I have been noticing the past few weeks though what appears to be a steep decline in the overall population on Iron Rock, and it's making me nervous. My guilds onliners has recently seemed to plummet. People seem to be checking out other games as we await the release of the new RvR dungeon and 1.4. I can't say that I blame them. There are some really nice looking and fun games out there right now. Not to mention, if you already have a couple rank 80's, Warhammer can get stale fast.
My question is, will these players come back? The answer with most will more than likely be yes, but I do fear that the games overall population will struggle a bit further. Is it to late for the game? Doubtful. The next few months seem very promising for Warhammer, and I am more than exciting to try it all out. Past that though, what do we have? At some point people will again cap out at rank 100. What will entice them this time that we don't currently have? Personally I think think the time to rank (TTR) from 80 to 100 should be crazy hard. Something that an average player probably will never attain. If TTR was actually difficult, people may not be getting so bored so quickly. The right balance of Renown vs. Time has to be achieved, and I don't think it is something we currently have.
Some suggestions might be as follows:
- Removal of damage / healing renown (only based on player kills)
- Removal of renown for BO's and Keeps
- Slightly increased renown for successful city siege
- Removal of renown for zone flips
- Slightly bit of renown for a lock in a zone pairing
- No more renown bonus items
Oh HELL no. People have been clamoring for the King weapons that are now the RR 100 SC weapons since beta. Making the road to get to use them any longer is a losing strategy that will seriously piss off the people who can't grind RR 24/7.
ReplyDeleteI echo your thoughts concerning IR. Our alliance activity has gone down over recent weeks. Even our guild activity is a little light.
ReplyDeleteBtw, I ran into you the other day in Praag. I am Datum (BW) of Sacred Legion. I know...it wasn't fair. We were like 4 on 1. We just couldn't help ourselves. I was like, "It's a Squiggy....GET HIM!!".
You stink, Vizo! You're little gobbo dropped me like the lame player I am!
ReplyDeleteI'm sure there will be many players who grind their way to RR100 quickly by playing an ungodly number of hours, but overall it will be quite steep. Then given time it will probably lessen just as it's easier to hit 80 today than it was within the first 6 months of the game. Not that I'm 80 yet.
If the proposed renown for RvR is true you could see some big renown rolling in. Every time a resource carrier delivers everyone in zone will get some.
Datum, I'm gonna have to keep my eye out for you now =p
ReplyDeleteRenoun for kills only?
ReplyDeleteWouldn't that fuck the support classes, particularly healers?
Your goal can be accomplished (and most easily implemented by Mythic) by simply bumping up the rp required to get to the next renoun level.
Where's the fun in the game, though? Is it leveling? Or playing? Personally, the game would not get stale for me just because I hit RR100 or 80 or whatever the max ends up being.
I'd like to get to max as soon as I can though, so I can be on even footing with the guys I am going up against.
The fun in playing (for me) is the combat itself. When I max out renoun I will probably end up going back and doing all the PVE quests. Maybe try my hand at crafting. I dunno.
In fact I wish there was a way I could stop gaining xp so I could keep a character in each tier. T2 has been the most fun for me so far I think.
Anyway, nice blog. Peace out.