I try to imagine it, I am guessing there would be a lot of people playing keeper and shade and a lot less people on RK playing other profs.
But some who don’t like SL much might choose to level their keepers and shades on RK.
Hitting level cap in SL with full teams of keepers and shades would probably be pretty quick, so people might come back down for RK content.
I am fine with waiting for Anniversary for SL though since I play casually/level slow and don’t stick with one character.
The idea of only keepers and shades in SL is interesting to me though, I’ve been in a full keeper team in Ely before though at a heck spot many many years ago.
I’m not actually making a suggestion because I’m not sure how I feel about it.
It’s nice to have everyone on Rk … And I never made it past like 100 or so on Rk only game play so the idea of leveling up to 150 or more on rk is intriguing.
Defeat what purpose? You mean why release sl but only let keeper/shade in, that wouldn’t be fair to other profs? The purpose is to release expansions completely, not limit them?
And yeah SL being just shade and keeper is the idea I was focusing on.
Could unlock keeper and shade and keep them out too but shade wouldn’t have symbs. And it would still defeat the “purpose” I guess.
My concern is that the main purpose for the server is to bring old and new customers to the game and make Funcom some money… but how many froobs made it past lvl 90-130 let alone 200 before upgrading or quiting. So a little piece of the pie might not be a bad thing.
Time will tell but I am a little skeptical people will stick around until mid July without at least a taste of SL.
Keepers and Shades are both Perk reliant professions, they were designed around Perks and Symbiants/Spirits. If you allow two professions to have perks while the rest does not, then you’ll create a scenario where Keepers and Shades will completely outclass everything else in almost every area
And “Why not just release SL in all its glory?” , well I was imaging a way to release SL from the start while also keeping things vanilla instead oh waiting until cap is 200, so it would be like releasing two separate games/worlds. Like Shadowlands would be it’s own game but only keeper and shade…
Maybe my familiarity with Mangos/Trinitycore/Arcemu and fun servers make me fantasize more about these things then I used to.
This has not really been suggestions just theorizing how it would/could work.
I’ve shared ideas on the old forums in the past and put them out there, like the $5 sl program was an idea I shared on the forums and then one day it happened.
I have always had crazy thoughts about AO and other games but not all my ideas are meant to be practical… I figured “General Discussion” was the place to post since I don’t see a “reet retreat” section anymore, other wise I would of posted there.
to me the problem seems obvious, the players are split into two camps, those who prefer expansions and those who prefer only notum wars. So the solution is equally simple, keep one server with expansions, and one server with just notum wars. they are two vastly different games. its like comparing the first or second generation of pokemon with the sixth or seventh generation (or whatever gen they are on now).
maintaining two identical expansion servers only divides the expansion-favoring camp among the new and old servers, while leaving the NW-only camp high and dry. If this rk2019 experiment has proven anything, its that there is a strong nostalgic force at play with the pre-expansion content that had not been fully realized until recently.
So what you want is a server for each expansion?
Because I want to relive SL, and not the later ones.
This is why a progressions server is perfect, because everyone gets a little bit of what they wanted.
I don’t want a server for each expansion, I just remember when SL first came out people more into the old Rubika lore/media and roleplaying were always saying the Shadowland expansion should of been a whole separate game and that SL didn’t fit.
The past few years I’ve been able to see/visualize how Shadowlands by itself could be it’s own separate game … take away rubika and all the content after sl and add some new or tweaked professions to go along with keeper/shade and SL could be it’s own game. Heck even with just keeper/shade it could work but two professions would be boring.
Funcom could take shadowlands and with a proper dev team create a new game from it. But that ship has sailed. I mean funcom could of done a lot more with SL.
and unfortunately, most of the players who felt this way ended up quitting with the later expansions, which only further bastardized the dystopian-cyber-punk-colonist rubi-ka theme.
By 2002, the total number of subscriptions created since launch was stated as 150,000.[88] After the release of the Shadowlands and Alien Invasion expansion packs, total subscriptions had risen to 700,000 in late 2004.
Same with 2019 server, it need to progress, SL should be out by now period. Look at the declining numbers last few weeks. 10 months left on server, lets go.
the numbers you are looking at are registered users, not active subscriptions. 2004 was when the froob program began.
the next line from the wikipedia article you cited there reads:
" The “free play” program, started in 2004, has had the most significant effect on subscriptions to date. ”More than 400,000 new players" signed up for free subscriptions in the program’s first ten months according to Funcom CEO Trond Arne Aas.[90] "
So indeed there were 700k subscriptions in 2004, but the majority of them never touched SL or AI content.
The lore from AO is massive and consistent.
SL added nothing but explanations and exploration into the lore-rich game world we have.
Why do you say that the lore does not fit?
Yes and no, the froob accounts was a big deal but not all of it, you can also see the income raising substantian aswell, how many of the froob acc actually converted to paid, and not to mention the multi awards shadowlands won and the press they got thanks to it.
The Shadowlands expansion was the most critically acclaimed by far, winning several Editor’s Choice Awards from IGN, CNet, GameSpot, GameSpy and others in 2003.
And most of all the numbers on 2019 are declining steady, and the few ppl that want Rubika Only knew from the start that this was a progression server, i would feel cheated out of my money if they did not hold up to their promise and start releasing expansions.
A lot of us started as froobs in 2004 and 2005, Rubika and the whole cyber punk thing pulled me in so I decided to upgrade right away, I think I got to like 95 on my then upgraded to SL. SL was and still is like a whole different game.
I spent most of my time in SL if I could…then LE came out and I spent a little less time in SL because…it was around that time LE came out that I actually had a GPU that could get decent fps in alien ships and/or maybe Funcom made LE missions less laggy then the alien ships used to be. But I never did much alien killing or city raids before LE came out… I spent majority of my time in SL.
So in a lot of ways SL is a different game.
It doesn’t feel like factions matter as much in SL, I don’t think vendors buy/sell for different prices based on factions like on RK, yeah there are gardens on SL but it doesn’t fell like the world is split into faction zones/cities like RK.
imho SL reinforced factions. Redeemed, Unredeemed. Vendors and MANY items specifically for only your particular faction. Faction specific Tier armor with the T3 sets being visually different for each faction.
I mean shoot, SL is the expansion that added actual “Faction” points. I’m confused.
It seems like most people are at 75 and I have 4 toons at lvl 50, bored with them all except doctor atm…I been spending so much time running missions trying to get nanos because I can’t afford anything.
I’m a slow leveler so waiting to release SL might give me time if I could catch up to everyone.
But the problem is that there are less people doing low level content so my progression slows and people are at 75 farming coh and whatever else.
So it feels like if I can eventually catch up to the majority of players depends on if I can focus on a single character long enough to catch up, or there is a surge of new character created to level up or twinks doing content in my level range. I was always a slow achiever in AO but years ago when I was younger I put a lot more hours into the game.
Tldr: I actually don’t mind SL not being released for awhile because it might give me and others with my play style time to catch up to all the people at level cap who farm/grind loot and credz.
I said SL didn’t “feel” like it was about factions as much.
You can keep someone locked up in a cell or small room 24/7 but give them a TV, phone,computer and internet,books, anything they want and even though they are a prisoner they probably won’t FEEl as much of a prisoner or as abused as they would if you left them in there with nothing.
To me on RK things feel like the world is all about factions and separation, but in SL it feels like factions came together to deafeat or tame powerful creatures and take control of the world. There we’re already factions redeemed and unredeamed and Omni and clan sided with one or the other but Omni doesn’t control this bright colored fantasy world of shadowlands like they do with RK and I can feel that…the real conflict is with the creatures of SL…yeah you have faction temples and all that stuff but I don’t FEEL the whole factions conflict and separation on SL. It’s there but I don’t feel or appreciate it like on RK.
I’m not the type of person to read the dialog or care much about lore though, I just focus on visuals and power/level gains or whatever.
