I have been playing this game since beta, and to be honest over these past months I feel that the gaming population of this game has taken a dive. What happened? The original armor system was so spectacular. Having to have crafted top tier armor in order to be able to survive in harsh climates was amazing for a few reasons. If you raid a clan in the extreme cold, and lose your armor in the process … That could be the deciding factor in being able to continue that raid. Having access to harder to get materials due to the extreme climates required the correct armor. I remember in order to create epic flawless armor it required a T4 thrall from that specific faction which is one of the reason why raiding was important. Now armor, and specific thralls are meaningless. You can survive anywhere wearing almost anything. The thrall system is completely ruined. The purge means nothing anymore. Getting a T4 purge thrall was a must in some cases. Not anymore. Crafting stations can use most any thrall to get the job done. Speaking of thralls… Why are they constantly being changed? I remember raiding a clans base that took two days to complete because of the thralls they had. Now… A newb can run through them without much trouble. The constant changing of weapons…Why? None of them have ever been too op. Remember how exciting it was when you found the lifeblood spear? How about when finally getting your hands on a Dicus the sharp? Dicus was one tough thrall. Why all of the constant changes when none in these areas were needed? I have really enjoyed the recent updates concerning the sorcery, and age of war. I love the bazaar, and battle pass. I think that these are good updates, and should be continued. Siptah, and exiled lands should be able to be transferred between. That is one thing that should be done. Ark survival evolved did this, and it has made them a lot of money by adding extra maps. Not being able to transfer between the two has split the player base. That in itself should make the devs think about making this possible. I would love to see a version of this game that gives us the ability to play the original game over the what many consider a now diluted game. Developers please listen to this… Bring back the original armor, and thrall system. That alone would greatly improve the game. Please bring back the importance of specific thrall/craft items. You guys have no idea just how much of the original game is greatly missed. And because of these changes you have LOST SOOOOOO MANY players that have left for good.
The game hasn’t died. Player numbers fluctuate across all games. Some players leave and return after taking a break, some switch systems or only play in single player mode.
This one generally agrees with problem points, and thinks it speaks to a few more general trends in the game.
Removal of the Survival aspect.
Yes, we still must eat and drink, but outside of a few extreme locations, that is all.
But perhaps worse, in correcting a dire problem (people freezing to death on Noob River because they wore gear to protect from the heat) they flattened out environmental protection on clothing so that it became irrelevant. Now it’s just grab the appropriate legendary shield, and eat some ice or spice and you’re set. It’s also the only real way to deal with it, so sad.
Lack of clarity in combat philosophy.
The Age of War saw a revamp of how personal combat works. Significantly changing the stamina management system and weapon damage. In a turn more towards souls like combat and away from the previous model. While this does expedite combat, it also is a jarring shift.
Furthermore, it saw yet another round of thrall nerfs (more on that later).
Response to Player Feedback.
Thrall nerfs are a prime example. Many on and off the forum complained at length that the Thrall was the real hero and the Player Character was just there to lead them around.
Pet nerf as well was a result of feedback from some persons that tigers were op.
Then there is the weapon balancing that heavily favours Hardened Steel over most other craftable gear, even gear that requires rare components or can only be crafted at, say, the Frost forge. Again, there was a swelling of posters complaining that Hardened Steel was pointless.
Much of this speaks to a somewhat rough attempt to make the game more new player friendly and power fantasy fulfilling. By leaning the game towards other, more popular, franchises, it may make the owners at Tencent happier. Motivations aside, the thrust seems to be a less granular and more simplified play experience.
Regarding craft slaves, they do matter, it just doesn’t change the name of the gear, only it’s stats. With regards to cultural armour, a mixed bag, if a player spends the points to learn a style, let them craft it, but losing the specific thrall dependent recipes did sting in the immersion aspect.
As for numbers, this one is dissatisfied with the means of tracking such things.
But on a personal level, this one does miss much of the survival nuance and wish it were grown on and expanded rather than leveled out and eroded.
The game hasn’t died at all. Its been pretty consistent for the past 4 years since some of its lowest points before that. What you see is player migration. Sometimes people take breaks, sometimes they simply move to other servers. Some even decide to do stints in singleplayer just to relax at their own pace.
One of the biggest issues with a sandbox game like this is that there is hundreds of ways to play it. Invariably people are going to want to try different ways. So you may not always see them on the same servers.
One of the things I find fascinating is the cute little challenges a small subsection of our community has been doing. At first it was just one person, but I think at least half a dozen have joined in on those.
The worst is yet to come for the pvp servers, with almost free bombs from the purge system which will still want to keep a base on it.
New players do not stay because they are completely wiped out in less than 15 minutes, it’s been a long time since a lot of players say it but quite the opposite is done, nerf of thralls, nerf of animals, explosives easier to obtain with each update, it’s really sad to see the bad choices one after another it’s like for the combat system who asked for that? no one and who is happy with it almost no one.
Sorry to be so negative but in my opinion this update risks doing even more harm to the game.
I really loved this game and I think it’s a shame to waste a masterpiece.
ps: I use a translator please forgive any grammar mistakes.
Conan hasn’t died. I have seen more activity ingame during the last year since Age of sorcery chapter 1 hit, than ever before during the previous 3 years. (I have played sporadically since early access)
It is true that the game has changed for the easier, but if that brings the game more players than I can’t see the devs changing their approach.
I have varying opinions on this, I’d say the game is better in short term bursts now instead of longevity. I think what they’ve done to thralls make the game more stable? But I agree and hate that Survivability and the need to camp and plan out which specific race thralls you need to get to craft the specific heat/cold/stat related armor. The entire pet and thrall system has not yet been fixed Still none of the food I feed to my thralls to optimize stats works right, there are no foods I can feet my horses to get them more grit % either. I continually complain that the introduction of the new crafting stations was un-needed and served to gimp the thrall system.
While I understand the bazaar and don’t entirely hate it—my biggest problem is things are released on it such as “Stormglass Large Pillar” which I think should just be added to the DLC we already own. Then when I want to actually buy these said things from the Bazaar I can’t cause it’s removed from rotation or won’t be on there for several days. It’s so stupid.
The game has shifted away from creative/pve towards a Pvp climate. But then the battle systems keep changing that trying to learn that becomes a hassle. I think lots of people can enjoy this game and play it. But it becomes an issue everytime I log in I have to re-learn the formula.
I’ll read it when you use paragraphs , thanks.
I agree with you. The game has taken so many bad updates, and changes that NO ONE asked for. Yes the devs have listened to those who cried about thralls being the hero, and players leading them around. But by nerfing those thralls you have weakened base defense and 3v1 scenarios. Nerfing animals serves no purpose to me. Animals have always been weak in my opinion. When players use them as base defense, I would always raid them just to off their animals. The pvp servers took a huge hit when they deleted thousands of the servers. Players who were the alpha clans on those servers lost months, and in some cases years of grinding. These are the players you should be listening too. Not the players who struggle getting off the noob river.
i feel that with the updates they did 1 thing right always.
and 5 wrong.
To me, the biggest example is the stamina system overhaul.
and i have to ask WHY. Who asked for the removal of the penalty after running out of stamina ?
in Age of sorcery they did make an attempt to make the perks better.
Only to invalidate everything in Age of war. stamina points and grit points are useless
because is a rolling thrust meta. if you don’t have 20/20/20 (str-agi-hp) you are handicapped.
with the most popular weapon being 2h axe.
Good luck trying to play a mage.
thralls are pretty much useless they don’t even offer some sort of utilty.
and by consequences the autorithy builds are a huge waste.
i still remember a dev stream when they showed AoW for the first time, the dev feeling so proud of what they were doing “oh i personally love this build by using rolling thrust”
my dude You are making the only viable build in the game.
There is not choosing.
but i guess that it is more because the shift towards a PVE focused game.
Cannot like this enough times. You win the forums for me today. Your prize is 100x harvest multiplier for a week! Oh wait, you play pvp. You get a bug where people can raid only your base during non raid windows for the week. You getbto play the gane 24/7 to defend!!!
LOL! Untrue. There is no such thing as PVP without getting neck deep in sheet.
That’s what I wake up to 
@Fleming5652 .I agree not happy with a good deal of the changes. My question is they deleted thousands of servers 
the population on officials is on decline…
especially ios.
they r trying to hit the CE franchise hard.
and they had the unbelievable idea to release dune as well!!!
terrible marketing…
they absolutely ruined armour and weapons as the bonuses they now provide r 99% meh…
also they ruined the temperature system in their effort to make “food” more important…
age of sorcery was a mediocre update in terms of what we gained and what we lost
CE isn’t dead but has always had a major exploiting problem on pvp servers throughout the years. Many people have quit over the years because of this
Take away exploiters and you still have balance issues which also kill the game. The meta thesedays is basically don’t have a legitimate base and attack everyone else who does.
The following is a list of ideas I often hear from the group of clans I play with on official:
Thralls should be made strong again at least for base defense scenarios.
Bombs need either a damage nerf or placement timer per individual player. No placing of bombs on enemy structures outside of raid window
Tier 3 bases should be actual castles not pushover sand castles. Make players use siege weapons and add new ones too
Roof pieces need HP buff to deal with bat raiders
Get rid of explosive arrows and replace it with a type of balista siege weapon with explosive bolts
Nobody playing on pvp servers legitimately asked to get rid of bubbles. Keep them if structure HP and thralls won’t be buffed
Set clan build limits instead of banning clans for building large logical defenses to deal with nerfed base defenses
Conan is a five year old game, Starfield just released. There’s going to be a drop in player numbers. Conan is one of those games where timed correctly, I can take a break from it for 2 months and not miss a damned thing.
My thoughts exactly. The whole game has been ruined with these changes, it has nothing to do with survival anymore, just running around naked killing everything and everyone no matter how well they are equipped.
The game has gotten flat so to speak, there’s nothing unique. So many things have been made meaningless, there’s no challenge in basically anything anymore so there’s no reward in playing. Everything can be obtained instantly or in a couple of days of starting a new server. I’m on 15 different PvP servers at the moment and every single one of them is empty or occupied by a couple of guys who log in every once in a while. And the reason why i’m on so many is exactly the fact that the gameplay is boring. Max level in a day, highest tier everything in a couple more. Then it’s just pointless, so we start a new server with different attributes, new way of building or something. Then it’s the same thing all over again, huge fortresses in couple of days because of the rates and all. I don’t even care to upgrade many of my buildings anymore or hide my stuff. If someone happened to raid me, rebuilding and re-aquiring materials and gear would at least give me something to do. But no, all of the servers are dead.