How Blood Guard does Lodi

[sereal]

Originally Posted by Lhancelot [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

This is why Nihilum was top guild for so long, it was the marketing genius of their recruiters.

Nihilum/Red recruitment video on Youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydjnPheTIhQ

If Cylocke and other Red recruiters really want Red to succeed and are serious about recruiting, I suggest they create some entertaining recruitment videos like this one!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KeSyf6TD3qY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btcRj6vF1Hg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wuhKeABevtg

rofl they really took recruitment seriously... It almost makes me want to play on red.

[Lhancelot]

Originally Posted by sereal [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KeSyf6TD3qY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btcRj6vF1Hg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wuhKeABevtg

rofl they really took recruitment seriously... It almost makes me want to play on red.

You have to admire their dedication to their craft. 100% unapologetic!

Yes, if these newer Red supporters had the balls to do something like these recruitment videos Little Gyno and crew did back in the day, we might see some new life emerge on Red p99!

I want to see Swish, Baler or Cylocke rub chocolate syrup and whipped cream all over their bare chests and guts while dancing to a retro 70s song.

I might try Red then.

Might.

[Rygar]

Originally Posted by HippoNipple [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

It is 100% on the Devs to create a server that keeps a high population, not the community. Red started with bugs, cheats and soon made server rules that made the raid scene all about zerging.

You can't expect a community to go against the natural rules of the server to create an environment that is favorable for everyone. The server rules do not promote multiple competing guilds. There is no penalty on death and you can't expect the server to pretend to care about PvP death just because that makes the server better.

The issue with Red is that the rules favor zerg mentality. It is a winner takes all environment so there can only be 1 end game raiding guild. You can't have 3 guilds in an area trying to do a first to engage. The zerg kills everyone else and takes all the content. There is no penalty on PvP death so the zerg will just overwhelm everyone else. Once the zerg wins they can sit on corpses and camp them until people get frustrated and quit for a couple days. It is why TMO had no chance on Red. Once a guild has taken the top spot there is nothing another guild can do until the number 1 guild gets banned or quits.

Top guilds:

Nihilum - banned
Holocaust/Empire - banned/quit
Apex - Current guild

Current issue with Red that will never be fixed by a community:

60 members of a guild looking at 20 members of a competing guild full of vets and highly skilled players. The 60 know they could take the 20 but might suffer 2-3 deaths a piece until their zerg finally overwhelms the 20. The zerg will not hesitate to throw away 2-3 deaths each to beat the 20, so the tight group of highly skilled 20 members eventually join the zerg if they want to do content and progress their character. You have to join the zerg no matter how much you dislike them or you just quit the server.

There is a way to fix it.

You can have item loot so small PvP guilds that focus on high kill/death ratios have something to do. This promotes anti-pk guilds. Top guilds wanting to zerg will not work because the losers that keep dieing over and over to get a dragon will lose items.

You can also hardcode it with teams but there still has to be some penalty on PvP death. Even with hardcoded teams people must have a need to protect their team from deaths.

I played on Red during Live (Rallos Zek), talking early RZ when they can loot your weapons. Even after disallowing weapon loot, item loot was a huge barrier to entry. Worked my ass off to get a bronze breastplate on my warrior, got like nuked out in the karanas before my group knew what was up and some naked wiz or whatever loots my BP (probably right into a bag, so retribution is impossible).

It was super stressful and in the end I gave up and joined a blue server, made it to maybe level 34 on a human warrior. I had some fun times hunting griefers in the early levels around crushbone and steamfont, but it got annoying as you progressed and your item values increased.

Other guildies that played zek recalled melee's bagging their gear when their HP started dropping too low. No Drop loot for melee's was real hard to come by early.

Maybe item loot helps in the situation you're describing (at the end game), but I think it would make a huge barrier to entry for new players. Even twinking a character will be tougher (no fungis, haste, crafted / dropped armor sets would be safe). Maybe a hybrid of allowing item loot only 55+ (if you the killer are 55+ and the slain are also 55+).

I still think this presents balancing problems, people at the top as you say will stay at the top with better no-drop items (haste, big resist pieces, etc) as the lower levels try to claw their up in junkier gear.

[HippoNipple]

Originally Posted by Rygar [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I played on Red during Live (Rallos Zek), talking early RZ when they can loot your weapons. Even after disallowing weapon loot, item loot was a huge barrier to entry. Worked my ass off to get a bronze breastplate on my warrior, got like nuked out in the karanas before my group knew what was up and some naked wiz or whatever loots my BP (probably right into a bag, so retribution is impossible).

It was super stressful and in the end I gave up and joined a blue server, made it to maybe level 34 on a human warrior. I had some fun times hunting griefers in the early levels around crushbone and steamfont, but it got annoying as you progressed and your item values increased.

Other guildies that played zek recalled melee's bagging their gear when their HP started dropping too low. No Drop loot for melee's was real hard to come by early.

Maybe item loot helps in the situation you're describing (at the end game), but I think it would make a huge barrier to entry for new players. Even twinking a character will be tougher (no fungis, haste, crafted / dropped armor sets would be safe). Maybe a hybrid of allowing item loot only 55+ (if you the killer are 55+ and the slain are also 55+).

I still think this presents balancing problems, people at the top as you say will stay at the top with better no-drop items (haste, big resist pieces, etc) as the lower levels try to claw their up in junkier gear.

Item loot doesn't work in Velious because of too much no drop gear.

It is perfect for classic/kunark with the best gear not being no drop gear but still having enough no drop pieces if you are scared to wear other gear.

In Kunark the items aren't game breaking either.

Another option is to make it less harsh by only allowing open inventory items not in containers, earrings, rings, necklace and bracers slots be lootable. This covers most resist gear through Kunark and allows melee/hybrid to maintain their AC/weapons.

[Lhancelot]

Originally Posted by HippoNipple [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Item loot doesn't work in Velious because of too much no drop gear.

I never cared if you got loots from PVP, it was about the fights more than anything.

I started on RZ, went to SZ, then to Zek. Never in the whole time did I lament later on that you couldn't loot gears.

[sereal]

Originally Posted by Rygar [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I played on Red during Live (Rallos Zek), talking early RZ when they can loot your weapons. Even after disallowing weapon loot, item loot was a huge barrier to entry. Worked my ass off to get a bronze breastplate on my warrior, got like nuked out in the karanas before my group knew what was up and some naked wiz or whatever loots my BP (probably right into a bag, so retribution is impossible).

It was super stressful and in the end I gave up and joined a blue server, made it to maybe level 34 on a human warrior. I had some fun times hunting griefers in the early levels around crushbone and steamfont, but it got annoying as you progressed and your item values increased.

Other guildies that played zek recalled melee's bagging their gear when their HP started dropping too low. No Drop loot for melee's was real hard to come by early.

Maybe item loot helps in the situation you're describing (at the end game), but I think it would make a huge barrier to entry for new players. Even twinking a character will be tougher (no fungis, haste, crafted / dropped armor sets would be safe). Maybe a hybrid of allowing item loot only 55+ (if you the killer are 55+ and the slain are also 55+).

I still think this presents balancing problems, people at the top as you say will stay at the top with better no-drop items (haste, big resist pieces, etc) as the lower levels try to claw their up in junkier gear.

I mean you could also play a mmo that was designed for PVP like darkfall.... After folks realised tasos couldn't lift they sold the IP to two companies https://www.darkfallriseofagon.com/ https://darkfallnewdawn.com/

[Daldaen]

Add item loot.
Add a No Drop destroy function. Instead of being able to loot one item, you can select one no drop item to destroy
Add Bag loot function. You loot the bag and destroy any no drop items in said bag when looting it.

This should fix red for sure. People can't hide behind bagging their items, and can't hide behind no drop geared toons.

[sereal]

Sounds like red would benefit with a relaunch every so often. Give new folks a chance to start on a even playing ground and give new and old folks a chance to race to the top.

Honestly if they relaunched red and kept the nice xp modifier I would jump on and play for a bit.

On the rule set, there are probably some interesting things that could be done in raid zones such as harsh unrecoverable (via res) xp losses.

You could do some stuff to mitigate no drop stuff - depending on what it is, tie it to a pp value and have that drop instead, or return it to the mob it came from - and it would become a guaranteed drop (and let the server know this target now has some extra loot) Maybe for certain classes like casters have a potential of losing a spell.

Probably shit ideas.

Also, changing all the rules would be pretty 'unclassic' though so at that point you might as well make a totally new PVP server locked to velious?

I never played PVP on LIVE - are the issues Red is experiencing the same sort of issues LIVE had?

[HippoNipple]

Originally Posted by sereal [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Sounds like red would benefit with a relaunch every so often. Give new folks a chance to start on a even playing ground and give new and old folks a chance to race to the top.

Honestly if they relaunched red and kept the nice xp modifier I would jump on and play for a bit.

On the rule set, there are probably some interesting things that could be done in raid zones such as harsh unrecoverable (via res) xp losses.

You could do some stuff to mitigate no drop stuff - depending on what it is, tie it to a pp value and have that drop instead, or return it to the mob it came from - and it would become a guaranteed drop (and let the server know this target now has some extra loot) Maybe for certain classes like casters have a potential of losing a spell.

Probably shit ideas.

Also, changing all the rules would be pretty 'unclassic' though so at that point you might as well make a totally new PVP server locked to velious?

I never played PVP on LIVE - are the issues Red is experiencing the same sort of issues LIVE had?

During this era it wasn't an issue because the PvP servers were either item loot or hard coded teams. They also didn't have the issue with the server being stuck at Velious 4 years after launch with a very small population.

Trying to make everything classic with awful timelines, locked progression and a much smaller population is a huge fail. Someone that has some good insight on potential effects of certain server rules needs to make good judgement calls on some custom rules.

Unfortunately the few with good insight are rarely the same few with the means to code and create the servers. P99 has done a good job of keeping their judgement out of it and just trying to copy what was already done back in 1999. All the other servers where devs have made custom rules and content have been awful so who knows if that balance of classic and custom will ever be done correctly.

[sereal]

Originally Posted by HippoNipple [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

During this era it wasn't an issue because the PvP servers were either item loot or hard coded teams. They also didn't have the issue with the server being stuck at Velious 4 years after launch with a very small population.

Trying to make everything classic with awful timelines, locked progression and a much smaller population is a huge fail. Someone that has some good insight on potential effects of certain server rules needs to make good judgement calls on some custom rules.

Unfortunately the few with good insight are rarely the same few with the means to code and create the servers. P99 has done a good job of keeping their judgement out of it and just trying to copy what was already done back in 1999. All the other servers where devs have made custom rules and content have been awful so who knows if that balance of classic and custom will ever be done correctly.

yeah, in that case they should just reset the Red server on a timer after velious has been unlocked. Maybe do a extra large XP modifier during the first month after the reset to encourage new players. I suppose this could upset all 30 of the Red regulars?

Personally I think they should do something similar for blue but you'd probably see blue go up to PoP before they reset.