, its time for those players to move on, and their buildings with them.
I’ll tell you this right now. I don’t care if someone has spent an hour on a building. A day. A week. A month. A year. Or even a Decade perfecting the perfect build. If you’re not actively playing 1-2 weeks after, then that space needs to go to someone who’s actively playing. And if they spend a week there and go inactive, then their stuff goes away from someone else. Server resources for active players only.
An inactive players attachment to pixels and numbers in a database means zero compared to the enjoyment and playability of a server and its performance.
This is not a kneejerk reaction. This is common weekly maintenance that hundreds of servers do all the time. One that Funcom has been neglecting.
So, define playing in a way that encompasses every single active player and doesn’t require anyone to go out of there way to be included in that definition. And go…
I am adamantly opposed to any requirement regarding how I spend my in game time in order to check a box to make sure my structures are intact.
I feel the view here is I support the practice of logging on simply to refresh. I don’t. I’ve let plenty of builds return to dust and started back from scratch. But weighing the options, I prefer the current system. Every proposed solution I’ve seen has a bigger downside than letting some guy refresh his castle because it makes him happy.
And I’ll tell you right now, I doubt very many people care what you think the acceptable time limit on base refreshing is.
But you have the right answer, if the practice bothers someone that much, find a private server where your values align and play to your hearts content.
Then I highly recommend you start offering some alternative ideas. Or potentially get Teimo’d.
Server performance is not good, and will be addressed. And given the choice between pissing off a player who only logs in once a week to refresh, and the rest who want to play with less server lag. That choice is clear.
Oh, goodie, it’s the variation on “Oh, you love X? Name every Y”
I actually can define active players by simply excluding serial refreshers, but what you want to do with that is “prove” that it’s impossible to implement something that doesn’t require even the tiniest change in the way any of those players play the game.
Which brings me to:
Yeah, so, here’s the thing: I don’t really have to convince you that the official servers have a problem that’s serious enough to warrant inconveniencing you slightly. Not that I know that it will inconvenience you; you might be end up being perfectly fine, but that’s totally beside the point.
The point is that those of us who see this problem are trying to convince Funcom. One of the ways of doing so is to present the problem well enough to garner the support of those who don’t meet every solution with a knee-jerk reaction, but are instead willing to consider the problem and contemplate and discuss possible solutions
. So I started again to shout while I was playing, not having fun at all. So I searched for privates and no matter how much I hate gaming sessions without, stamina loss, or nights, or hunger or whatever the admins of private servers do to the settings, I could play without crush… and it was a great relief!
