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Alpha Two Phase III testing has begun! During this phase, our realms will be open every day, and we'll only have downtime for updates and maintenance. We'll keep everyone up-to-date about downtimes in Discord.
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.
Why the econ of 2.5 didn't work out vs 2.0. and random complaints - Retrospective
Fireguard
Member, Alpha Two
in Artisanship
This is all my opinion, and probably too late but posting it anyways.
Why Phase 2.0 was better game state than 2.5.
TLDR: They nerfed everything players were going for to make them not worth the effort. So the point of doing the game loop died.
- Level 10 gear VS level 20 gear.
1. Level 10 gear mattered.
a. Phase 2.5 a green level 20 piece of gear was better than heroic level 10 gear. Made going for level 10 gear pointless.
This ties into the next few points;
2. Crafting mattered starting sooner than later.
a. When level 10 gear matters, the level 10 benches come online starting the first week. People get to start doing gathering and crafting gameplay loops.
3. When only level 20 named mobs matter, its better to not upgrade nodes.
a. Power comes through disparity of the high end VS the mid/low end. If the best gear everyone can get is named mobs - then the hardcore grinders are incentivized to keep the exclusivity in place by not increasing server progression. Phase 2 EU did a lot of node funneling and tons of their people were in really good gear due to being carebear about caravans. But NA had the better disparity for higher end guilds. 2.5 - nobody CBA upgrading nodes.
TLDR: Intended gameplay loop only starts 2 months in on a 3 month phase. Crafting has to start mattering at least in Apprentice tier.
- Having a gold sink for HC players - Enchanting.
1. No enchanting means basic items very expensive.
a. Suppose you get 100g. In phase 2.5 your options are to buy named items or green level 20 items from NPCs.
b. In phase 2.0 that 100g would be a decision on buying materials from the market, enchanting your gear, buying a player crafted item outright, tipping crafters, etc. The gold gets spread out to multiple players and player interactions. Rather than buying named items or NPC dropped items only.
2. Lack of common gear and no alternative sinks means price hikes.
a. A casual player leveling up has like 1-2g. When a basic level 10 item or 20 item used to be 10-30g, they can't play the game. The lack of bare minimum gear in phase 2.5 forced everyone to compete for bare minimum scraps of gear on the market places. All the value is in one item instead of being spread out over multiple items / sellers / crafting tips, etc.
3. Increased pressure to RMT.
a. Sketchy to even list this as a point but - when you can save yourself 100 hours of the most boring gameplay loop in existence (afk alt tabbing in every 20 minutes) its a lot easier to succumb. I understand long term there is always going to be pressure. But without a basic minimum gear set and extremely unfun loop - people will more likely opt to the easy route.
TLDR: Gold has to matter. Or there will be 30g for a green item levels of inflation at the start.
- Other random pain points but not related to this forum topic. That I want to complain about.
1. 3 day listing and high listing fee of market place.
This narrows the scope of type of goods you can list. The time it takes to research and list items - sometimes its better to just vendor it and use the saved time being profitable. (usually not the case but its a big PITA.)
2. Early game gold.
You feel either forced to take a loan from a guildie or to vendor your glint. Vendoring glint feels extremely bad. It also sucks that there are no alternative options for glint than caravaning. We will see how much crate hauling helps. But it sounds like its going to be very boring.
3. Caravans have a terrible gameplay experience.
When you are doing a caravan run, no pvp is the ideal situation. But when you spend 90% of the time AFK auto run in a straight line... jesus. You can't tell me the end-game intention is for players to spend 2 hours farming glint, 3 hours afk on a caravan raft. AT LEAST let us risk it all on a supersized van to haul a large amount at once. Most players end up having stockpile of glint in their storage they never end up running because its so boring. Even if you do kill someone's caravan, glint is so common to come by its not worth risking your own van in a contested area to haul the goods. Crowbaring should have a 10 min minimum timer before it becomes an option imo.
4. PVP doesn't matter.
Doing pvp in Ashes of Creation is a suboptimal activity. While also being the riskiest thing to do. Gear only matters for caravans, and you could just bring more people instead to solve that problem. The game feels best when PVPers are the driving force funneling the economy. (Phase 2, pvpers are running vans to buy mats from PVE side to amp gear).
5. PVE doesn't matter.
Whats the difference between a pve player with all common gear VS all legendary gear? They can farm glint faster. Maybe they have an easier time soloing more named mobs. Thats it. There is no point to increasing your power as a PVE player.
Between points 4 and 5 - gearing doesn't actually have a purpose yet. People are just doing it for fun.
6. Lack of storage for mass cycling of goods.
Not enough storage space to do anything in bulk. All the misc rarities, the random variety of tiers of matterials, the 20 different types of badges/mark stuff etc. Its just all garbage
7. Scarcity of mats.
You already know. There are some people who have routes and stuff that are doing fine but the average player gathering isn't really an income option. Gathering should be the default, if a bit suboptimal, gathering method generally. This leads to a fair amount of people coming to the conclusion of 'If I can't get named mobs, I can't run caravans, and I can't even gather, then I can't do anything'.
8. Named mob farming sucks.
Yes.
That is all my complaints and comparisons for now. As long as gold is meaningful, people can start doing the material cycling loop at apprentice tier, and we get baseline gear while leveling, I think we will have a good time. IMO novice tier should be able to be done completely solo relatively easily. (why else give everyone access to every novice profession?).
Why Phase 2.0 was better game state than 2.5.
TLDR: They nerfed everything players were going for to make them not worth the effort. So the point of doing the game loop died.
- Level 10 gear VS level 20 gear.
1. Level 10 gear mattered.
a. Phase 2.5 a green level 20 piece of gear was better than heroic level 10 gear. Made going for level 10 gear pointless.
This ties into the next few points;
2. Crafting mattered starting sooner than later.
a. When level 10 gear matters, the level 10 benches come online starting the first week. People get to start doing gathering and crafting gameplay loops.
3. When only level 20 named mobs matter, its better to not upgrade nodes.
a. Power comes through disparity of the high end VS the mid/low end. If the best gear everyone can get is named mobs - then the hardcore grinders are incentivized to keep the exclusivity in place by not increasing server progression. Phase 2 EU did a lot of node funneling and tons of their people were in really good gear due to being carebear about caravans. But NA had the better disparity for higher end guilds. 2.5 - nobody CBA upgrading nodes.
TLDR: Intended gameplay loop only starts 2 months in on a 3 month phase. Crafting has to start mattering at least in Apprentice tier.
- Having a gold sink for HC players - Enchanting.
1. No enchanting means basic items very expensive.
a. Suppose you get 100g. In phase 2.5 your options are to buy named items or green level 20 items from NPCs.
b. In phase 2.0 that 100g would be a decision on buying materials from the market, enchanting your gear, buying a player crafted item outright, tipping crafters, etc. The gold gets spread out to multiple players and player interactions. Rather than buying named items or NPC dropped items only.
2. Lack of common gear and no alternative sinks means price hikes.
a. A casual player leveling up has like 1-2g. When a basic level 10 item or 20 item used to be 10-30g, they can't play the game. The lack of bare minimum gear in phase 2.5 forced everyone to compete for bare minimum scraps of gear on the market places. All the value is in one item instead of being spread out over multiple items / sellers / crafting tips, etc.
3. Increased pressure to RMT.
a. Sketchy to even list this as a point but - when you can save yourself 100 hours of the most boring gameplay loop in existence (afk alt tabbing in every 20 minutes) its a lot easier to succumb. I understand long term there is always going to be pressure. But without a basic minimum gear set and extremely unfun loop - people will more likely opt to the easy route.
TLDR: Gold has to matter. Or there will be 30g for a green item levels of inflation at the start.
- Other random pain points but not related to this forum topic. That I want to complain about.
1. 3 day listing and high listing fee of market place.
This narrows the scope of type of goods you can list. The time it takes to research and list items - sometimes its better to just vendor it and use the saved time being profitable. (usually not the case but its a big PITA.)
2. Early game gold.
You feel either forced to take a loan from a guildie or to vendor your glint. Vendoring glint feels extremely bad. It also sucks that there are no alternative options for glint than caravaning. We will see how much crate hauling helps. But it sounds like its going to be very boring.
3. Caravans have a terrible gameplay experience.
When you are doing a caravan run, no pvp is the ideal situation. But when you spend 90% of the time AFK auto run in a straight line... jesus. You can't tell me the end-game intention is for players to spend 2 hours farming glint, 3 hours afk on a caravan raft. AT LEAST let us risk it all on a supersized van to haul a large amount at once. Most players end up having stockpile of glint in their storage they never end up running because its so boring. Even if you do kill someone's caravan, glint is so common to come by its not worth risking your own van in a contested area to haul the goods. Crowbaring should have a 10 min minimum timer before it becomes an option imo.
4. PVP doesn't matter.
Doing pvp in Ashes of Creation is a suboptimal activity. While also being the riskiest thing to do. Gear only matters for caravans, and you could just bring more people instead to solve that problem. The game feels best when PVPers are the driving force funneling the economy. (Phase 2, pvpers are running vans to buy mats from PVE side to amp gear).
5. PVE doesn't matter.
Whats the difference between a pve player with all common gear VS all legendary gear? They can farm glint faster. Maybe they have an easier time soloing more named mobs. Thats it. There is no point to increasing your power as a PVE player.
Between points 4 and 5 - gearing doesn't actually have a purpose yet. People are just doing it for fun.
6. Lack of storage for mass cycling of goods.
Not enough storage space to do anything in bulk. All the misc rarities, the random variety of tiers of matterials, the 20 different types of badges/mark stuff etc. Its just all garbage
7. Scarcity of mats.
You already know. There are some people who have routes and stuff that are doing fine but the average player gathering isn't really an income option. Gathering should be the default, if a bit suboptimal, gathering method generally. This leads to a fair amount of people coming to the conclusion of 'If I can't get named mobs, I can't run caravans, and I can't even gather, then I can't do anything'.
8. Named mob farming sucks.
Yes.
That is all my complaints and comparisons for now. As long as gold is meaningful, people can start doing the material cycling loop at apprentice tier, and we get baseline gear while leveling, I think we will have a good time. IMO novice tier should be able to be done completely solo relatively easily. (why else give everyone access to every novice profession?).
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