How to Deal With STs (Personal Opinion)

#1

Of course, the topic of STs has been a recurring topic in Realm Eye. However, most of the issues around STs are not based around the newer DECA based sets but the sets produced by the money grab of Kabam era. There are three major issues with Kabam Era STs (probably more but these are mine)

  1. They are not SB

  2. There are clearly issues in balance (with some parts of a set being OP while other parts suck)

  3. They are rarer than whites

However, because they take up such a massive part of the economy, it would simply be unfair to significantly nerf any single item because it would harm any individual who decided to already invest in that item. So what’s the solution?

My suggestion is to make all STs+deca SB. Once SB, any nerfing or buffing will still affect individuals BUT because it is SB, no one actually cares (aka tablet, dirk, leaf bow etc…) But of course, making it SB will destroy the economy… but it may be a risk worth taking, especially as the economy is already kinda screwed up. However, to make sure it’s not a surprise, there should be a two month warning before the removal of the STs (into SB). It should also be noted in the two month warning that all STs shall be subject to balancing changes once they become soulbound.

Of course, there will be issues as the prices of STs fluctuate as we approach the two month mark but truthfully there probably won’t be that big of a change. People who invested in STs as currencies desperately trying to sell them while people who want one last chance to obtain them desperately trying to buy.

Obviously, this is an incomplete idea. It comes with many issues but I believe that it is a step that needs to be taken.

#2

The economy should never be a factor in item balancing. The economy is meant to adapt to game changes, not the other way around.

#3

My idea is this:

DECA announces they will be making all STs soulbound in say, 2 months. This will be a popup when you enter the game, one of the cards on the right of the character select screen, pinned on Reddit etc so everyone knows. This will give everyone more than enough time to buy and sell before the SBing. Everyone wins c:

I do think that having 1 high value item non-SB would be nice, however. Keep Decades unSB imo.

#4

hey… the pop up idea was mine!! (though I never added it :stuck_out_tongue: ) However, we already got UBHP. Decades shouldn’t be UnSB

#5

Why not though? It’s currently unobtainable and UBHP isn’t equal to Deca’s price.

#6

Wrong

image

But seriously, this still wouldn’t fix the underlying problem of the economy of realm right now or in the future. it also doesn’t fix the fact that STs are sold in the shop mystery boxes and packages, so it doesn’t matter how broken or rare they if you can pull money out of your ass and use a slot machine to get them.

I also don’t see how this would fix STs in any way, you’d still have garbage stats on certain items, but now you just can’t trade them to people who might want them.

#7

Some ST’s are SB, while some are tradable. If it were SB, I would shove it in a vault unless it if was actually useful by itself. If it was tradable, I would save it on a mule.

#8

Moved to #ideas:other

#9

Imo the exact opposite should be done
All the ST’s should be unsb (when duping is fixed ofc), because most of them are whitebag level, and with all the ST chest pachages and mystery boxes and whatnot it’s basically like selling whites in the nexus.
It’s especially apparent with the Symbiotic Ripper (an ST you can get for gold), which is by many considered to be much much better than CDirk (an event white - one of the rarest and most coveted items in the game).

Also:

  • Being tradeable doesn’t mean it can’t be rebalanced. Multiple untradeable items have been rebalanced in the past, some of them pretty recently, and there’s even a sword nerf in the makings.

  • You’d have to live under a rock to think people don’t care about sb items. Yes, people don’t really use weak items that much, but the outcry to buff CDirk was certainly noticeable.
    On a side note: Leaf Bow is pretty well balanced so I have no idea why you included it there.

  • The Kabam ST’s are NOT problematic in any way. Some parts are pretty powerful, but none are op, and other parts being weaker doesn’t matter when you factor in the set bonus. The DECA ST’s actually suffer from many more problems, the biggest of which, as mentioned above, is because they’re essentially whites sold in the nexus for money. That’s blatant P2W. You don’t have to be an expert to see that.

  • They’re rarer than whites, because they’re meant to be traded. When whites were still tradeable they were much rarer than now too. Also, it adds to the issue of selling rarer, and sometimes better whites in the nexus for REAL MONEY!

  • Making items untradeable would harm people who invested into them or use them to compact their wealth (literally everyone past the dying to hobbits phase) WAY more. Could you imagine taking a 3 month break and suddenly coming back to see all your stuff is sb and you’re basically broke? That’s a even bigger problem for those who keep these items on their mules, because now they wouldn’t even be able to use them on their main account, and noone really plays on mules because they’re just not meant for that. What would you do if you had an account with a wizard holding 24 sb Pixies?

  • The economy is only screwed up during bigger events, and for a while after them. This however would destabilise the entire game to the point where half the playerbase would quit right away never to return. Such a change was possible years ago when realm was still small and during development, but now that’s no longer the case. If any such changes were to be made it’d have to happen gradually, sb’ing items one by one, with a better alternative way of storing your valuables implemented long beforehand, so people could get comfortable with it before being forced to switch, and a way to convert them put into the game forever, so those who missed the transition period wouldn’t lose all their currency.

Overall, it’s not a step that should be taken, but rather one that should be avoided at all costs.

#10

:star_struck: Fun fact!: :scream: The MG Sword and the MG Shield had times when each was soulbound, back in the rollercoaster days of Kabam.
image image

The sword actually went unsb->sb->unsb as Kabam tried to make up its mind about what they wanted to do with these items. This was before STs, at the time they were mere standalone reskins like the Solstice wizard items, which also flipflopped between sb and not.

If you want more historical context:

Before ST arrived as a concept Kabam seemed very keen on doing plain reskins, hence the Solstice items, and the Amethyst dagger (ehh?? – Foul reskin, see wiki), and Morning Star/Dbow & Illumination/Dblade on the UT side (the first MotMG, June 2014).

The MG Knight items then got made into the forerunner of Kabam’s STs (while the wizard solstice items were left alone, and nothing else was done with the dagger at all; its full name Dagger of the Amethyst Prism even hints at an abandoned trickster set…).

The second ST (Paladin) then set the template for all future Kabam STs: one good item that is a blatant UT copy but arguably better, a bonus for wearing the whole set, all items tradeable.

This is what got the ire of the community :rage: , because from PaladinST onwards the STs mimiced UTs yet Kabam sold them in the nexus and left them tradeable, while maintaining the sb restriction on other UTs.

Now I think Kabam’s standpoint was “all the equipment we sell for money is tradeable”, though logically problematic when items X and Y are to all intents and purposes the same yet one tradeable the other not.

Deca patently doesn’t take this attitude as they happily sell both soulbound and unsb items. So why aren’t their ST sets tradeable?
I’m looking at an Acclaim in the nexus. A good item. I can buy it and trade it away.
I’m looking at Etherite in the mystery box. A good item. I can buy it and trade it away.
I’m looking at ST Helm in the mystery box. A good item. I can buy it and… it’s sb?

It’s not logical, and Deca should decide whether their view is “ST=sb” (and bring the Kabam STs into line) or “STs=unsb” (and bring the Deca STs into line with Kabam’s). Because either one way or the other, half of their ST sales strategy is currently doing it wrong. :rofl:

Last thoughts, on the replacement Oryx knight set

Deca’s retread over the Oryx Awesome knight set, effectively retiring it, removal from drop tables and replacing it with Oryx’s Battle Attires, I think means they’re saying that one is now dealt with in their mind.

I would urge them to actually go further and put the old items into O1’s loot table. Doesn’t matter that there’s no set bonus, it’s just a quirk of history. And the set is good anyway, being full WC tops. Two Oryx sets, there are two Oryxes, it’s a nice symmetry. Could even give the sets slight variant skins & do different bullets or something. Embrace it that the old set is different, don’t just abandon it to dust, & partsolves the problem of O1 currently having like 1 good loot item (exaHP).

#11

UBHP from o1? You mean exa hp?

#12

Aha my trap to see if anyone read the whole thing paid off (jk… thx for the catch!)

#13

Forgetting drop tables from dead content, geez. But no problem <3

#14

@ArexRew I understand your point but I still believe that decades should be SB. Although UBHP is not at all a replacement for Decades when it comes to value, I believe that it is close enough. Considering that the Ring of Decades no longer drops, I simply don’t like the idea of keeping it tradeable and making it vulnerable to duping. You are right that there is no good reason to make it SB. I simply believe that it should be SB for personal reasons. I own a bunch and looking back at it, I don’t deserve them.

@WindowsHDD The reason I think this would help is because no one cares when SB items are modded but changing the stats of tradeables could screw around with the economy. Once SB, they can then screw around with the stats and balance. Additionally, making STs deal with RWT. As for DECA selling STs in shop, I don’t think it’s okay whether or not the STs are SB simply because of their extreme rarity either way. The only solution to that would be for DECA to stop…

@Xyagan UnSB ing is a perfectly logical idea but the catch is that it can only be completed AFTER duping is removed. And, given that that’s going to take a while, I’m suggesting SBing them. AFTER duping is removed, I believe a lot of the game could be changed. We could bring back UT weekends for example.

As for the fact that a lot of non SB items have been changed. Yes but specifically for STs, the high valued items are only high value because they’re broken. Nerfing them to balanced would significantly decrease their value and screw over people who have invested in them. I remember when they said they were nerfing etherite (back when I invested in them), and the value dropped by like 3 life. Then the actual “nerf ” happened (Removed the +2wis,+2vit) and it instantly jumped back up.

As for the argument that the Kabam STs are balanced, just look at value and you could see that it’s not true. Almost all the sets are terribly balanced. For pixie, the sword and armor are good while the ring and seal are unusable. Look at the ST wizard set where the staff is a t12 with higher amplitude, the spell is a great ability, the robe is mediocre at best, and the ring is often worth less than dust. Look at the Skuld set with an OP dagger, an alright cloak, and a useless hide and ring. The mystic set is actually alright with each individual item having use while the geb’s set comes with a free useless wand. They are definitely not properly balanced.

As for the one by one thing, that was actually what I was thinking. After figuring out a balance, they would then give a warning. I was never actually thinking of them all happening at once.

Finally, I agree with the P2W process happening at the mystery box but as I noted earlier, I believe that no matter what, those mystery boxes should not exist, whether or not the STs are SB

#15

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