Svenn

Updated with the most current info! We'll be ramping up as Crowfall gets closer to Beta/Launch.

Why is this a concern? It won't be part of the game, just part of testing. Shouldn't we be focusing on the actual game at this point and not issues caused by the fact that the game isn't released yet? How much time is going to be spent coming up with a solution to something that won't be an issue shortly after the actual launch of the game? Is release still planned for this year at some point? We haven't heard anything in a while, and I thought we were supposed to be in Alpha long ago. If so, this is really a short term issue. If release isn't planned for this year then I think the bigger issue is that people are just getting tired of waiting. I'm patient and I understand that development takes time but people are coming in expecting this to be their main MMO now and then leaving because it's not done. It's going to be hard to bring a lot of those people back. Burning through your potential player base in a pre-release state seems like a bad idea. Trying to solve problems that are specific to that pre-release state and not the finished game seems like an even worse idea as it wastes resources and slows development. Crafting (well, more the economy) isn't in a great place, honestly. The system itself is solid and making items can be fun... but how is the economy supposed to work? Who are crafters supposed to sell to? Previously crafters were necessary to keep a guild stocked with gear, but that's about it. Now, they need to make the occasional gear while people will just use the drops they get? I'm a bit confused about what the expectation is here. Who are crafters supposed to sell to? How is the economy supposed to work? Crafters make gear for their guild but when, where, and why will crafters sell to people outside their guild? What is my incentive as a crafter to sell to people outside my guild since that just makes them stronger (this will be even worse in the dregs where you really don't want to supply your enemies with great gear and everyone outside your guild is essentially your enemy)? And if I did want to sell to my enemies, where am I putting a shop for them to access (again, especially in the dregs, which is my main focus)? And will full time crafters even be a thing? Originally, with item decay and all gear coming from crafters a crafter would be able to pump out tons of gear to sell as it was all needed. Failed rolls were still useful as some basic gear to wear around while saving the better gear for big fights. WIth item drops how often will players actually go buy from a crafter? What will happen to the gear that had some bad rolls since it now becomes essentially worse than the dropped items people can easily get? The main reason I backed Crowfall on Kickstarter is because I was expecting a sandboxy experience in which there were a lot of valid paths and professions with a lot of interconnectivity. No one could be self sufficient on their own. Crafting, Harvesting, and Combat were all valid career paths. It seems now that combat is the valid career path and crafting/harvesting are side activities instead of full blown professions.

RIP crafters.

So, will any of this siege stuff apply to Dregs? Unless I'm somehow mistaken, we're supposed to be able to build our own stuff in the Dregs. Will scheduling apply there? How will it work? I'm a little concerned about how much effort is being put into making 3 faction campaigns work while ignoring any other campaign types.

Wait... what? Where is that mentioned?

I get that they need people playing for testing... but so many people are going to burn out before we ever hit release (or shortly after).

So.... is this sanctioned campaigns?

Please make all the changes you need to before release whenever you want. Don't worry about disrupting gameplay or anything mid campaign. None of it matters right now.

Any word on wipes, imports/exports, or using current characters in the Sanctioned Campaigns yet? If there won't be a wipe it would be nice to know now so we can be ready. I don't want to start mobilizing my guild only for everything to get wiped or unable to be used in the Sanctioned Campaigns. Most of us are trying to avoid playing too much before then to avoid burnout before (or shortly after) launch so I don't want to get people in if they don't need to be playing yet.

Well, the real question is what is the win condition for dregs? I mean, are we going to build our own keeps and then those start generating points? Are there going to be keeps/outposts/forts that guilds have to fight over (I hope not, the whole idea of dregs was building your own stuff and fighting over that)? It would be pretty disappointing if Dregs was basically the same thing as the faction campaigns.

They absolutely need to make EKs able to be started on demand by anyone if they are public. It should be automatic, like joining an instance in any other game. When someone attempts to join, if it's not spun up it spins up automatically. This should be cheaper for them in server costs because right now what happens is instead of EKs spinning down and back up as people come and go they just stay up all the time as people idle in them to make sure they stay open. Automatic instance starting is a standard MMO thing, and if it doesn't happen it's going to really kill EKs.

So wait, the Dregs will have us just capturing forts and keeps for points? That's kind of disappointing, and seems like it will be a little weird with a hundred different guilds fighting for control of stuff. Also curious what we'll be capturing since I thought the idea was to let us build our own stuff in the dregs instead of having pre-placed buildings.

You're in luck. They've always said the plan was to let you trade VIP time to other players. Also, as I said multiple times, VIP shouldn't be entirely about EKs (or any one thing). VIP should give a variety of things for multiple types of players. You can add some of these EK bonuses along with other non-EK things that will appeal to other players, including yourself. If you don't care about these bonuses, ignore them.

Again, this wasn't meant as the only thing to be in VIP. The best way to approach VIP, imo, is to give a variety of things to appeal to different players. EK bonuses aren't for everyone, but if they are just one part of VIP then you've sold it to people big on EKs. For people not interested in EKs, there should be other things as well. As for dropping VIP, these benefits should only be available while the person has subscribed to VIP. I mean, that's how subscription stuff works.

I know some of this may have been suggested before (and may already be planned as upgrades to the system) but I was thinking about Eternal Kingdoms and realized some of these might be well suited for VIP bonuses. Expanded EK map size. Perhaps let people with VIP have a larger EK. I'm not sure if we're hitting the limitations of the engine or anything yet but if it's possible a larger EK for people with VIP would be cool. More EK space doesn't add any advantage, just gives those of us who enjoy creating our own kingdom some more space to play around with. As a bonus, this might promote spending more in the store on buildings. More players in the EK. Right now the maximum amount of players in an EK appears to be 12. I'm really hoping this is increased for launch across the board, but maybe additionally allow VIP to have more people in their EK. For some of us, we want a nice bustling EK and that means having lots of people. And having written this I just looked at the FAQ and saw this "These are also full MMO servers, so we expect them to support hundreds of concurrent players." so this idea might not be needed... Minor Cosmetic EK upgrades. Anything from actual 3d assets like a unique looking spawn temple to show off your VIP to simple stuff like custom banners/backgrounds for your EK in the lobby UI. Yeah, this requires some new art/UI so it might be something a ways off but people love cool cosmetic stuff to show off. Automatic EK spin-up. I hesitate to even put this one here because I really feel this is needed for EVERYONE in release and not just VIP, but I want to see it in any form. Let us set our EKs to automatically spin-up any time any player attempts to join instead of making us have to manually spin it up (and leave someone AFKing in there if we want it to stay up, which means lots of EKs will just be spun up when no one is actively playing there because people need to keep it open all the time so really automatic spin up would save on server costs). It can spin down when no one is there, and then spin back up automatically as soon as someone joins. This is just normal instance tech that MMOs have had for years, so I'm not sure if this was already planned or not. Obviously VIP shouldn't be entirely about EKs but some EK bonuses could be a nice thing to draw some people into VIP without adding pay to win elements. A mix of VIP elements for different areas of the game would be a great way to get a variety of people to subscribe (I'll be subscribing no matter what the bonuses just to support the game). I realize some of these may be limited by performance/tech, but I tried to keep this to things that were relatively simple and not entire new systems.