I'm curious why there was even a level increase added (at this time)?
You've completely severed every level 50+ from the huge world of Telon and limited their play to a very few chunks and the 'as-yet-incomplete' PoTA.
You've punished thousands of people who were still managing to enjoy Vanguard, all in the futile pursuit of preventing a very small percentage of people from powerleveling to 55 faster then you had planed. You did this recklessly and without thought and as a result, made the game a mess for the rest of us.
Why even bother with the levels now? Seriously... I can't see any reason to have them at this time. Level increases in every other MMO game out there come with expansions... they need the new content to go with the levels. here in Vanguard, we instead get the devs screwing with old content to try and suit the new levels and suit the under 50's... which is an impossible task, the way they are going about it.
Why couldn't you have just concentrated on more level 50 content?
- made another premium raid dungeon instead
- populated Kojan with high level content.
- Worked on dveeloping the content to support a level increase instead of just slapping a level increase into the game.
- Bring crafting and diplo up at the same time. Instead, we have crafters hitting level 55 in hours while you nerf the crap outta the rest of the game to try and keep a few adventurers from doing the same. And you ignored diplo altogetether.
Why did you have to sabotage the work of several years and thousands of man hours on this game with this pathetic, ill thought out and (as usual) poorly implemented patch?
I tend to agree here. All i can figure is they thought it would compel people to return to the game if they feared they would fall behind on the level curve if they didn't come back.
I don't understand putting the levels in if not prepared for that elite crowd to hear a starter pistol and try to zooooom to achieve levels. I mean, tackling content and leveling as fast as possible is in some guild's charters.
Also, going into a sheer panic and blocking people from xp at this point is kinda like shutting the proverbial barn door after the horses have gotten out. Some people have mused that the devs have friends that they wanted to get over a threshold of level, and then cut everyone else off. Personally, though it looks that way from the outside, I doubt there is such an abysmal level of professionalism.
Provide incentive, increase xp in the new zones, and make sure that desired items are dropping. Any time the loot drop percentage lever is slid below 5%, that choice should be reconsidered, imo, for the health of the larger segment of the playerbase.. folks with alts, and folks that cannot or will not obsessively grind. The carrot vs. whip analogy is very astute.
Suga@Seradon wrote:
I tend to agree here. All i can figure is they thought it would compel people to return to the game if they feared they would fall behind on the level curve if they didn't come back.I don't understand putting the levels in if not prepared for that elite crowd to hear a starter pistol and try to zooooom to achieve levels. I mean, tackling content and leveling as fast as possible is in some guild's charters.Also, going into a sheer panic and blocking people from xp at this point is kinda like shutting the proverbial barn door after the horses have gotten out. Some people have mused that the devs have friends that they wanted to get over a threshold of level, and then cut everyone else off. Personally, though it looks that way from the outside, I doubt there is such an abysmal level of professionalism.Provide incentive, increase xp in the new zones, and make sure that desired items are dropping. Any time the loot drop percentage lever is slid below 5%, that choice should be reconsidered, imo, for the health of the larger segment of the playerbase.. folks with alts, and folks that cannot or will not obsessively grind. The carrot vs. whip analogy is very astute.
Can I get an AMEN!!
Well, for the time being, I've canceled my four subscriptions.
Vanguard just doesn't look good from any angle at this point. Hopefully things turn around for the best, and quick.
I agree with the OP on nearly every point. The level increase was only asked for by the vocal very very few.
After 2 years of steadily making leveling in this game easier, they have done a complete 180, to the point of simply removing an entire level of XP for thousands of toons and creating an exception to the dot system where none existed before.
Trying to cram 40-50% of the player base into 1 dungeon is unbelievable (and isnt going to work), all in the name of "adding levels," then nuking the rest of Telon with nerfs and ill-thought-out boundaries to prevent these vocal very few from levelling too fast. So, the game that is "designed to promote grouping" and "has a huge immersive world" now has lvl 51s that can't group with level 49s, crossbows that shoot 33 feet, and even con 3 dots that can wipe a group.
...and, it's all to naught. We already have level 53s in the game. We'll have level 55s in 10 days' time or less.
My question is Why? Why is is so bloody important they not get to 55? What difference does it make? If you dont want them to PL others thru the rest of Telon, or farm choice mobs, fine. Make it so they cant hit anything below level 45. The devs should try what everyone complained about in the begining of the increased XP curve and slow the entire game down to a manageable level, rather than trash the the work of the last two years to accommodate 1 patch.
3 weeks after patch we'll have level 55s, unless the devs just take away all their XP or put lockout timers on everything. Shortly thereafter players will begin finishing PoTA, and the complaining for content or AAs or light sabers or hand grenades will start anew.
Most of the players used to talk about the diversity and amount of content while leveling and the storylines and the hugeness of Telon. Now they are all being funneled into 2-3 very narrow, overly grindy experiences and just complaining about the grind. Maybe SOE should play on VGs strengths (yeah - like THAT hasn't been said 10k times here) and fix the bugs, the raid UI, and the broken quests, and all the other stuff we voted on in the poll.
It's been said before and worth repeating - No dev team, no matter how large or talented, can push content out faster than players can consume it. I dont understand why try to cater to less than 5% of the player base you'll never keep up with anyway, and do so to the detriment of the other 95%.
Ayrlanna@Xeth wrote:
Can you show me one post that asked for a level cap increase? Or are you just upset and blowing things out of proportion?
Yeah, I can actually, more than one. I'll edit this post when I find a few, but I'm playing just now.
I dont know what you mean by blowing things out of proportion, since I said a very few people asked for a level increase. I have never supported a level increase. A couple posts even said raising the level cap and adding AAs and a relaunch "was the only way to save the game." but not many said things like that.
Yet, we have a level cap increase now, to the detriment of much of the game and the playerbase, this is an unsupportable direction for the game, as no matter what the devs do, they cannot keep up with the players unless they nearly kill XP altogther, then no one will even play.
You asked for one, here is the earliest one I can find. Note all the folks saying what a bad idea this is:
http://forums.station.sony.com/vg/p...?topic_id=24678
A couple asking for no increase, again the majority stating no level increase:
http://forums.station.sony.com/vg/p...?topic_id=24619
http://forums.station.sony.com/vg/p...?topic_id=40469
There are more there, but I'm playing non-50+ content, so I'm not digging further.
People have been 50 for a long time and the game still got better and better in people eyes and then what...
Vangaurd NGE, this is it..Everyone who played SWG knows what NGE was, but if you dont just google it and you will see that SOE apoloigez for it and confess they made huge misstake.POTA game adjustments mark my word will be the NGE of Vanguard. I usually play with 3 rl friends and we think this content should have been new content to make way for some kind of endgame type of content which offer multiple ways of advancement but in the end all adjustments just seem to speak of new SOE NGE adventure.What they should have done:1. Focus on the present content and just put in new content that is inline with current lvl 50 and gear.2. In order to add more features to toons you should have made AA's.The devs will not be able to keep up with AA content or LVL content since this game dont have that many devs compared alot of other MMO's which also are having content problems so devs dont try the impossible....To the people who think POTA is all that shiny and great, it wont be that fun in a empty Telon....
I agree, raising level cap was shortsighted decision without adding enough 50+ lvl content.
They added levels to force people do a LONG grind for the new levels and then another long grind for their new skills/spells.
This is the actual new content and they hope that this will keep players occupied for a year or so when they will release the next new grind.
Shakita@Halgar wrote:
Sure.A big mistake, even more with the lack of content, the AA system not released, and the dev's attitude to not see the reality: for a very low population game like VG, the "grind forever for almost nothing" is completely absurd.
I was back to see the evolution, I've seen. Accounts (2) re-cancelled
What really burns me is while the top 5% get to lvl they wanna hold the rest of us back who cant grind 20+ hrs a day.So now you got the Top 5% lvled you put a stop to lvl increase.thats right i said stop when you put a 4 dot con to a 2dot just to cut Adv xp you stop lvl increase,come on guys get a clue here is my question: Why is it ok for the top5% to lvl and screw the rest of the 95% player base?
You have open the can of worms manage them dont try to put them back in the can.
Karma@Sartok wrote:
Suga@Seradon wrote:I tend to agree here. All i can figure is they thought it would compel people to return to the game if they feared they would fall behind on the level curve if they didn't come back.I don't understand putting the levels in if not prepared for that elite crowd to hear a starter pistol and try to zooooom to achieve levels. I mean, tackling content and leveling as fast as possible is in some guild's charters.Also, going into a sheer panic and blocking people from xp at this point is kinda like shutting the proverbial barn door after the horses have gotten out. Some people have mused that the devs have friends that they wanted to get over a threshold of level, and then cut everyone else off. Personally, though it looks that way from the outside, I doubt there is such an abysmal level of professionalism.Provide incentive, increase xp in the new zones, and make sure that desired items are dropping. Any time the loot drop percentage lever is slid below 5%, that choice should be reconsidered, imo, for the health of the larger segment of the playerbase.. folks with alts, and folks that cannot or will not obsessively grind. The carrot vs. whip analogy is very astute.Can I get an AMEN!!
AMEN!!!!
I couldn't have said it better myself!
Should have just added AAs and then raised levels later when they had more than a remodeled (not even sure if I can call it that) zone to xp in.
