Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Alpha Two Phase II testing is currently taking place 5+ days each week. More information about testing schedule can be found here
If you have Alpha Two, you can download the game launcher here, and we encourage you to join us on our Official Discord Server for the most up to date testing news.
Alpha Two Phase II testing is currently taking place 5+ days each week. More information about testing schedule can be found here
If you have Alpha Two, you can download the game launcher here, and we encourage you to join us on our Official Discord Server for the most up to date testing news.
[Feedback] The most important issues in Alpha 2!
FEDChurch
Member, Alpha Two
Hey Ashes Friends,
Here are some thoughts (and proposed fixes in bold) from a larger-sized organization on things we think may need looked at sooner, rather than later:
-Time-to-kill adjustments in PvP - the enchanting system is a good start, as Steven talked about... but balancing PvE and PvP metas will be challenging without a secondary stat or debuff (similar to WoW's "resilience" stat, or a game-wide debuff that reduces dmg taken from players)
-Processing changes - processing materials is in a tough spot. Having people walk across the map to process something is one thing (I know we have some more options coming down the line)... but then making them wait hours for it is a bit limiting. This combined with our next point can make the system tedious, at best. We think halfing processing time would be a start.
-Gathering rarity adjustment - set gathering node rarities isn't a good option. All of the nodes should be random within their tiers in our opinion. It's tough to even get ahold of legendary mats, as those specific nodes are ALWAYS legendary (and therefore always camped).
-World bosses and best-in-slot gear - with Tumok still turned off indefinitely, and Firebrand not spawning or bugged, there is an obvious lack of end-game content for people to utilize. Other than "farm glint until your eyes bleed" for enchanting and materials, there isn't other options for gear progression currently, and even with the bosses we are lacking. I think this also is exacerbated by the level 10 gear meta, since none of the current best pieces are level 20 drops from end-game PvE. We really need more options, or fixes to current bosses, at minimum.
-Guild Leveling System adjustments - obviously I had a post on this before, and the price for commodities was reduced by ~75% which helped a ton. That being said, the cost to level a guild to level 2 or 3 is just astronomical. We think the guild exp needed to level from 1-4 should be reduced by about half to give more casual guilds a chance to at least test the systems. A 15-20 person guild should be able to get ONE skill point in a week or so. Currently that couldn't be further from the truth.
-Caravan risk versus reward - this one is tough because it is basically the single source of consistent income and content that the game offers in alpha. We think that smaller groups and solo players get disproportionately punished for losing a caravan, as they take a bigger risk at the same reward as other group. Losing 10-50g in caravan parts to potentially net 15g is a tough investment. Again, we understand that all of the systems are intertwined, so fixing gathering makes higher tier parts more accessible, etc. But ultimately, we think making a set caravan recovery cost (where you get your van back), or maybe only destroying 1 of the caravan parts on destruction (instead of the entire van) could help.
-Node development - the major issue currently is that populated nodes are leaps and bounds ahead of unpopulated nodes. It's a very unforgiving system for all of the servers currently. You are relying on node mayors to work together to even get benches up to be able to test systems that are in the game... when in reality, it shouldn't be benches that are holding up people from testing content. We think each node should have a buy order that citizens can use to funnel gold to other nodes. So for example: Winstead mayor could put up a commission where their citizens could kill X amount of bears to funnel 5g to the node currency of Azmaran, or whatever node is selected. It would help close the gap a bit.
Thanks for listening! We would love input from everyone on this!
Here are some thoughts (and proposed fixes in bold) from a larger-sized organization on things we think may need looked at sooner, rather than later:
-Time-to-kill adjustments in PvP - the enchanting system is a good start, as Steven talked about... but balancing PvE and PvP metas will be challenging without a secondary stat or debuff (similar to WoW's "resilience" stat, or a game-wide debuff that reduces dmg taken from players)
-Processing changes - processing materials is in a tough spot. Having people walk across the map to process something is one thing (I know we have some more options coming down the line)... but then making them wait hours for it is a bit limiting. This combined with our next point can make the system tedious, at best. We think halfing processing time would be a start.
-Gathering rarity adjustment - set gathering node rarities isn't a good option. All of the nodes should be random within their tiers in our opinion. It's tough to even get ahold of legendary mats, as those specific nodes are ALWAYS legendary (and therefore always camped).
-World bosses and best-in-slot gear - with Tumok still turned off indefinitely, and Firebrand not spawning or bugged, there is an obvious lack of end-game content for people to utilize. Other than "farm glint until your eyes bleed" for enchanting and materials, there isn't other options for gear progression currently, and even with the bosses we are lacking. I think this also is exacerbated by the level 10 gear meta, since none of the current best pieces are level 20 drops from end-game PvE. We really need more options, or fixes to current bosses, at minimum.
-Guild Leveling System adjustments - obviously I had a post on this before, and the price for commodities was reduced by ~75% which helped a ton. That being said, the cost to level a guild to level 2 or 3 is just astronomical. We think the guild exp needed to level from 1-4 should be reduced by about half to give more casual guilds a chance to at least test the systems. A 15-20 person guild should be able to get ONE skill point in a week or so. Currently that couldn't be further from the truth.
-Caravan risk versus reward - this one is tough because it is basically the single source of consistent income and content that the game offers in alpha. We think that smaller groups and solo players get disproportionately punished for losing a caravan, as they take a bigger risk at the same reward as other group. Losing 10-50g in caravan parts to potentially net 15g is a tough investment. Again, we understand that all of the systems are intertwined, so fixing gathering makes higher tier parts more accessible, etc. But ultimately, we think making a set caravan recovery cost (where you get your van back), or maybe only destroying 1 of the caravan parts on destruction (instead of the entire van) could help.
-Node development - the major issue currently is that populated nodes are leaps and bounds ahead of unpopulated nodes. It's a very unforgiving system for all of the servers currently. You are relying on node mayors to work together to even get benches up to be able to test systems that are in the game... when in reality, it shouldn't be benches that are holding up people from testing content. We think each node should have a buy order that citizens can use to funnel gold to other nodes. So for example: Winstead mayor could put up a commission where their citizens could kill X amount of bears to funnel 5g to the node currency of Azmaran, or whatever node is selected. It would help close the gap a bit.
Thanks for listening! We would love input from everyone on this!
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Comments
As far as nodes being held back, that is simply the game. That is what is always going to happen, and is intended. For testing it would be cool to see things expedited, but it’s not needed as other systems aren’t in place yet regardless. We don’t need to test the high end crafting as the system is already going to be scrapped and reimplemented in the future anyways. If you want to test the balance of those items, my answer is the same; balance does not matter right now and them tuning the crafting really makes no difference.
The reality is that you and your guild rushed to the end of the game as it exists right now and you are now bored. That’s fine. Many are. There has been a massive drop off in participation this past week because many others have hit the “wall” as well.
I suggest waiting until more content can be tested rather than attempting to get hot fixes in for things that don’t actually matter, as they are still being worked on internally.
We are far from bored. I'd argue that we are the most active guild in all of Ashes. And i mentioned multiple times that there are updates coming for some of these problems. But some of them can be addressed to make ALPHA better. "Just wait" is a fine answer... but probably not the best one. I think things that discourage testing certain game mechanics in an alpha are limiting... as we are all testers willing to test... but don't have the option to.
Good points to be honest, and all of them are Definatly needing some adjustment in one way or another to the systems currently in place
I don’t think the guild xp required to lvl is too much, it could be reduced a small amount but I understand we’re not suppose to get it quickly ,however at the amount it is at now, I don’t think any small guild will be able to get too far with it. The reduction in commodities was a great start.
Processing : I love how rare and hard the mats/gear is to get in this game. It should be a lot of work. It’s not for the weak. Gotta have a certain grind in you to get kitted in this game. It’s great. But something’s off with processing , I think it’s time just needs to be reduced while being able to have multiple queues rolling on the proper bench. Having to run from node to note and wait around for hours to process in bulk is such a time sink, hell even processing 15 willow boards is 30 min of time. It’s not good for anyone. An option to queue up and cook at the same time would be really nice, halving processing or even making it instant tbh would be clutch.
Rarity: Having epic & Lego raw mats be gate kept by people setting timers on a node and going back to it constantly is rough.
Ttk: Please don’t nerf enchanting into the ground or reset enchanted gear. Too much time and gold and grinding has been put into enchanting / crafting bis gear.
If anything just give us more HP, easy.
Glint: oh why , oh why do you not want us to have all the shiny glint and gold?! They call me Glint Eastwood! I want the glint! I love gold! Please don’t take anymore glint farms/spawn away from us.
Great game, great alpha test so far. Keep up the good work gamers!
The solution to me as a player is simple; create an alt and park it at the table. Become my own ecosystem when it comes to processing materials. This solution is not fun due to it not being social. If your solution upon reading this is “just run back to the table after an hour” you are missing the point; it isn’t worth my time running across the map every other hour. I have better things to do, as do you. Value your own time more. What’s more, I know plenty of crafters who are swearing off crafting next phase. Nobody wants to be the (underpaid, under appreciated) town NPC. Nobody wants gold and time sink jobs. If it’s meant to be a profession why doesn’t it feel worthwhile? It’s dull even for pve focused players.
Regarding the other points; I’m hoping static rarity for resources is just a placeholder until more sophisticated spawning is implemented. I understand devs want people fighting for resources. However all they have right now are a handful of people with spreadsheets and timers farming all of the good resources and hoarding them. It’s less social friction and more “trickle down economics”.
Node development: I want to be able to ally with other nodes, if even temporarily, and help send resources through mayoral commissions. This is a great gold and time sink that I find favorable. It feels like an actual investment.
Caravans: only the driver has any sort of risk. This has to change. People running caravans are not just risking commodities but also the entire caravan itself. The risk of losing it all stops many people from ever trying, which is a shame. Can we talk about the flagging system as well? It is terrible. The party/raid lead flagging for attack or defend should apply it and flag the entire party, or create a pop up like loot table changes.
Anyway thanks for reading tldr; I love this game, and want it to do well. I’m not bored!
Yea great points here.
You hit every nail square on the head with this. Could not agree more.
The guild commodities nerf was good, however i worry about the higher levels of guilds costing so much. Also the issue of small guilds not being able to achieve some of those numbers.
For defending caravans there isnt much incentive for a random person running by you to just flag defender and continue on the journey. Obviously the social interaction of it, but i think there can be someway you can sweeten the deal systematically without it becoming abusable.
This might be small but one of the most frustrating things for me is just not being able to right click someones name in chat and invite. Also not being able to inspect someone or /reply.
I also dont care for the resource rarity system. Farming a timer to go hit a tree isnt great. I would much rather have them as a random chance to spawn or something. So many times my group members have been like “i can only run for 40 minutes then i gotta drop to get this legendary willow/braidwood”
Farming glint to your eyes bleed could use some adjustments. Even if its a simple as glint dropped is evenly distributed amongst party members.
Just some things I’ve encountered
I like your caravan idea, like on destroy the van goes back to the home city or launch citycaravan master inventory but loses gear based on the upgrades. Like if you have a all the components upgraded maybe they lose 3 of the 5 (example scale).
Regarding guild XP, I still think more thought and opinions should be shared from Intrepid itself. From related items they talk about I am not sure if this game is for people that just want to chill with a 30 person guild and if they do, then they need to work harder. If they implemented some type of guild XP scale ppl would just cheat the system somehow by staying small and then expanding or some other version. Also, while we are in the same guild I don't disagree with a concept of long grinds for leveling guilds. To long and we say ppl will just quit because it's to hard but to short and end game content happens to fast and they quit. Long term goals need a balance and it only seems terrible because most want instant satisfaction. I think a decrease could be healthy for alpha just to test the levels and perks but at launch I think it should take a long time to level, I wouldn't consider a month of running a couple a week at 50ppl to get one level would be unacceptable. It'll either force these smaller guilds to team up and become a force or accept the grind. They might quit but ppl will always find a reason too anyway.
Last, to wompie, how could anyone be bored running from town to town for hours trying to craft one piece of equipment! That said they have talked about more buildings to have more crafting so I think that needs pan out. Steven did say something about needing a node wipe in phase three to implement some new items like the vassal system. He's also talked about these temporary things they do in alpha and it wouldn't be bad to temporarily decrease the needs to build up these nodes for alpha if node wipes are in the future.
Also I'm pretty sure we are just going to destroy azmaran when sieges come out anyway so rip on the jm options anyway.
😂
1. Cannot trace the xp for turning in guild commodities
Or
2. Make it so anyone can run guild commodities even if they are not in a guild so they can sell them.
Trading guild commodities does make it 1000000% unfair to smaller guilds intent or not, if bigger guilds like us or pirates can have their zergs run commodities and stack XP into one guild they will burn the smaller guilds regardless of which branch. This system should force a guild to review their players and slot people that want to participate in order to grow, not just the hyped up sweaty ppl with ADHD while asking devoted ppl to go farm the xp and hand it over (we do not do the ladder, it's all voluntary). Sure they can drop and add ppl later but reward the participants.
Option two is also acceptable because then the smaller guilds or big ones can buy the xp and this could help offset larger guilds trading them. Also greedy players in a big guild will just sell their shit too so that. I'm sure ppl can sell them now no problem but those with out a guild are cut off from this rev stream.
My takes:
TTK- 100% agree a secondary stat for PvP would be the easiest solution. A "if player=true::half,damage" is also a solution. BUT these are not necessarily the rights solutions. We are currently stuck at what will be the mid-game where gear seems to drastically change the power of the player. Changes to these systems now might have a drastically different impact at what will be the end game. However it wouldn't hurt to try these things now to see what kind of impact it has on PvP as a whole.
I am not a fan of stat compression as a solution. We like big numbers. I don't think it would hurt to change the way Con contributes to HP. Instead of 10 hp per con make it 20. See what happens. Things can always be rolled back. It's Alpha.
Processing- I don't mind the time sink for crafting but it needs to be adjusted to be in balance from processing class to processing class in regards to final crafted product.
Gathering Rarities- 100% agree gathering nodes shouldn't be campable. I know artisan classes will eventually have skill trees (??). A solution i believe would be to create a threshold meter for gathering. Keep the rarities random but allow for the threshold meter to very slowly increase your rarity quality over time the longer you go without hitting a legendary (per type of resource). Perhaps even make the player choose which resource they want the meter to be active for. I need leggo tin so I'm going to activate that meter so that every tin node I hit contributes to that until I get some but the other mining resources would remain complete RNG. RNG sucks so there needs to be a way to reward the time investment if someone decides to grind for 8hrs for a particular type of resource.
World Bosses and BiS gear - Yes put them back in asap BUT remember it's level 25 mid-game, mid-level content. There doesn't need to be 5+ mid level raid bosses, UNLESS these are just placeholders for mechanics testing (??). There will be more.
Guild leveling - 100% what he said.
Caravans - Seems to be a HUGE part of the lateral progression of the game. I suggested creating a universal Caravaner class that gains xp as you run caravans that provides points to spend into a skill tree. Part of that could include ways to hire mercs for escorts for your caravan so you aren't 100% defenseless as a solo player, a perk that gives you a hidden compartment to safeguard high risk crates etc. tldr: The caravan system is a huge part of the game right now and if it's intended to be that way it needs to be more dynamic and provide more player agency. It just seems to flat as it is.
Node Leveling - It's Alpha take off the binders and let us test. It'll all be gone soon anyway who cares if we break it.
Sorry for the long post. Good stuff Church.
ROFLMAO. Dude I WISH I had time to "be bored."
My GOD I would KILL for "Man Im bored" time.
I am in a constant non-stop rush for mats, money, and xp. Even at 25, it hasnt stopped. Im logging in an immediately looking for glint, xp and drops. Even at 25, I still have a ridiculously long list of things to do.
Only now I also have to add in crafting time, processing time, traveling time..
and NOW Ive also got to deal with war decks, PVP, attacking, defending, assisting and even saving people all across the entire map.
Nevermind the "well the game just blew up my caravan due to a ridiculous bug.. so now Ive gotta farm the mats to replace that." or "How did I just die standing alone in a field?!? Guess Im farming that xp debt off.."
Do you have *ANY* idea, how many times per day I say outloud "good god can I get 5 minutes to X Y or Z?"
Nobody I've spoken with in FED is "Bored." to any degree. Trying to find their way to a peaceful gameplay loop in a current build of systems that are 110% designed to frustrate, anger and waste the players time and money.. good lord yes. Dealing with random obscene nerfs to classes without any real logical reason to do it yet? Sure.
But "Bored."?
Nah bro, you need to re-evaluate yourself and the things you dont know anything about.
Even when in-game events are lacking, FED is running private events, PVP practice, Open Tournaments, Caravan Events/Escorts/Rescues, Scheduled and pre-planned war events for fun and trash talking etc. Even the (it actually happened!) Surprise War Deck by Thor and Actual Pirates at 10am EST on a weekend. I was SCRAMBLING bleary eyed with a cup of coffee planning a caravan run with some guildmates.. OHSNAPTHEYCOMING!... guess I dont have time to be bored today!
Church and the other Leaders of FED are literally some of the hardest working people Ive ever seen for an MMO where they have no financial gain for doing so. Derek runs Opal like a tight knit force of armed angry meth'd up Honey Badgers.. and our win record shows it. Ive gone from a mid-tier player to a slightly more experienced mid-tier player because of him. Kyle is running non-stop for Winstead and its citizens, carrying mats, assisting in crafting, providing materials at or below cost to citizens.. Ally runs fun events like Hide and Seek, downtime Open World games like RAFT, RUST and Valhiem etc and keeps things fun and lighthearted! Street is.. well.. he's Street.. he's the most banned, erased and de-leveled character in MMO history.. even tho he's never once been banned, de-leveled or erased. He brings great content to the guild and is a hell of a man to have around when crap hits the fan.
Im not touching on even 1/10th of the amazing leadership/players/officers of FED. But it should convey the general idea.
This is a sandbox social MMORPG. Your "Content" is what you make it to be. Not entirely what the game provides. If your guild isnt doing all of what FED is doing, I feel sorry for you.
All while we, the members, are working hand in hand with those leaders.. working our asses off to progress both the node and the server itself to be the absolute best MMORPG ever created.
I would KILL to be "bored."
~ Hawtsauce
PS - I do apologise for hijacking the thread, but accusing us of being "Bored" simply to try and discredit and gatekeep an MMO where *all* input is respected and valuable just sticks in my craw. This isnt Pantheon, we dont need gatekeepers or virtue signalers here. Church not only presented problems, he offered solutions, which is 10x more than most other people ever do.
Static node spawns seem crappy until its compared to the dumpster fire that is hunting and coal. At least the static spawning mats exist in game and feel attainable.
A way to decrease complete caravan component destruction on death / bug would be fun i think. A caravan insurance system might also help alleviate this without having a negative effect on crafters and could double as a gold sink.
Node cloaks being hard tide to nodes feels bad. give citizens a way to get a non tradable version for cheap and then have the tradable versions cost a bunch of gold or currency tokens. This may not matter at all long term but right now choosing home node based on cloak stats is a major bummer for folks trying to play semi seriously. I know about the equip it and renounce citizenship work around but that seems like an exploit at worst and troll at best.
agreed