Big rant

#1

Hello all.

I recently made a new account, with absolutely nothing on it, just, you know, to get a “new player” experience. What I got was walking around in the godlands for hours upon hours getting to 6/8, then finding out the amount of life and mana sources are stupidly rare. I’m not allowed to trade (ppe rule), so maxing life and mana… well, let’s just say I’m not gonna kill 23 crabs to get life pots… and if I’m not the only one shooting it, it’s not even guaranteed. Mana, well, you need less of it to max, but no one runs ocean trenches and no one runs parasite chambers. If there is another mana source, I’m sorry i missed it. But the only life and mana source I’ve ever known was O3… something that isn’t usually ran publicly. I was lucky enough to come across three O3’s, and, well, I was 0/8 at that time so I only managed to do 1. Keep in mind that I’m a good player with a good grasp of how o3’s work. If I was brand new, I would probably teleport to the godlands and die in 2 seconds to a medusa bomb.

And that brings me to the next point. The game does nothing to show players how to really play the game. It teaches you how to walk… and let’s be honest, unless youve been playing mobile or console games your entire life, everyone knows WASD are the movement keys. Camera rotation, QE, makes sense. X for off center, ok ok. Problem is, most players don’t use rotation keys. Some people I’ve talked to says it causes motion sickness or whatever. And then comes the part where it says when your health hits 0, you die. That… well, is kind of untrue but ok. Death permanent blah blah. Click to shoot, kill chicken, blah blah. The biggest problem is, the tutorial tells you how to play the game, but it doesn’t go into any details. Everything else, you have to look up by yourself, and let’s be honest, the age range of the players in this game are either boomers from the last decade or 9 year olds. These kids don’t even know that google exists. Like, it’s not rocket to search up a wiki for this game, but at the same time, it shouldn’t be this wiki’s responsibility to teach them things, it should be the game.

A new player has no idea what items are “good” and what items are “bad”. I’ve seen people try to pawn off t11 items. Maybe they were worth something in 2013, because those items were considered to be close to endgame. But we have t14 stuff now, so those old tops are just worthless. Trading is just a huge waste of time in my opinion. And before you can even trade, you gotta get something worth a damn. New players probably spend more time dying and begging than they do buying and selling. Their characters probably have never seen a blue bag. What the fuck are they supposed to trade? t8 items? No one wants those. I had no problems getting my wizard geared enough to deal damage worth a damn because I know how to play the game. I know what dungeons drop what, I know which bosses attack which way, and I know how the game works. A good way to make trading better is to introduce a marketplace so USW4 doesn’t get clusterfucked on the daily. I’m not gonna mention anything against the ToS, but there was a guy named “Nilly”, and if you know about that marketplace, you know. If a random coder can implement that shit all by themselves, I don’t see why a multi dollar company like DECA can’t. The benefits of this is that it gives a general range of prices to items, that a new player wouldn’t know anything about. They can just browse and see what items are worth what. Current trading system right now, filled with people who love to sell overpriced garbage. And of course, deselect scammers, and people trying to sell books of chess.

I’ve seen a spreadsheet somewhere of somebody equating each level of the pet’s heal and mheal into a value of vit and wis. I don’t remember the exact numbers, but its at least a couple hundred vit at a good heal level. Even then, you will never really understand how much your pet does, until you play the game with a shitty common pet with level 1 heal. And that is what I came to realize. My pet does SO MUCH. The introduction of vital combat was controversial to say the very least, but I feel like the people that it affected the most were people who were new and didn’t have good pets. A low level heal is already shit enough as it is, and having that made even more shit, well, it’s just bad. I like how it was made to nerf pets, but just made new players’ lives harder. Vital combat’s effect on pets should scale with a pet’s levels. But of course, it’s DECA, its probably too complicated for that multi dollar company.

The amount of garbage ive seen in a new player’s inventory is ridiculous. They keep T6 items from the godlands. They keep forest maze marks. They keep so much garbage, that it’s actually painful to look at. The problem is there’s no way for them to know that what they’re carrying right now is absolutely worthless. And the 8 starter vault slots, brother, I’ve had my new account for like 2 days and It’s already filled. Yeah new players can buy fame packages, but some people don’t even know that you can buy those. Deadass, on reddit, I’ve seen people not realize that you can buy that shit with fame. You can’t really blame them either. Deca adds free packages and shit all the way at the bottom of the shop, nobody in their right mind would scroll all the way to the bottom unless they knew there was a free pack. Anyways, back on the topic of storage, yeah you can get vault unlockers on campaigns and logins, but are you seriously gonna expect a new player, who probably logs in just to lose their character, to keep playing your shitty microtransaction filled pixel game that takes longer to load than my Minecraft Sky Factory 4 with over 100 mods? Yeah. No. And campaigns, they’re boring uninspired fucking pieces of shit just to keep players playing this chore of a game. The only reason I can get highest tier on campaigns is because I grind O3s until i max the campaign. But you’re cooked to hell if youre telling me that new players can do an o3. The amount of grinding that it takes to get all the rewards is absolutely bonkers. It makes me want to rip my nails out by their roots and pluck my own hair out of my head. And there is NO WAY that a new player can get max tier on that shit. I would literally suck my own dick if you know any new player who maxed out a campaign without spending money.

And THE BEST FOR LAST. RAIDING DISCORDS. I know I’ve been a huge proponent for raiding discords, but tbh, I’m only in favor of them because they’re easy. It’s not fun, and it makes me want to stab my own eyes out. Where the fuck did the rotmg go where everyone would cram themselves inside an unorganized tomb of the ancients? Why do I have to listen to a 13 year old shotcall, and how the fuck are new players supposed to know that these discords even exist? I’ve talked to some people and they didn’t know that these existed. Yeah, they can help you get richer and become a better player, but at the cost of what? They strip the game of all fun. It’s not even a game anymore. And let’s not talk about these discords’ moderation methods. Today, I got suspended for 3 whole days because i brought a t11 staff, and the requirement was t12. Ok, 3 days because I brought a staff an entire one tier below the requirement, i mean its bullshit but whatever I can just do o3s in dungeoneer. But I was really fucking pissed. So i dm the motherfucker who suspended me. Turns out 2 other people got suspended for 3 days for being under reqs. Difference between me and them is, that I was 6/8 and barely under reqs. One of them had a t5 staff, and the other was 0/8. Also, i risked my own ass with less than 600 max hp by equipping an exa dex. And the other offenders had zero HP exalts, and judging by their characters, zero o3 completes, which meant that in the end, I was probably 10x more effective in terms of dps, and yet, received the same punishment. Now imagine if I was a new player and my first fucking raiding experience was getting told to GTFO because my staff was shit. Nice one. Very nice. I couldn’t even dm the raid leader because my rank was too low. Remove the chat rank filter, it does absolutely nothing to stop the bot problem anyways. You’d imagine that a multi dollar company like deca can take care of all the bots in such a simple pixel game, but oh no, new players have to suffer because you cant take care of bots (straight up cant even see their messages). People get shadowmuted randomly because you can’t take care of bots. I cant even say the name of the game im playing because you cant take care of bots. You can’t take down RWT websites but you can somehow manage to get your own blog get infected with malware. Truly a multi dollar company, I mean, i can see why you rely on UGC to make things for you all the time. And yet you still manage to fuck something up with every update. Congratulations. Yall want these mfs to fix kensei, but they’re probably gonna make wizard DC bug when they fix kensei. Yall want these mfs to add an auction house, but all I see is a new dupe method. Yall want these mfs to buff assassin, all I see is them adding a shitty little wismod.

I know you are saying “Bacon stfu, at least theyre updating the game. Stop crying stop malding stop seething.”. Yeah they are, and I obviously know they are. The thing is, Kabam didn’t give a flying fuck and let everyone know about it. Deca are acting like they care, but we all know that they don’t This facade theyre putting up is insufferable. You acquired a dying game and your multi dollar headass made it die even more. At this point they’re just milking it until it dies for good. It’s very clear from the amount of shit packages and the stupid mother fucking battle pass, that they are doing exactly just that.

And yes, I said multi dollar, not multi million. I’m insulting deca if you didn’t catch my drift.

Bonus (click me)

My experience with support:

I had a video of me, dc’ing from o3 as he died. I uploaded it to google drive, and, clearly, I was really pissed, because I at the time, was bad at o3. So a complete meant a lot ESPECIALLY SINCE THIS WAS THE COMPLETE I NEEDED FOR 1/5. And tbh, this garbage shouldn’t even be happening. How the fuck an entire osanc gets a dc, i have no idea.
So this is the message get back:

"Hello !

I apologize for the issues you have encountered, but we do our best to assist players with their requests. We treat our players with respect, and we expect the same in return. Please feel free to contact us once you are ready to have a productive and civilized conversation.

Regards,
Valsined"

I had a minute long video of me walking around a disconnected O3, with the RL talking, and this is what they hit me back with? I mean, I know it’s not the support’s fault, but… just give me my complete for fucks sake.

I said:

"you treat the players with respect so you give me a copy paste message after disconnecting the entire o3? Nice fucking excuse and great PR yall have. Give me my exalt, and give me my mark. "

They reply:

"Hello !

I apologize for the issues you have encountered, but we do our best to assist players with their requests. We treat our players with respect, and we expect the same in return. Please feel free to contact us once you are ready to have a productive and civilized conversation.

Regards,
Valsined"

I said:

"im not looking for a civilised conversation. I’m looking for a compensation."

And then after that I finally got my mark, and my complete. By then, I already beat o3 like 4 more times, so I was literally just like, wow. And that’s just one time I had to interact with their support.

#3

This spreadsheet?:

This is definitely wrong. In Combat’s main nerf, to pets, was implemented in such a way that it scales with pet level. The higher your pet level the greater the nerf. The nerf adds 2 seconds to the delay. At level 1 the delay is normally 10 so becomes 12, a 16% nerf. At level 100 the delay is normally 1 second so becomes 3, a 66% nerf.

But that’s less important than another effect, the 2x boost to VIT and WIS effect when not IC. Up until pet level 50 or so (it varies by class) maxed VIT and WIS heal more than their pet.

A player with a common or uncommon pet sees the least effect from the nerf, and will most notice the VIT/WIS boost which more than compensates for any pet nerf, provided they can stay Out of Combat for enough of the time.

#4

It all really comes down to a realm rework. Make the difficulty increase from highlands to godlands not as insane as it is now and create some low level UT’s for beginner monsters to drop. This would hopefully make someone more exited to try a new class after dying instead of just quitting. Also, a campaign or some kind of story quest would really help with giving direction to new players and explaining the mechanics when they become relevant. A newb now has no idea what ‘maxing a char’ means because very few games handle progression like that, and they don’t need to know until they can get to level 20 consistenly imo.

#5

Kinda with @Joshawsum’s points, just understand that new players are new players. Every single point made except for discords can be countered by the little experience new players have. They don’t know how certain dungeons work? They run them and learn. They don’t know the value of items? They play and learn. Pets? Learn. From my personal experience, I never got better just by reading through the wiki. First-hand experience is what taught me what to do and what not to do.

Also take into account that not everyone is trying to be the most efficient and optimal when playing. If they don’t care about these things and want to play their own way, that’s their choice. Those that want to improve and get better will do their research.

Last point. What are you trying to say about life and mana potions? If you’re saying that they are inaccessible to new players, they will trade for them. PPE’s are supposed to be challenges, and most if not all new players will not be restricted to a PPE. If you are saying that there is not enough for new players, also false. Easiest examples I found through a quick search are wlabs for life and esben for mana. Both can soloed (if needed) on squishy chars. Imo getting your first 8/8 is a struggle, but getting more will get exponentially easier after your first.

tldr: experience allows players to learn and grow; give them time to do so

#6

tldr + ratio

#7

Yeeees. I know that some people in my Discord might have even gotten sick of me mentioning that an Elder Realms type scenario fixes so many problems, even if it’s a massive undertaking. (I’d still want the coding of this game fixed first, though…)

I picked the main piece of the discussion apart in another place, so I don’t feel like doing it again here. But suffice it to say that while I agree with a couple of the principles, I think that there’s way too many assumptions being treated as facts here, and a narrow view on what success and playstyle means for newer players, and games in general.

#8

Others have picked apart this post in other ways, so I will not focus on those. I would like to clarify that overall, I do think this game could be more beginner-friendly, with further pushes towards more endgame content and items in recent years making it harder for newer players to interact meaningfully with more experienced players.

I disagree with the premise (stated here and many other places) that the game is not beginner-friendly because it is hard to jump into endgame content (O3, Shatters, LH, etc.), whether public or discord-run. Endgame content is not meant to be farmed by people who started playing a month ago; it’s meant for players who have been playing the game for years. New players should be running through the realm, learning how the game works and getting the hang of godlands dungeons, if they’ve made it that far. If they’re trying to farm OSancs within the first month, then something’s gone terribly wrong with the learning process. If they do want life, they should first learn how to run the aforementioned godlands dungeons to get the potions to trade for life, because apparently wisdom pots are stupidly valuable now and UDL farming is now a legitimate wealth-obtainment strategy.

It’s worthless to you, but to a new player, a T6 item might be the strongest they own for a while. They can trade those forest maze marks for a quest chest which might give them a T8 item. Remember that you’re looking at this from the perspective of an experienced player who’s used to having the most powerful items in the game, and that someone who can’t complete an Abyss will have a very different take on the game.

#10

I took this the wrong way in the initial post and I really shouldn’t have said that so mb

Oh really? Let’s look back to check to make sure

This, yes THIS, was your argument Bacon. While I’ll agree that the first part of your argument was that pet do help a lot in the early game, and while I agree with that, the second part’s argument was that vital combat actively made newer player’s lives harder, which just simply isn’t true. Checking the spreadsheet, you can see that Ooc pets will be worse than in combat vit and wis regen (keep in mind that because vit and wis regen was doubled, in combat regen would be the same as og vit and wis regen) till about lvl 42 heal and lvl 50 mheal if we assume that a character has 50 vit and wis. Keep in mind we’re using OoC pets, so in order to match InC pets, we’ll need to use higher lvl pets to match up with the InC vit and wis regen. Though my estimations, I believe that in order to complete with InC regen, you’d need about a lvl 60-ish pet for both heal and mheal in my generous estimations. Now, I don’t know about you, but most newer players aren’t going to get a lvl 64 pet anytime soon, but my point is that newer players are getting more out their InC regeneration rather than their pet. Does having a pet (even if under lvl 60) make a difference? Yes, but if we were to assume that the average newer play has a lvl 50 pet for example, they’d essentially be getting the heals of a lvl 36 pet OoC pet, which means that they’d get more heals from vit regen and wis regen.

#12

didn’t you like just quit realm lmao? obv I don’t know the details so tell me if I’m wrong here

#13

People very frequently quit the game yet remain active on the forums for some time, also please try to keep the discussion on topic.

#14

we should probably assume they have a slightly lower value than that. 50 vit and wis seems pretty high for a new player i think. Although the analysis following wouldn’t change that much.

#15

I just wanted to add my thoughts on this part here. Let me preface this by saying I’ve almost exclusively been playing on npe’s whenever I’ve returned to the game in the last few years. My primary source of mana has been OT’s and Cdepths after the rework but there are other dungeons such as Ice cave and Parasite chambers also. I can only speak for myself but in EUW, there are no shortage of players entering any of them in a decently filled realm unless there is a more attractive event to kill or the realm is about to close. The only issue I can see for new players is that they may not know where mana drops from but if we’re talking in general for any player that is aware of the drop locations then I would say there are plenty of sources available that don’t have a terribly high difficulty. For life potions, it can take longer however yes, Ddocks is the only godland dungeon that can provide a guaranteed life pot from the calamity crab but also remember that the boss Bilgewater and the chest also has a chance to drop it. Personally I like to do tombs / nests / and ddocks for life pots but I concede that the skill ceiling for doing nest and ddocks can be a little high. Tombs are an attractive option and are also relatively easy but they have suffered recently with shortage of players entering especially if they don’t see someone rushing the instance they enter.

But it also depends on your methodology for maxing as some players will only farm for specific stats before moving on to others. If you’re like me, I will first pot up some speed and dex via snake pit / sprite (and mwoods) and then run some ddocks as they provide a faster route by dropping greater speed and dex but alongside this you may get the odd life pot. Same for vitality / attack by running Wlabs which can drop life pots from Forgotten Tree and Megamoth. Same for farming wis / def in Cdepths which can also drop mana. My point being that if you run dungeons that drop multiple stat pots then it’s a lot quicker to progress rather than waiting till 6/8 before you start to pot up for hp / mp. We are actually quite lucky as I’m sure you’ll remember a few years ago there weren’t too many dungeons that dropped multiple types of pots and IIRC there were none godland dungeons which dropped life and mana.

#16

You don’t need to max life unless you’re doing end game dungeons. You don’t need a super cracked pet either. People have forgotten how to be careful and slowly build from the basics

also being mean to support won’t change anything

#17

cope, seethe, mald

we all struggled like this back in the day starting out fresh, literally fucking everyone, u seemed to have forgotten it and just now re-realized when starting a new ppe/nae whatever it was :skull:

ur complaining about shit that has been here for 9 years bro, every word u just typed has been said by 2000 other people before, nothing is going to change, get used to it.

#18

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#19

The kicker for me is how dude starts the rant off by saying “I’m not going to kill 23 crabs for life pots” so great, he’s already resented one of the easiest and most free methods for getting life pots. Keep in mind that he’s a good player with a good grasp of how this game works. If you actually read out his whole post I salute you lol, I didn’t even bother

#20

skill issue B)))))))))))))))))))))))

In all seriousness I feel like new players are in a good spot. The noobs who beg are just too lazy or are just desperate, but over time they’ll learn that begging won’t get them anywhere and that they have to work for their gear and pots. The Discord thing, okay, fine. I do agree that the Tutorial doesn’t tell you more about what to do. In the beginning, all you know is “enter dungeon and get loot, get level 20.” IMO, the Tutorial should tell you more about character stats and how to maximize them. That way, new players will know what to look out for besides “get level 20.” Overall, I disagree with half of the post but kind of agree with like 25% of it. Also, git bad B))))))))))))))))

#21

Knock it off.

#22

Preface: On the first day of returning to the game after 2 years of inactivity, I’ve also noticed these problems. ESPECIALLY the discord problem. I reminiscence back when players have to hug the edge of the Nexus to trade, and when 4 realms are generally full on a given time.

Discord:
A game should not require another app to function, so why does RotMG? From the perspective of a new or even 2 year player, how are you suppose to know these harder dungeons REQUIRE a discord raiding group?
Yes require. No random group of 50 realmers will be able to finish a void or o3.

Difficulty and updates:
Every update is geared towards the top 200 players; they are the money makers. Deca makes the game harder and more challenging for these 200 players; while turning a blind eye to newer players. The real problem is how long it takes to get to these end game dungeons. O3 for example, you need to get all the keys (which is long enough) and then learn how to do O3.

How to fix?

  1. Too many servers - too many players spread across each server and realm. RotMG is not like back then when you need this many servers. Minimise it to 4 servers so you push the players closer.
  2. Make end game dungeons easier to access. A normal player spends 1-2 hours playing a day, maybe 7-8 hours a week if they’re lucky. A normal player should be able to experience the end game dungeon at least twice a week. The keys to O3 should be easier to access.
  3. Dead players. This is hard since there are many reasons for this. The best you can do is try to acquire new players through advertising and increasing your player count. Contact content creators so they can advertise the game.
#23

I don’t know if there is another game that requires 3rd party app to function. But yes, this is so sad, Discords pretty much trivialized exaltation dungeons really hard.

And runes are not free either. Someone has to spend 2 USD for an Exaltation key, and runes are not guaranteed either, even for 1 player. And by the top 200 players, who are you talking about? Those in the top guilds?

4 servers? Like US, EU, Asia and… Aus? Just those 4?

That too, but also need to increase the incentives to raid exaltation dungeons.

This is the hardest one by far. Once you get new players, you gonna keep them. Player retention is equally important as hooking in new Realmers.