Freehold Implications on Server Population & Profession

mcnasty wrote: »

I will choose a heavily populated server at launch, even if it means long queues. Reason? I don't want to land on an anemic server that dies a slow death and ends up getting merged in 3 months.

The freehold stream was fantastic. So good. This game is going to be a masterpiece.

Ngl, the freehold stream made me really want to choose processing and own a freehold, but if I'm being real, I probably won't have anywhere near enough in-game time to do the work necessary for that considering my other objectives in the game.

However, the fact that max 10% of a full server (maybe only half that or less!) will be able to have a freehold at any given time got me thinking about this server population discussion from last fall. For players who really want to focus on a freehold, it seems like they might target the less populated servers to increase their ability to obtain one. Other players won't care as much about freeholds, and may target higher pop servers for the reasons noted in this thread. With these competing objectives, we could see a pretty good leveling dynamic across server populations.

One additional thing is now also clear. Losing your freehold, either through siege or even worse, a server merger, will be absolutely painful AF. So much work, time, identity and economic incentive is tied-up in your freehold.

Lastly, it's hard to imagine choosing Processing if you don't intend to own a freehold. I personally wouldn't choose a profession that I didn't think I could master. I'm wondering if this means processors will be a small portion of the population. Seems weird, but maybe. And holy F, can you imagine losing your freehold if you're a master processor? It would cut the legs out from under you until you can re-acquire and re-build.

Very good showing @StevenSharif . So impressed with what you're doing here.

Hype. LFG.

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Ludullu

mcnasty wrote: »

One additional thing is now also clear. Losing your freehold, either through siege or even worse, a server merger, will be absolutely painful AF. So much work, time, identity and economic incentive is tied-up in your freehold.

This was always a pain point in the game and it's now an even bigger one. Though on the flipside of that, freeholds now seem way more of a business/profit type of thing, so if you managed to get one before, I'd assume you have a ton of money to bid on the new one.

I'm not sure how many people would have that kind of forethought and overall approach to the system though. Most would probably just feed all their money back into their character/freehold and not have much leftover.

mcnasty wrote: »

Lastly, it's hard to imagine choosing Processing if you don't intend to own a freehold. I personally wouldn't choose a profession that I didn't think I could master. I'm wondering if this means processors will be a small portion of the population. Seems weird, but maybe. And holy F, can you imagine losing your freehold if you're a master processor? It would cut the legs out from under you until you can re-acquire and re-build.

I feel like processing would've been the least chosen profession branch even before this change. Maybe this was even seen as a way to help processors earn good money through freeholds, cause they'd be the only ones with the ability to produce and sell top lvl processed goods.

Depraved

mcnasty wrote: »

mcnasty wrote: »

I will choose a heavily populated server at launch, even if it means long queues. Reason? I don't want to land on an anemic server that dies a slow death and ends up getting merged in 3 months.

The freehold stream was fantastic. So good. This game is going to be a masterpiece.

Ngl, the freehold stream made me really want to choose processing and own a freehold, but if I'm being real, I probably won't have anywhere near enough in-game time to do the work necessary for that considering my other objectives in the game.

However, the fact that max 10% of a full server (maybe only half that or less!) will be able to have a freehold at any given time got me thinking about this server population discussion from last fall. For players who really want to focus on a freehold, it seems like they might target the less populated servers to increase their ability to obtain one. Other players won't care as much about freeholds, and may target higher pop servers for the reasons noted in this thread. With these competing objectives, we could see a pretty good leveling dynamic across server populations.

One additional thing is now also clear. Losing your freehold, either through siege or even worse, a server merger, will be absolutely painful AF. So much work, time, identity and economic incentive is tied-up in your freehold.

Lastly, it's hard to imagine choosing Processing if you don't intend to own a freehold. I personally wouldn't choose a profession that I didn't think I could master. I'm wondering if this means processors will be a small portion of the population. Seems weird, but maybe. And holy F, can you imagine losing your freehold if you're a master processor? It would cut the legs out from under you until you can re-acquire and re-build.

Very good showing @StevenSharif . So impressed with what you're doing here.

Hype. LFG.

um if you lose your freehold, you don't lose ur character processing experience, do you? you just lose access to processing stations until you can get access to a freehold.

NiKr wrote: »

mcnasty wrote: »

One additional thing is now also clear. Losing your freehold, either through siege or even worse, a server merger, will be absolutely painful AF. So much work, time, identity and economic incentive is tied-up in your freehold.

This was always a pain point in the game and it's now an even bigger one. Though on the flipside of that, freeholds now seem way more of a business/profit type of thing, so if you managed to get one before, I'd assume you have a ton of money to bid on the new one.

I'm not sure how many people would have that kind of forethought and overall approach to the system though. Most would probably just feed all their money back into their character/freehold and not have much leftover.

mcnasty wrote: »

Lastly, it's hard to imagine choosing Processing if you don't intend to own a freehold. I personally wouldn't choose a profession that I didn't think I could master. I'm wondering if this means processors will be a small portion of the population. Seems weird, but maybe. And holy F, can you imagine losing your freehold if you're a master processor? It would cut the legs out from under you until you can re-acquire and re-build.

I feel like processing would've been the least chosen profession branch even before this change. Maybe this was even seen as a way to help processors earn good money through freeholds, cause they'd be the only ones with the ability to produce and sell top lvl processed goods.

I think the meta will be to pick gathering with your main, then processing and crafting with your alts since you can use your freehold with all your characters from your account. so it doesn't matter which character in your account picks processing and you definitely want to be a gatherer with your strongest character so that you can survive the dangers of verra out in the wild.

Ludullu

Depraved wrote: »

I think the meta will be to pick gathering with your main, then processing and crafting with your alts since you can use your freehold with all your characters from your account. so it doesn't matter which character in your account picks processing and you definitely want to be a gatherer with your strongest character so that you can survive the dangers of verra out in the wild.

If you manage to be the one who owns the freehold - yeah, potentially.

Depraved

NiKr wrote: »

Depraved wrote: »

I think the meta will be to pick gathering with your main, then processing and crafting with your alts since you can use your freehold with all your characters from your account. so it doesn't matter which character in your account picks processing and you definitely want to be a gatherer with your strongest character so that you can survive the dangers of verra out in the wild.

If you manage to be the one who owns the freehold - yeah, potentially.

obviously... for those who own it..duh xD
not everybody will do this obvs, but its probs the best thing to do.
also, remember families

Fantmx

NiKr wrote: »

mcnasty wrote: »

One additional thing is now also clear. Losing your freehold, either through siege or even worse, a server merger, will be absolutely painful AF. So much work, time, identity and economic incentive is tied-up in your freehold.

This was always a pain point in the game and it's now an even bigger one. Though on the flipside of that, freeholds now seem way more of a business/profit type of thing, so if you managed to get one before, I'd assume you have a ton of money to bid on the new one.

I'm not sure how many people would have that kind of forethought and overall approach to the system though. Most would probably just feed all their money back into their character/freehold and not have much leftover.

mcnasty wrote: »

Lastly, it's hard to imagine choosing Processing if you don't intend to own a freehold. I personally wouldn't choose a profession that I didn't think I could master. I'm wondering if this means processors will be a small portion of the population. Seems weird, but maybe. And holy F, can you imagine losing your freehold if you're a master processor? It would cut the legs out from under you until you can re-acquire and re-build.

I feel like processing would've been the least chosen profession branch even before this change. Maybe this was even seen as a way to help processors earn good money through freeholds, cause they'd be the only ones with the ability to produce and sell top lvl processed goods.

I actually wonder at what point do we start having so many pain in the ass conflict points introduced that the path of least resistance becomes the dominant path forward. Guilds working together rather than competing means no constant rebuilding and losing valuable items. There are plenty of other places for pvp to occur to counter balance a lack of node sieges.

I'm sure it will be cool and fun and new for a little while but the 10th time a guild has to rebuild and reestablish all of their freeholds I'm sure they will start looking for alternative methods.

Ludullu

Fantmx wrote: »

I actually wonder at what point do we start having so many pain in the ass conflict points introduced that the path of least resistance becomes the dominant path forward. Guilds working together rather than competing means no constant rebuilding and losing valuable items. There are plenty of other places for pvp to occur to counter balance a lack of node sieges.

I'm sure it will be cool and fun and new for a little while but the 10th time a guild has to rebuild and reestablish all of their freeholds I'm sure they will start looking for alternative methods.

Yep, good point. I hope someone at Intrepid have told or will at least notice and tell Steven that there's quite a few contradicting designs right now. Bill might just be that guy, considering his position, experience and a fresh pair of eyes.

Azherae

NiKr wrote: »

Fantmx wrote: »

I actually wonder at what point do we start having so many pain in the ass conflict points introduced that the path of least resistance becomes the dominant path forward. Guilds working together rather than competing means no constant rebuilding and losing valuable items. There are plenty of other places for pvp to occur to counter balance a lack of node sieges.

I'm sure it will be cool and fun and new for a little while but the 10th time a guild has to rebuild and reestablish all of their freeholds I'm sure they will start looking for alternative methods.

Yep, good point. I hope someone at Intrepid have told or will at least notice and tell Steven that there's quite a few contradicting designs right now. Bill might just be that guy, considering his position, experience and a fresh pair of eyes.

The odd part of this is, the less depth the game has, the more likely people are to just 'up and rebuild' because the thing they are invested in is their personal experience, ego, etc.

The more depth you add, the more you dilute people's emotional investment over multiple aspects (the sort who have reactions to be invested in something other than ego and their combat/econ skill).

And even when it's nothing other than 'Hey we're at least not losing' people have still often done this. The point of the conflict cannot be 'to not lose it' for the majority of players, it has to be 'to enjoy the process of competing', because by simple statistics the majority of players are in the 'you win some, you lose some' band.

The only way to avoid 'losing some' is to not agree to not fight. Maybe that's what Steven is counting on? That in the end, Ashes will evolve toward peace?

Raven016

Fantmx wrote: »

NiKr wrote: »

mcnasty wrote: »

One additional thing is now also clear. Losing your freehold, either through siege or even worse, a server merger, will be absolutely painful AF. So much work, time, identity and economic incentive is tied-up in your freehold.

This was always a pain point in the game and it's now an even bigger one. Though on the flipside of that, freeholds now seem way more of a business/profit type of thing, so if you managed to get one before, I'd assume you have a ton of money to bid on the new one.

I'm not sure how many people would have that kind of forethought and overall approach to the system though. Most would probably just feed all their money back into their character/freehold and not have much leftover.

mcnasty wrote: »

Lastly, it's hard to imagine choosing Processing if you don't intend to own a freehold. I personally wouldn't choose a profession that I didn't think I could master. I'm wondering if this means processors will be a small portion of the population. Seems weird, but maybe. And holy F, can you imagine losing your freehold if you're a master processor? It would cut the legs out from under you until you can re-acquire and re-build.

I feel like processing would've been the least chosen profession branch even before this change. Maybe this was even seen as a way to help processors earn good money through freeholds, cause they'd be the only ones with the ability to produce and sell top lvl processed goods.

I actually wonder at what point do we start having so many pain in the ass conflict points introduced that the path of least resistance becomes the dominant path forward. Guilds working together rather than competing means no constant rebuilding and losing valuable items. There are plenty of other places for pvp to occur to counter balance a lack of node sieges.

I'm sure it will be cool and fun and new for a little while but the 10th time a guild has to rebuild and reestablish all of their freeholds I'm sure they will start looking for alternative methods.

Players will just slow down the rate of sieges when the pain is too high. Then will siege again when they get bored. Or they leave the game.

Fantmx

Raven016 wrote: »

Fantmx wrote: »

NiKr wrote: »

mcnasty wrote: »

One additional thing is now also clear. Losing your freehold, either through siege or even worse, a server merger, will be absolutely painful AF. So much work, time, identity and economic incentive is tied-up in your freehold.

This was always a pain point in the game and it's now an even bigger one. Though on the flipside of that, freeholds now seem way more of a business/profit type of thing, so if you managed to get one before, I'd assume you have a ton of money to bid on the new one.

I'm not sure how many people would have that kind of forethought and overall approach to the system though. Most would probably just feed all their money back into their character/freehold and not have much leftover.

mcnasty wrote: »

Lastly, it's hard to imagine choosing Processing if you don't intend to own a freehold. I personally wouldn't choose a profession that I didn't think I could master. I'm wondering if this means processors will be a small portion of the population. Seems weird, but maybe. And holy F, can you imagine losing your freehold if you're a master processor? It would cut the legs out from under you until you can re-acquire and re-build.

I feel like processing would've been the least chosen profession branch even before this change. Maybe this was even seen as a way to help processors earn good money through freeholds, cause they'd be the only ones with the ability to produce and sell top lvl processed goods.

I actually wonder at what point do we start having so many pain in the ass conflict points introduced that the path of least resistance becomes the dominant path forward. Guilds working together rather than competing means no constant rebuilding and losing valuable items. There are plenty of other places for pvp to occur to counter balance a lack of node sieges.

I'm sure it will be cool and fun and new for a little while but the 10th time a guild has to rebuild and reestablish all of their freeholds I'm sure they will start looking for alternative methods.

Players will just slow down the rate of sieges when the pain is too high. Then will siege again when they get bored. Or they leave the game.

But that goes against the design pillars, which is my main point. Are they adding so many systems of conflict that they end up in a self defeating position?

Depraved

Fantmx wrote: »

NiKr wrote: »

mcnasty wrote: »

One additional thing is now also clear. Losing your freehold, either through siege or even worse, a server merger, will be absolutely painful AF. So much work, time, identity and economic incentive is tied-up in your freehold.

This was always a pain point in the game and it's now an even bigger one. Though on the flipside of that, freeholds now seem way more of a business/profit type of thing, so if you managed to get one before, I'd assume you have a ton of money to bid on the new one.

I'm not sure how many people would have that kind of forethought and overall approach to the system though. Most would probably just feed all their money back into their character/freehold and not have much leftover.

mcnasty wrote: »

Lastly, it's hard to imagine choosing Processing if you don't intend to own a freehold. I personally wouldn't choose a profession that I didn't think I could master. I'm wondering if this means processors will be a small portion of the population. Seems weird, but maybe. And holy F, can you imagine losing your freehold if you're a master processor? It would cut the legs out from under you until you can re-acquire and re-build.

I feel like processing would've been the least chosen profession branch even before this change. Maybe this was even seen as a way to help processors earn good money through freeholds, cause they'd be the only ones with the ability to produce and sell top lvl processed goods.

I actually wonder at what point do we start having so many pain in the ass conflict points introduced that the path of least resistance becomes the dominant path forward. Guilds working together rather than competing means no constant rebuilding and losing valuable items. There are plenty of other places for pvp to occur to counter balance a lack of node sieges.

I'm sure it will be cool and fun and new for a little while but the 10th time a guild has to rebuild and reestablish all of their freeholds I'm sure they will start looking for alternative methods.

yeah guilds working together and all that, but guess what? there arent enough resources for everybody. so even if guilds worked together, and I'm saying every single guild in the server, then you will have distribution problems. why do I have to wait 1 year to get an item (or my guild) when I (we) are contributing equally and as much as all the other players (guilds) do you see the problem now? your "solution" only works when there are enough resources for everybody. remember there is scarcity in this game, that's why people compete, so they can have access to the limited resources =_=

also, statistically speaking, more people enjoy cooperative-competitive games (activities).

Fantmx

The point of working together is to fairly distribute items and resources....."working" "together".

I don't understand what you think working together means...

Raven016

Fantmx wrote: »

Raven016 wrote: »

Fantmx wrote: »

NiKr wrote: »

mcnasty wrote: »

One additional thing is now also clear. Losing your freehold, either through siege or even worse, a server merger, will be absolutely painful AF. So much work, time, identity and economic incentive is tied-up in your freehold.

This was always a pain point in the game and it's now an even bigger one. Though on the flipside of that, freeholds now seem way more of a business/profit type of thing, so if you managed to get one before, I'd assume you have a ton of money to bid on the new one.

I'm not sure how many people would have that kind of forethought and overall approach to the system though. Most would probably just feed all their money back into their character/freehold and not have much leftover.

mcnasty wrote: »

Lastly, it's hard to imagine choosing Processing if you don't intend to own a freehold. I personally wouldn't choose a profession that I didn't think I could master. I'm wondering if this means processors will be a small portion of the population. Seems weird, but maybe. And holy F, can you imagine losing your freehold if you're a master processor? It would cut the legs out from under you until you can re-acquire and re-build.

I feel like processing would've been the least chosen profession branch even before this change. Maybe this was even seen as a way to help processors earn good money through freeholds, cause they'd be the only ones with the ability to produce and sell top lvl processed goods.

I actually wonder at what point do we start having so many pain in the ass conflict points introduced that the path of least resistance becomes the dominant path forward. Guilds working together rather than competing means no constant rebuilding and losing valuable items. There are plenty of other places for pvp to occur to counter balance a lack of node sieges.

I'm sure it will be cool and fun and new for a little while but the 10th time a guild has to rebuild and reestablish all of their freeholds I'm sure they will start looking for alternative methods.

Players will just slow down the rate of sieges when the pain is too high. Then will siege again when they get bored. Or they leave the game.

But that goes against the design pillars, which is my main point. Are they adding so many systems of conflict that they end up in a self defeating position?

I don't know what you mean. But in the end, the more people play the better for the game is, assuming the game is made also for profit. If the game is made just for players, without profit being the main objective, then Steven can chose whatever player audience type he wants. He may even make mistakes and fail. Or he can change his mind if he thinks he made a mistake. Some players will blame changes anyway.

Depraved

Fantmx wrote: »

The point of working together is to fairly distribute items and resources....."working" "together".

I don't understand what you think working together means...

that defeats the purpose of a competition...

you can work together with your allies to defeat your enemies. you just want a pve game then.

you can still make an agreement with other guilds where no one every attacks each other, no wars, no sieges, but then you wont have caravans or naval combat. when are you going to pvp? remember when you win in PVP you take other people resources. nothing stops you from becoming friends with other guild leaders and all agreeing to not fight and live peacefully and happily ever after

Fantmx

Depraved wrote: »

that defeats the purpose of a competition...

You are agreeing with me here. Do you realize that?

I said what if they add so point points of conflict it becomes easier for guilds to work together rather than in conflict. That would go against what they are trying to do in creating a world that changes through conflict and competition, their design pillars.

Depraved

facepalm

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