As probably everyone hoped for, the game release was a success (at least from my pov) and we have a lot of new players and old backers getting back into game.
I enjoy the game very much, I made some new friends with whom I’m in touch daily even out of game using Discord servers, suffice to say we are an established group of friends, that without the existence of this game we wouldn’t even know each other exist. I’m very exited for what new features and recipes will be added in the future and TITANS, huh, that would be something wouldn’t it!?!
With that said, there are also some bad parts in the game, some aspects that need refining and some that need a new approach. I will list bellow some of the items that I’m referring to and that the title implies as well as a possible solution to such problems, so here we go:
Plot griefing, a rising issues that becomes more and more noticeable to those that do not plan ahead their builds and get blocked by reserved plots. Plots, that are not necessarily reserved with bad intentions, they just maybe wanted a plot there but, never built something due to real life issues or, maybe another game got their attention and the beacon remained fueled.
Solution: Place some power in the hands of the mayor or the adjacent neighbors, ability to report in a meaningful way the plots and eventually lift the restriction on them if the owner is not responding.
Mayor/Warden title: Currently the title is given to the player that has the build with highest prestige in the city. And so it comes the situation where the mayor can have a lot of offline time and the city name remains with an older name for a long time. This is just an example, it didn’t happen to me or the city where I was one of the founders (Sunken City). But the thought doubted on me, what if the mayor suddenly disappears.
Solution: First of all, my suggestion is to change the name into “Mayor”, everyone that I talked to besides the staff/devs of the game use it. Second, a voting system can be put in place right in the settlement prestige window, where a list of all the characters that have builds inside that settlement is displayed and for that each player could place a vote beside the name of the wanted mayor and that way the character with most votes will the in the management position for that city. In the back-end, each player can have a calculated weight (value) for it’s vote and each report made for that specific mayor can be taken into account when calculating if that char should be the mayor. I’m getting to much into detail here so I will stop for this subject.
City area/region: A lot of people do not have for the start a big number of plots, but, as a group, they want to build on a larger area, but, eventually they end up being blocked by someone else that already reserved the plots.
Solution: A specific number of special plots (ghost plots) that one can use anywhere to state that they want to reserve that spot in the future. Those ghost plots are just a marker on that land that let’s others know that they owner will want to reserve it in the future. The ghost plots have every aspect of a unreserved plot, they can be beaconed or plotted by anyone.
City management: Currently the mayor has the “power” of changing the name of the city, and that is all. Given the above points implemented, a more diverse set of tools would be very useful in the hands of a city manager, things like writing a message/customized notification that will appear to anyone entering that city (this was mentioned already in another post on forum), the possibility to mark/flag/report griefing spots/plots (if this “power” would be in the hands of the mayor, than the team that manages the reporting would only monitor the city mayors not everyone on the game) the ability for the mayor to see the timers on the city beacons and many more…
I will end my post here to not make this into a novel.
I agree with most of the points but not this one. I agree on the one I read somewhere in the forum that beacon fuel should be absolute. Just a quick example of this is for example you wont be able to play for a few months due to business trip or medical issues, you planned and set up your beacon so that you still have something to come back to and not worry if somehow it got voted out or force you to log in once ever few weeks etc. Adding the voting option to force remove the beacon would make the greater fuel useless because you can’t leave it anyway without worrying.
Edit: On the other hand, I kind of understand the problem with straight up abandoned plots and to top it off, the building is not finished or not appealing as well. But I’m still not sure introducing a subjective player’s opinion to have power would be the ideal solution…
People, there is a reason for fuel for beacon. Sooner or later those beacons will go out. Maybe one thing I would change would be removing beacon fuel from glean club. This actually should help quite a bit.
I think the issue is with beacon abandoners on un developed plots with zero prestige or any building at all on them, I agree that a developed plot with some building should only be based on beacon fuel timers, the other scenario should be addressed in my opinion.
There are definitely some points I agree with and some that I don’t.
I would love to vote on some stuff, like settlement name, especially if I get swallowed up and I already had my own settlement name…and had no choice about that. However, I do not agree that every player get a “weighted” vote…that’s a little 3/5ths compromise for me. All accounts get one solid vote if this system is implemented.
There is a reason why you can’t feul beacons forever now…I definitely don’t think that a group should be able to vote one person out…talk about griefing! You can just gang up on someone. Sometimes people have to be away, like business, and accident or and may not get back for a while. I have a person right behind my build that is a beacon only…and if he/she comes back to build, fine…and if not, fine…it’ll be gone eventually. this game has just released. I guarantee that in three months, a lot of those beacons will be gone when their fuel runs out…
While appreciate what you are trying to accomplish, I am very much against voting for anything in the game. It is a mechanic that I believe can be manipulated by a group pf people to in fact take ownership from the people that invested the most time and effort into a town. Even if it is based on prestige percentage, all I need is a prestige vault in a town with a natural setting to get the majority of the prestige to take control. So it changes nothing. If it is pure numbers of players then all I need is a group to take control. If it is plots then all I need is a group to come in with more plots.
My concern is what happens when the Mayor is the one griefing? So the mayor surrounds your build with walls because they decide they do not like you and you cannot report it? I do not think the developers should ever put that much control in the hands of one individual.
I do understand with the plots only being gained through leveling that it can take time to get enough plots to claim the area you might be interested in. If the developers did provide the ghost plots and someone plotted there anyway what happens? You complain the forums that someone took your spot? But it is not your spot and you might never use it. Plans change so we are now going to crowd the planets not only with true plots reserved for expansion but additional ghost plots? I think this creates more issues than it solves. People will complain that someone took there spot and the reality is that it is not their spot. I think this creates a more complicated system. Right now if you plot it, it is yours as long as you keep it fueled. With these ghost plots, who really owns the spot?
I do understand and will agree that you have raised some issues that need discussion. But I am concerned that the solutions either do not solve the problem or may create more problems.
I agree, those are complex problems with multiple end points, and a solution to satisfy every player, don’t think it exists. The solutions provided are just suggestions thought by me “on the fly”, not necessarily correct or the most appropriate.
The best we can do, is hope we don’t encounter to many ill intended reactions around the areas we build, because as in every MMO… it eventually comes to the people we play with and the community that get constructed. The game developers can only give us the tools, or, is best on their part to only give us the tools and not restrict us.
It comes to our own respect for those around.
So far since launch I’ve spent a lot of my time just exploring and on my travels I’ve found a couple of potential sites that I might like to build on and to that end I have put down beacons and plotted out the footprint of the areas I would like. I might build on those sites, I might not, at the moment they are out in the wilderness with no one around. Eventually I will either build on them or unplot them if I need the plots or find somewhere else. If in the mean time a group of players come along and decide they like the spot too that means that they can just settle next me and before I know it I’m voted out of my own plots. If that ever becomes the case then I think a lot of players will leave the game, me included, as it then makes a complete nonsense of the whole plotting and beacon system. It’s bad enough that we can get swallowed up by more prestige and have our settlement name taken away from us but giving someone the power to remove someone else’s plots is a step too far.
I have also plotted some areas away from others and do not want them to be stripped from me. Now if someone wants to discuss my letting go of them. I might give them up, give up some, or keep them, but at least it is a discussion. I will also say I have plotted next to some people and in that case I did take the plots, but followed up to ask if they had plans for the space. If they did fine, I will move, if not then I did ask and will not feel that I should give them up in the future.
I don’t agree with the ability to take someone else’s plots, I didn’t say that in my post. But the possibility of the mayor to report them and maybe to see the beacon fuel and if the beacon is of someone with gleam club membership… this would seem fair for me. I wouldn’t mind for someone else finding out what the times is on my beacons and the gleam membership… you can already see it, it’s nothing secretive about it.
Perhaps it’s the wording but this to me implies removing someone’s plots from an area the ‘mayor’ might want for whatever reason, whether it’s for the good of the city build or just for some personal agenda.
They might not be able to respond for any number of reasons that doesn’t mean they might not build there in the future. If it’s a gleam club member that has just placed some plots down and forgotten about them then that’s more of an issue with the gleam club and being able to buy as many plots as you can afford and never have to worry about fuelling them.
Edit: I thinks it’s good that you have brought this subject up and are looking at ways to improve it, it’s through discussion that we can see other people’s points of view and hopefully everyone together can help form some suggestions that the Developers can consider.
Sure, i have full stock of stuff in my vaults. I go on vacation. How the hell am i going to feel safe?! Camp laptop every day so i can be sure nobody really griefed me by voting my beacon out? Sure, i can probably get some consequences when i’m back and see my staff pillaged. Bigger chance i will just froget about the game and move on.
So, i have a settlement (cause i have enough prestige). Now a bunch of guys settle around me. Two weeks later they vote me out, change name and start advertising their group using my build as the center. Nice. No chance to fight it cause they vote me out and I’m but one guy. And now I have to move, regardless how long it took me to build my house and surrounding area up.
And they start griefing/crying when somebody will ignore that. Cause why actually someone should not ignore it? How the hell does it differ from land grab using huge walls surrounding some area?! we already have plots which are way more effective when it comes to grabbing land. This only means some people feel they need more and they don’t have patience to wait till they will be able to get them by exping. Either way, how many plots will actually be enough?! Why not just increase starting amount of plots? Ech…
Report griefing should be made to devs not to some other players. But this is the only part i’m actually quite happy if would be implemented.
