117565-returning-player

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Background:
 
I started playing during open beta, after obtaining a deluxe edition of the game. It did not take me long to begin to realize that there were quite a few problems with the game. Regardless, I stayed until launch and through the first month, leveling 1 character to 50 and several to between 10-30. I was quite critical of the game, and have never been shy about voicing my opinion. although I always felt that, at it's core this was a very good game.
 
As the time to commit to a sub was approaching, I decided that there were just too many problems, and not enough being done to correct them, so I decided to give it a few months and return when they had time to sort things out.
 
The now:
 
Utterly bored with the game I am currently playing, I decided to come back and resub for a month to see how things have changed, and how the game has grown in the months I have been away. I fully expected to see less servers (as this is always the case in any mmo that isn't that game that shall not be mentioned) I said this in another thread, but I wanted to get the opinions of some the the people's names I recognize from my time here before. What happened?
 
I am not interested in giving my feedback anymore, I already did that before, and now I just want to have a little fun, and try and get some value out of my Deluxe edition purchase.
 
I subbed blind, started the patching, and came to the forums to see what was what. I have to say that I was shocked.
 
To the vets, that did not answer in the other thread....What happened? As I stated in the other thread (lost on page 24 or some such, which is why I started this new thread) I fully expected somewhat of an exodus, and that the game would settle into a niche with a nice healthy niche community. What I am reading here, and on other , less moderated forums, is that this game has taken a pretty big hit to it's player base. It was kind of disturbing to me to see that fran persons topic ( I remember them from open beta) and also see the optimism that was so pervasive at launch, has all but dried up.
 
So to the vets, who may or may not remember me (wasn't that memorable, so I don't really expect anyone to) What happened? I honestly did not expect this.
 
Xtorma.	
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You're asking for an impossible explanation. :P
 
A lot of things happened. MMO burnout, poorly conceived system designs, ramped-up difficulty, lack of tangible rewards for endgame content, little annoying bugs sprinkled everywhere, PVP exploiting, rampant negativity from haters as well as from folks who are simply frustrated but like the game, gamers who eat up corporate hype and then blame anyone but themselves for the fallout... it goes on, I'm sure.
 
There is no coherent explanation anyone can give. Hell, some will maintain that the game hasn't actually taken that big of a hit to its population. My personal opinion is that there were some weak links at Carbine (I have to say that some of the functions in this game seem very poorly coded/planned), and that the gaming community's patience is thinning out more and more each year. Consequently a lot folks have no problem leaving a sub-based game for the many, many other possibilities that exist in the gaming world today.
 
Also in my opinion, a bunch of them will come back. What should not be underestimated: The resilience of MMOs and their ability to bounce back with a bit of time. I think Wildstar is much better than release versions of SWTOR, RIFT, and  FFAAR in terms of fundamental gameplay, depth, and fun factor, and since those other games are doing fine, I believe Wildstar will find its way.	
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You've come back about a few weeks/month too soon!
 
The long and short of it is the servers got merged into megaservers but a lot of people left the PvP server for PvE because they needed more members to raid and you could only transfer one way.  So the PvE servers hold the majority of the population.
 
There is a patch due to happen mid November so could be in the next 3 weeks sometime to address balancing issues, rune changes because they were too random and loads of other stuff like a lot of class AMPs and tons of bugs.
 
There have also been internal changes at Carbine in terms of process and trying not to release rubbish patches by spreading the QA team too thin and getting it on PTR for proper testing before release.  Staff have been shipped out, about 60 staff went, Gaffney (ill) went and Frost (offer he couldn't refuse) went too.
 
But for me the game still works, yea it has it's annoying bugs every now and then but these will go, as it's still relatively new for an MMO but the fundamentals are better than the others.	
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I can't speak for everyone but I've personally gotten a little tired of the pool of unhappy that the forums have become. In-game, I meet plenty of happy players who have never once looked at the forums here. I think that optimism is still around, we've just gotten tired of the 800+ "What's happened"/QQ/Doomsayer/"I quit unless blah happens" threads. If you defend the game, you're a white knight. If you dont defend the game, you're a doomsinger. It's almost just better to stay off of here and enjoy the in-game experience. The forums and Facebook are probably the worst places right now for player opinion, if you're returning and you want to gauge how the game populace is doing/feeling.
 
I know a lot of players who are waiting for Drops 3 and 4 to decide if they really want to come back or not, since those are bringing much needed changes/bug fixes/itemization blerps. Some people came back for the megaservers. Lots of people have flocked to this server or that for now, until PvP is fixed (from what I understand, it is massively messed up atm). Personally, I play on Entity and I almost never see a negative attitude from the players there (yeah, there is occasionally someone who is generally unhappy with the game, or who demands that the Drop comes now and right now and such)...excluding the occasional troll, but y'know, whatever.
 
In other news, Welcome Back! Pretty much what the others said. New MMOs, especially in this day, are bound to have plenty of issues at first. Staff to be removed/replaced, bug fixes, content issues, etc. Personally, I will keep holding out hope for this game until the day the plug is pulled (may that not be for 20 years yet).	
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I can't speak for everyone but I've personally gotten a little tired of the pool of unhappy that the forums have become. In-game, I meet plenty of happy players who have never once looked at the forums here. I think that optimism is still around, we've just gotten tired of the 800+ "What's happened"/QQ/Doomsayer/"I quit unless blah happens" threads. If you defend the game, you're a white knight. If you dont defend the game, you're a doomsinger. It's almost just better to stay off of here and enjoy the in-game experience. The forums and Facebook are probably the worst places right now for player opinion, if you're returning and you want to gauge how the game populace is doing/feeling.
 
I know a lot of players who are waiting for Drops 3 and 4 to decide if they really want to come back or not, since those are bringing much needed changes/bug fixes/itemization blerps. Some people came back for the megaservers. Lots of people have flocked to this server or that for now, until PvP is fixed (from what I understand, it is massively messed up atm). Personally, I play on Entity and I almost never see a negative attitude from the players there (yeah, there is occasionally someone who is generally unhappy with the game, or who demands that the Drop comes now and right now and such)...excluding the occasional troll, but y'know, whatever.
 
In other news, Welcome Back! Pretty much what the others said. New MMOs, especially in this day, are bound to have plenty of issues at first. Staff to be removed/replaced, bug fixes, content issues, etc. Personally, I will keep holding out hope for this game until the day the plug is pulled (may that not be for 20 years yet).
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I can't speak for everyone but I've personally gotten a little tired of the pool of unhappy that the forums have become. In-game, I meet plenty of happy players who have never once looked at the forums here. I think that optimism is still around, we've just gotten tired of the 800+ "What's happened"/QQ/Doomsayer/"I quit unless blah happens" threads..
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Forums for anything are mainly full of gripes etc...it's the nature of them.
 
As the saying goes:
 
"You don't know what you've got (until you lose it)"
 
It's not that people don't appreciate it but they don't feel the need to come and shout about it..it's the way things work!	
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Welcome back! I don't think anything in particular "happened." I think a lot of things happened - almost all of them which can be attributed to "it's the first year of a new MMO." First years are hard. Early adopters are almost always put through a bit of a wringer as balance and bugs are worked out, staff changes happen, etc. We also get to laugh later as we share the stories of how we used to be able to do this or that crazy or OP thing that was removed/fixed/balanced. (Remember when we could jumping puzzle Stormtalon and skip the whole back half of the dungeon...the good ole' day!! :P )
 
I haven't been overly surprised by anything Carbine has done thus far. I will admit that I've been a little surprised by the reaction of much of the community - it certainly got a lot darker a lot faster than I thought it would.
 
As for me, I'm still having fun. My guildies are pretty happy. Some are taking a break, but many of us are still quite enjoying this as our main game. Most of them never touch the forums (or any of the "less moderated" places).
 
My advice - find people you enjoy playing with (or at least hanging out with while you do your thing). It makes any game a ton more fun, IMO, to have a good community to game with. And then, play the game - without reading the forums too much. Just enjoy yourself and the people you are playing with. Take breaks when you need to, and check things out again when the urge strikes you. I'm not sure why people feel the need to make such a big deal about things.	
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You came back after less than 6 months and expected significant changes?  6 months into any new MMO and you'd be lucky to get a new dungeon.  This isn't LoL, or whatever other game that throws out whatever it can as quickly as it can to squeeze another 5 bucks out of its players before the game is forgotten.
 
MMOs play the long game.	
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Oh Xtorma, I remember you. Well some of the Evindra players(Scott/Tex Arcana) left after the announcement of the Mega Servers and that RP servers will be no more.
 
Some people are taking a break while waiting for Drop 3(The Jesus Patch).
 
Some people are taking a break to play WoD.Some people got bored of the game.Some people just got tired of the forum.	
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			is that why Tex left? Wow, i guess he really felt let down by that, seems like the RP community has bounced back and handled it very well though.	
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			What happened?  lots of other people got bored or frustrated with the game and left, same as you.	
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is that why Tex left? Wow, i guess he really felt let down by that, seems like the RP community has bounced back and handled it very well though.
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Background:
 
I started playing during open beta, after obtaining a deluxe edition of the game. It did not take me long to begin to realize that there were quite a few problems with the game. Regardless, I stayed until launch and through the first month, leveling 1 character to 50 and several to between 10-30. I was quite critical of the game, and have never been shy about voicing my opinion. although I always felt that, at it's core this was a very good game.
 
As the time to commit to a sub was approaching, I decided that there were just too many problems, and not enough being done to correct them, so I decided to give it a few months and return when they had time to sort things out.
 
The now:
 
Utterly bored with the game I am currently playing, I decided to come back and resub for a month to see how things have changed, and how the game has grown in the months I have been away. I fully expected to see less servers (as this is always the case in any mmo that isn't that game that shall not be mentioned) I said this in another thread, but I wanted to get the opinions of some the the people's names I recognize from my time here before. What happened?
 
I am not interested in giving my feedback anymore, I already did that before, and now I just want to have a little fun, and try and get some value out of my Deluxe edition purchase.
 
I subbed blind, started the patching, and came to the forums to see what was what. I have to say that I was shocked.
 
To the vets, that did not answer in the other thread....What happened? As I stated in the other thread (lost on page 24 or some such, which is why I started this new thread) I fully expected somewhat of an exodus, and that the game would settle into a niche with a nice healthy niche community. What I am reading here, and on other , less moderated forums, is that this game has taken a pretty big hit to it's player base. It was kind of disturbing to me to see that fran persons topic ( I remember them from open beta) and also see the optimism that was so pervasive at launch, has all but dried up.
 
So to the vets, who may or may not remember me (wasn't that memorable, so I don't really expect anyone to) What happened? I honestly did not expect this.
 
Xtorma.
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I think what happened is that Carbine got the effort/reward balance off. That is, the gameplay is amazing and the fights are great, but the reward system set up to incentivize you to keep running the content doesn't quite work.
 
But they are tweaking things with feeback and it's going to be great when they get everything worked out.
 
I know, people talk about how we shouldn't be paying to play beta, but honestly a lot of this stuff only really works out with you have hundreds of thousands of people doing it. And the game is really fun right now if you enjoy the combat style and amazing fights.	
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Background:
 
I started playing during open beta, after obtaining a deluxe edition of the game. It did not take me long to begin to realize that there were quite a few problems with the game. Regardless, I stayed until launch and through the first month, leveling 1 character to 50 and several to between 10-30. I was quite critical of the game, and have never been shy about voicing my opinion. although I always felt that, at it's core this was a very good game.
 
As the time to commit to a sub was approaching, I decided that there were just too many problems, and not enough being done to correct them, so I decided to give it a few months and return when they had time to sort things out.
 
The now:
 
Utterly bored with the game I am currently playing, I decided to come back and resub for a month to see how things have changed, and how the game has grown in the months I have been away. I fully expected to see less servers (as this is always the case in any mmo that isn't that game that shall not be mentioned) I said this in another thread, but I wanted to get the opinions of some the the people's names I recognize from my time here before. What happened?
 
I am not interested in giving my feedback anymore, I already did that before, and now I just want to have a little fun, and try and get some value out of my Deluxe edition purchase.
 
I subbed blind, started the patching, and came to the forums to see what was what. I have to say that I was shocked.
 
To the vets, that did not answer in the other thread....What happened? As I stated in the other thread (lost on page 24 or some such, which is why I started this new thread) I fully expected somewhat of an exodus, and that the game would settle into a niche with a nice healthy niche community. What I am reading here, and on other , less moderated forums, is that this game has taken a pretty big hit to it's player base. It was kind of disturbing to me to see that fran persons topic ( I remember them from open beta) and also see the optimism that was so pervasive at launch, has all but dried up.
 
So to the vets, who may or may not remember me (wasn't that memorable, so I don't really expect anyone to) What happened? I honestly did not expect this.
 
Xtorma.
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I'm credd til January, haven't logged in months waiting to see what happens with this coming drop (I don't expect much or many new/returns).  The players I came to this game with all quit for other games. Investing in a mmo in the state WS is worrisome...no matter if you think it has some really good parts, w/o a long life expectancy the investment of time and questionable future is not worth it. 
 
GW2, AA, FF, and WoW all have new releases between today and December so there's that too.  
 
I also believe players are burnt out on themepark mmo's and the genre is flooded with them.  I'm currently playing GW2 just for the WvW a few times a week, and AA (even w/its issues) just because it's one of the few PvP sandbox esque mmo's out there.  I really doubt I can ever devout my focus on a themepark mmo again, 2004-2014 themepark RIP for me.
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Evade,
 
 
I was actually more interested in vet players take on what, in their opinions, were the reasons so many have left. Appreciate the snarky reply though, sort of establishes the fact that not much has changed on the forums, although I remember quite clearly how so many people said it would drastically change once the free 30 days were over.
 
Was actually just curious. I will start a new character and level up to 50 again, just to see for myself if anything has changed, and just how healthy the player base is.
 
Hope to see everyone in game :D
			
				
	Edited November 4, 2014 by Xtorma	
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How is investing in WS any different than investing in random single player game every 4 months?
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If I understand your question right because it's a mmorpg that costs $65+$16/m that requires most content to be completed with other players, and in general when you invest in a mmo you have certain expectations (set by the developers) that covers that monthly cost plus the general notion of playing 1-5years+.
 
but this is opinion, some mmo players may buy/sub up a mmo and treat it like a single player rpg too I'm sure.
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No new MMO promises you longevity or other players. You play if it's fun. Other players play if it's fun as well. If Wildstar was taken down tomorrow I would still remember what a guild I managed to build and how much fun I had in it. I wouldn't feel like my time was "wasted" because I didn't invest that time into some other MMO that I might have not found as fun.
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No new MMO promises you longevity or other players. You play if it's fun. Other players play if it's fun as well. If Wildstar was taken down tomorrow I would still remember what a guild I managed to build and how much fun I had in it. I wouldn't feel like my time was "wasted" because I didn't invest that time into some other MMO that I might have not found as fun.
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is that why Tex left? Wow, i guess he really felt let down by that, seems like the RP community has bounced back and handled it very well though.
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1-22 is pretty empty, haven't seen more than 1 other person questing yet. Have seen some people in thayd though. I'm on the megaserver for na pve.
 
I remember more fps issues than I am having now, so there seems to have been a few optimization passes, although it may possibly be attributed to the lack of players, I don't really think so.
 
i'm not very good at the game, I can tell you that. I am pretty much stuck at a place where I have to protect a box from a few waves of assassins in whitevale, and can't do it 1 level under. Will have to level some.
 
Started a toon on the dom side, and have yet to see anyone from lvl 1 - 10, but those levels go so fast, that I can't really make an honest assessment from there. will wait until I make it to the 20+ zone, as lvling seems to start to slow down a bit there.
 
There seems to have been no improvements to the tutorial, but I see that we will be able to skip it soon, so that is probably why. I actually thought the tutorial was pretty bad when I first started playing back in open beta, but I have come to realize that it wasn't really the tutorial, as much as who it was aimed at. I have played a LOT of mmo's, so figuring out how to play wildstar, was second nature. The tutorial was not for me , it was designed for anyone who didn't have any, or much mmo experience. I can't honestly judge it if that is indeed the case,  because my experience will taint my objectivity. There is some funny stuff on the ships though , if you take the time to explore and listen to dialog.
 
Combat is as fun as I remembered it being, although I am still not a fan of unavoidable damage, and probably never will be.
 
I don't seem to have the dps to make anything past bronze with the challenges. Cant pull a lot at once because of the white damage, and cant seem to be able to kill more than 50 same level mobs in 5 mins. Others make it to gold though, so it is my issue not the games, but it does sort of foster just skipping them if I don't make it to bronze first try.
 
Levels seem pretty well balanced after 15, with the challenge ramping up a bit in that level range. It's a cake walk 1-15, but that is pretty much standard mmo fare, and many games NEVER get challenging during solo play. The red mobs are pretty easy to spot if you pay attention, and avoidable, but are there if you want the challenge, or are playing in a group. Haven't run into any must kill reds guarding quest objectives, as I did when the game first started up.
 
That has been my experience so far. I am NOT advocating for any changes , nor is this meant to be critical, it is simply how I am experiencing the game so far. I have not played my 50 and wont until I have another, or my month runs out, and I decide to resub.
 
Have a nice day,
 
Xtorma.	
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