Should We Clear? - 2009 Edition

[Particle]

It's that time again.  It has been suggested that we clear the server.  As with last time, I still believe this is a good thing to do.  There aren't tons of players like back in the day, and that's probably partly due to things being so damn boring.  There's an insurmountable gap between players that prevents any kind of PKing or NPC killing from being anything more than an automatic win.

No poll.  Post with your opinion clearly stated [Yes/No] and then elaborate on why you believe so.

A few quick notes:

• People who don't play anymore:  You've already removed yourself from the game, effectively, so it really isn't necessary for you to post anything unless you're intending to play again after a clear.
• People who play now:  Please explain your opinion either way.

As always, ultimately it's up to me.  Popular vote does help shape my opinion, however.

Also, Yes/No me on each of the following.  They are proposed generally for the betterment of gameplay, the economy, etc so don't reject them for selfish reasons.

• Coins limit - Help keep people down to reasonable amounts of cash, helping to keep the economy going.
• Storage limits - Another economy-motivated factor.
• RL cap - Perhaps use other kinds of rewards other than allowing people to become infinitely more powerful.
• New map - DL required but more interesting.

Direct your friends and other players here so they can state their piece.

[astal]

I think we should clear... It's really extremely boring in pcrpg now. I can kill nearly everyone that plays. It's no fun for the people that are just starting. Now everyone can start again. Anyway barely anyone gets on now because they know they'll never get to a high level.

    * Coins limit -- It seems ok because there is way too much money in the game.
    * Storage limits -- Well it would help the money situation as well because you wont be able to store 50 million claymores
    * RL cap -- I do think if there was one it should be around rl 300, because that's when it starts getting bad
    * New map -- Meh, doesn't matter but it would take some work wouldnt it?

[x-ta-c]

I don't think we should clear. If it isn't evident already, there anre not enough player as it is; not due to the huge, insumountable gap between the oldschool and new players, but due to the rediculous age of tribes itself. Clearing the server would do nothing except clear out the people who do decide to stop by and play once in a while. I for one, would quit, as I've invested way too much time into my toon to have it cleared due to an inactive server.

And I agree with Astal's 4 points. coin limit would maybe spice things up, and storage limit would help with the coin limit part. Remort cap is understandable, but would kinda kill the motivation to be the highest rl player =p. New map? I'm all about it!

Really, if you want to bring more players in; add some more content.. like.. A LOT more. If people hear that the most successful trpg server is planning lots of new content, or a big expansion, I'm sure they'll be interested. Expand the map, add items, maybe some decent quests that dont involve "go get me x# of blah and i'll give you a useless, small reward".

[Riddle]

i dont think i want a clear.
im to busy to be able to play as much as i used to and iv spent so much time on riddle.
i log on when i can but if there were a clear im pretty sure i would prolly quit and find other things to do. and i agree with xtac. a clear wont bring more people. it would prolly jus make players that worked hard leave.

coin limit i agree with. i have 200 mil and have no idea waht to do with it since i dont buy anything. i have everything i need. how bout putting money to be more necessary. like to store stuff you gotta pay. get me? like storing a anchets sword should cost some $, the amount increases with how much better the item is. so cheap weapons like hatchet can be like 5 coins to store while a keldrinitels could be like 5k. somethin like that. you decide the prices

storage limit should be placed as well per item. like depending on how good it is.
if it were a kls then you could only store like around 5 in storage. if it were a broad sword you can store like 100.
somethin like that.

rl cap. hmm well being the highest rl is what most pple care about and if you were to set an rl cap what would happen when they reach that cap? they would probably end up leavin since itd be like the end of the game at that point. i have a sorta idea. when you remort you get a +.1 multi on every stat. but instead how bout only 5 stats can go up by .1 and its the players choice by which he wants to have that .1 boost. you see where im goin right? or does it still not makesense?

new map sounds nice! i wanna explore like when i first began! explorin on that first boat to ethren was nice n tryin to learn the map i enjoyed all that.
i agree with X on the decent quests. and maybe you can make houses actually useful as no one really joins them.
how bout really really complicated quests that give great rewards, but only requirement is you must be in a house.
or like the top weaps and stuff can only be used if you are in a house!
thatd spice things up and raise competition amongst players. except try and make it where players cant all join a single house in hope that no one will pk them. so try keeping balance among the houses.
maybe some special things houses can fight over as well so there can be like wars among houses

oh and anyone kno corona/codehs email address? i sorta wanna talk to him bout packtropolis since i think its sorta a cheap quest....

[astal]

I guess a clear wouldn't exactly be that great but it is a little boring... anyway just like put in the new things and maybe that will do something lol

[Dyre]

I haven't played in forever, however...

I'm always for a restart, primarily because it gives a perfect excuse to make changes to the mod.  If a clear means seeing some big changes, then I doubt anyone would be against it.

edit:

Jeez..  It's been five years since the last clear.

[x-ta-c]

Hehe; at this point.. Clearing pcrpg would be like clearing WoW. Anyone who played the game for any more than the time it took them to hit rl50+ most likely would not come back. Clearing the server = end of PCRPG imho..

[PheeNuX]

Clearing for the sake of making it an even playing field would be the final demise of PCRPG. Not sure how many people still play tribes or even take note of how active the server is but I can tell you that it is really disappointing to see 3-4 regular people online with the occasional drop in from someone looking to #bash or #mug (just enough to keep you on your toes). The disappointing part is when you put it into perspective that once there was a time where there were so many people on the server that it caused the server to lag and there was multiple people in different zones with lots of good times.

So something happened which caused the population to die down, perhaps the fact that tribes no longer has a master server running, there are master servers but they aren't the default which makes it difficult for those people who download tribes for free and have no idea why they can't see any servers.

So if you cleared to make the game even, I don't think that would work as there are only half a dozen people who play regularly but if you cleared to allow for new content, that may interest some of the older players to make a return.

[Bovidi]

Well I would personally say clear.  Although I am not really active in Particles anymore.  On a side note if you do decide a clear maybe wait until you see what happens when Tribes version 1.40 gets released.

A few things that took away the fun for me was:
Coins (It should be a struggle to get coins, maybe if claymores and other expensive items sold for less)
Killing/mining while in storage (If you are in storage make it so you can't hit anyone)
Limit weight cap (Kind of crazy how much you can carry when you start getting a higher RL)
Skill multiplier (Every remort you get 0.1 extra multiplier...maybe it should be switched to something lower, since at rl 100 it becomes too easy)
Less SP per remort / SP limit (So you can't store enough SP to basically carry you through the remorts)
Less additional SP skill (Every remort you get another 1 that you can add to your skill before it gets capped maybe making that less)

Anyways that is just my opinion

[Dyre]

I think there's plenty of ways the entire mod could be improved on quite a bit.  Of course, that involves development, which involves time.  It's plausible that Tribes v1.40 will end up breaking TRPG, and also plausible that it will increase the engine's overall potential.  I honestly believe that a fresher TRPG would revitalize the community, though, even if it means clearing.

I wonder if there's some people in the community who might be interested in beginning TRPG development once again.  With a new official patch for Tribes hitting, we might have a massive opportunity here, and might be forced to update TRPG anyways.

Anyways, I think this is getting a little off topic, which I might be guilty of starting  .  Perhaps we should consider a general TRPG wishlist/brainstorming thread.  Perhaps ideas that are well received could be considered for implementation.

[Kyrie]

I would miss my two over-developed characters, that's for sure!

Haven't had time to play lately due to tax season, but I'll be back.

I would only clear under the conditions that significant changes would be integrated into the game immediately after the clear. Like, clear the character database, restart the server, and all changes are there.

I would also only do it if it would mean the mod has been made compatible with 1.40 (IA's Tribes release). I haven't heard any info on when that's due to hit, though.

The main issue that the game suffers from is that it's too easy at higher remorts.
There are viable solutions to that, they'll just take work.

-Decrease the amount of lck received on remort, do not give out excessive amounts of lck in quests, and disable buying of lck (Or make it expensive, and only purchaseable in limited quantities).
-Decrease the HP bonus on each Remort. Use a max HP amount, modifiable by your base stat (higher base stat = higher max HP).
-Remove SP? Instead, distribute a set amount of SP for each skill on each level up. You could do it where the skill gained is equal to the base stat, essentially, you'd give 1 sp to each skill on each level up. You'd have to change skill requirements for that to work.
Alternatively, at each level up, automatically distribute a specific amount to each skill on each level up, enough that players can use appropriate skills/weapons/levels when needed, determined by their base skill (to determine which weapon they should be using).
-Skills don't increase by use.

The result of these changes:
Less lck. Since lck has been made rare, players will take more care to protect their amount of it.
Less HP. Players are easier to kill, no matter their level or remort. Players must take more care to stay alive.
Less SP. Players cannot become super powerful through extreme skill increases.
No max remort means that players can continue to remort until they have 'perfect' stats.
If you set max stats at 100, and each skill increases by .1 for each remort, it would take 500 remorts for a mage to reach 'perfect' stats (if their HP starts at 0.2), but only 50 remorts to reach perfect casting.
Of course, you could tweak it to be whatever level you want just by changing the max level for each stat.

[Particle]

Looks like a clear isn't popular at this time.  We'll just keep on trucking then.

I would like to get some new stuff into the mod, but it's clear to me that I'm unlikely to make it happen.  What we really need are some dedicated mappers/prefabbers.  We've had people intend to contribute before, but I never receive anything.  heh

I'd be happy to pay money for such contribution.  I just can't seem to find anyone.

[Jonathan]

It has been too long to simply just clear now. We need new additions. It seemed to me even the admins got so bored with the mod they started to max their characters remort levels just to see how high they could go meanwhile doing little quests or anything else that would make players want to stay in the server.

I would like to suggest the remort level cap and storage cap. Having a new map and models would be nice, but it really would not change anything after about a month. I am not sure about a coins cap, but I will say that the money comes way too easily and even by remort level 2 or 3 you may have every item in the game. This leaves little to look forward to in the game as a player and add on the fact that you go through the same zone rotation each remort and it is boring.

Maybe not all of these are so easy implement, but even small additions like twice as fast cheetaurs paws (a rare drop or extra expensive) would make things more interesting. Not every player should have the exact same things in their inventory. Throw in a lot of different rare drops that CAN be mugged.

Make items that are individual to classes. Maybe you start with them or you have a certain chance of getting one every five remorts.

Whatever the case I think the days of remorting the same way and as many times as you can just to see how high you can get your multipliers should end. Having 500,400 even only 200 remorts allowed would be a good place to start. From there you can start working on making playing through to this point not exactly the same each time. I know everyone with high level characters is going to whine about this, but you are only putting the nails in the coffin.

As for the new terrain I found it very frustrating to try to replicate and/or manipulate the current hills using the terrain editor. You can only select so many tiles at a time and even working with a small grid tribes would crash again and again. I do not know how they original team did it, perhaps asking a coder would be going in the right direction.

[Arf]

The Server that Evil is referring to is mine,  It is a collaboration of Cody's original ideas, with some very talented additions by some very talented individuals.  I will make it available to everyone,  hell i will donate it to PCRPG if needed.  Just let me know what you want to do

[Vorter_X_]

How about 2 cents from an oldbie? I haven't been here in forever, but I am extremely familiar with the mapping UI that came with Tribes. A short time ago I had gotten to the point where I was implementing buildings I had created myself, I'm not the best, but I was copying blueprints of castles and stuff my friends were drawing. I don't prefer to make my own buildings as that is not my best talent. I can't even say I can contribute much...I've said I would before, and ended up with no time to do it, or no motivation...I stopped playing WOW about 3 months ago and have since not been doing anything but playing freeware and ps3 games with my brother in law...And working...I might have stuff stashed on here...Or old HDDs from back in the day. I had a completely new layout to the RPGMap using all the original buildings and such, I quickly whipped up a new set of items and standard effects, nothing flashy...not my dept...And I had to replace nearly all of the NPC's...I need to stop going on about this....Umm...I uploaded a couple screenshots of Cerrasti...And I think I gave the files to SirScarve here...Idk if he has them still...