A post was merged into an existing topic: Add back original color palette planets like old Universe
I am having a hard time moving past this myself. Anyone who says the penalty isn’t bad is not higher level. Maybe have to take up bag mining for a proclaimed:wink: 65k xp off one bags worth of bombs.
The other things don’t stop me from playing boundless. Bugs in the forge make me not forge until they are resolved. Only the xp death after 30 makes me turn the game off , out of all the bugs in the game that alone makes me walk away and go outside and see day light.
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The Only thing that turns me off is when : {ANALOGY} a restaurant gives you a menu but when you pick an item , it is unavailable {end analogy}.
I bought the Deluxe Digital Version and so did a few others. and none of us (acccording to Steam forums) got the extra features proposed there: not the cubits or the 10% lifetime bonus to your total beacon plot balance, nor the 30 days of Gleam Club membership.
Disappointing.
The rest is Good , I played 7 hours total game time already and I have no comlains on In-game features.
these kinds of things will always be taken care of as high priority. just be patient. 
they are on top of it, and there has been more than a few cases of this.
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Wasting significant blocks of play time:
- Running around on a planet for 3+ hours and finding exactly 1 plant for shimmering orb (despite atlas saying they’re all over the place).
- Running around in caves (all vertical levels) for 2+ hours and finding 6 saltpeter fragments. (despite atlas saying they’re all over the pace)
- Digging down to many far-and-wide gem hotspots on a planet to find all of them have been thoroughly cleared. (again thanks for nothing atlas)
SURFACE RESOURCE GENERATION - A BIG PROBLEM
It’s getting very old, and very frustrating very quickly. It’s not at all fun to spend an entire game-play session running around endlessly dodging OHKO mobs (or not and taking a massive xp gain hit). The above listed are only a few examples of cases where I set out for any resource in this game which just do not exist, particularly surface resources. The problem is, they are the norm.
I know some changes have been made recently, and I can at least find fibrous more frequently. The truth of the matter is it’s not good enough and it will not last. These changes also hardly impacted the surface resource problem at all.
The root issue is players don’t want to spend a whole play session (or 2 or 3 or all of them as can be the case in Boundless) not finding ‘x’ item and in fact not finding anything else in that time. People like me who value their free time to unwind and play a game outside of the daily grind, will:
- make goals
- want to progress on those goals
- set out multiple times to achieve said goals
- quickly drop this game after being constantly frustrated with nothing done toward their goals after countless hours of effort.
(I won’t do this last one because I see great potential in this game but your average player will)
Think of this way; you go to work all week, you work your tail off and get rewarded with your $0 paycheck. What will you do? You will drop that job immediately and find a new job. This analogy isn’t perfect, but it drives home the point I’m making.
Okay so I acknowledge the issue is nothing new and it doesn’t seem to be going away. The mentality seems to be to tackle the problem by some form of upscaling the current system (add planets, adjust respawn algorithms to try and simulate a dynamic system, smaller chunk size). These are band-aid fixes (and some are one way scaling) and are not a very sustainable approach especially as player base fluctuates.
A FEW IDEAS
Let’s talk outside the box solutions for a bit, and I encourage the developers to imagine their software as a less rigid system and stop trying to fix something that is inherently broken as it is today-- as a developer I believe that creative potential is limitless with code if you’re willing to consider more ways to deliver.
A practical solution to server constraint is to offload to the client. This is a basic principle and can be applied to this problem in a hybrid sense. Consider something to the effect of the server generating surface resources specifically for the client based on some algorithm that incorporates distance explored. Obviously the server must be the control here for abuse reasons, but this should be* easy to scale in real time with minimal resources (*some assumptions made).
Another idea is NPCs, aerial drones, or a machine where you trade something in exchange for them entering into a venture to fetch you a small amount of a resource over a period of time limited by some daily or weekly allowances. In fact, maybe they can also bring back random items from a specific category to send them out to get. This would augment the current system.
Yes, the second one is a tactic used by subscription MMOs to get people to log in daily and maintain their subscription. However, the reward principle makes it a very successful tactic, particularly for casual players who don’t mind making progress toward a goal over a protracted time-frame. The key is they are making some progress instead of none. It’s little effort and thus provides little reward. That’s way better than very high effort and zero reward.
The third idea I’m not going to give specifics for, but it would involve some form of instanced content providing resources as a reward. This one is obviously quite a bit more complex, but the trade off is you can come of with some really neat things and provide another source of resources that guarantees some reward for effort.
These are just spitball ideas, maybe some of them have been proposed or considered but the point is the system for surface resource regeneration is not working. It will never be manageable and never be truly dynamic enough to scale up or down as player numbers fluctuate. What’s worse is that you are allowing it to be player driven by having player presence influence it.
VOLUME AND SURFACE AREA ARE DIFFERENT
I think the ore and gems work decently/better after the latest changes, which is great. Why is that? It’s simply “volume” vs “surface area” with “foot traffic” factored in and rarity/demand.
Honestly if you really think hard about it, the player influence is the major problem with the current regen system and the sole reason it isn’t working without adding more planets (this is a one-way scale solution… pretty dangerous). If I can traverse a very large percentage of the planet myself in a reasonable amount of time, that means each planet can support an alarmingly low number of players (with respect to surface resources).
How many planets do you have to add to get the equivalent in surface area that you have in volume on a single planet. More than 1 that’s for sure.
It’s so easy to influence a very large surface area on foot in a short amount of time, and a lot more people do it (regardless if they are looking for surface resources or not). Still the fact remains, it’s very likely in 4 hours that at least 1 other person was either looking for a specific surface resource (or simply walked past) where you are now to get somewhere. This likelihood is immensely compounded if the item is one in high demand.
Just wait until groups of people figure out they can own/grief whole item markets just by systematically walking around a planet or 2. Scary enough for you?
BOTTOM LINE
The regen for surface resources is very broken and does not scale the same as in rock resources. This is going to cause a lot of people to walk away, I promise. Whatsmore is it makes this game caged-in from such great potential. There needs to be another/better option to get these resources.
MAIN POINTS (TLDR)
- Gathering reward for effort is grossly unacceptable for a game with a major theme that is gathering. Effort => Reward is a serious turn off in this game for today’s gamers. This is most noticeable with surface resources.
- Spending a lot of time to make ZERO progress is among the worst things you can do to your player base and contradicts the game’s title.
- A player-driven resource generation system is ineffective. I call it player-driven because yes a small group of organized players can 100% directly control if surface resources spawn or not in this game.
- The answer might be to focus in on the player experience instead of the flaws of world generation which can never work @100 efficiency.
- There are many other game mechanics that can be introduced that can reward resources in a more guaranteed fashion.
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Some resources could be available on lower tier worlds. Why not make shimmering orbs and such spawn on rugged worlds (in smaller amounts) and then scale up with world tier progression.
I hit this moment that I could make titanium tools if not shimmering orbs shortage. Total bottleneck.
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Well nothing turned me off playing boundless till now but recently , gathering surface resources such as beans , fragments , lamela , orbs , leaves and etc has started to become really frustrating. How can it be harder to find basic resources than to find diamonds and titanium ? It does not make sense. Maybe you can make some way of farming. For example we can plant beans and after a day or two , harvest them to get even more beans or something like that. Not to mention the XP system that also turns me off lately. I am level 34 now and I need lots of skills to endure in higher tier planets but I cannot level up easily. It feels like this game is a game that u need to spend all your time on it instead of playing it among other games. I hate that. I prefer to play 1-2 hours a day but with this current grinding it seems impossible to accomplish much.
Grinding has started to feel like Warframe lately. Hard to find basic resources , Hard to level up , Lots of time consumption.
However I am not trying to offend anyone or anything about the game I love the game and recommended the game in steam reviews. Just wanted to answer the topic question : P <3
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The resource regen is a pain but it was brought to light recently that the surface resources being taken wont start world regeneration, there has to be block changes in the chunk they were located in, so when collecting resources in your favourite areas if you break the block below the resource its more likely to regen later. Not ideal but iv found its been helping .
I was in the same situation as you recently with the levels and was honestly on the verge of leaving the game because of it, but I decided Id at least give a go at alt characters (particularly hated the thought of doing this) before I go, So I made an alt for just crafting and spec’d my main to be a hunter/miner and have to say it worked out soo well, my hunter/miner is lvl 34 and I have to say he’s hard as nails, I use him on the tier 6 planets for mining and killing (except meteors) and its very manageable and fun, and the alt quickly level’d up to 19 by ust crafting what I needed and can now make almost everything. Its worth trying out alts and making specific builds instead of a all round character.
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I know , I have alt characters. It is helpful but not completely. you still can’t have all the skills needed for being an efficient gatherer or miner. The other biggest thing about alt character is that , I don’t feel comfortable with it. I mean , there must be 1 character representing 1 player in a game. A character that you nourish and make it better and stronger . One character to have a bond with . I never liked having alt characters in any game. I don’t like it in this one either. They said it is an option because many players love them. OK . But what about the ones that don’t ? I like having different skill sets in the same character. However it’s just useless now because after level 30 , leveling up is a heavy grind. How am I going to pass level 50 to have extra skill sets with only 1-2 hours of playing for fun in game ? There is also an XP penalty that does not decrease as time passes . Other XP methods are also nerfed. For having more and more characters you need cubits which can be bought in the shop that might give some players the wrong idea of “Pay To Win” .
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I will agree with you my preference for a lot of the same reasons would be to have one character and just have other skill sets. With the way xp is earned, it would take too long to get to level 150 to have a fully spec’d out character. I feel forced to use alts in order to do the things I want to be able to do myself.
The longer I feel stuck in the level 30’s (and I have not even gotten to level 40), the more bored I get with the game. But I cannot do the things I want until I get the skills. It is a chicken and egg situation. I need the skills to go to the planet to get the resources to make the tools that will let me be more effective at getting xp to get the skills I needed in the first place.
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This that turning me off is the luck of RPG elements! What i mean?
- Add an armor/weapon system with stats. (bow/sword/mace/wand/staves/shields/two handed etc…) (heavy/light/medium armors)
- Make the items provides you skills. For example a fire wand provides you a fireball skill… or a thorn shield gives reflect damage or a holy stave gives healing skill etc… (Depending the quality of the item will give you better unique skills or more than one skills or stronger skills).
- Add guild Tabards or Cloaks with guild icon.
I really want to see dungeons and raid bosses that drop unique armor/weapon skins… and of course a GvG feature with sieges and battles between guilds…
Will we ever gonna see these kind of features in the game? I wish someday…
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No idea on Guild Related wearables - but armors are already being developed, and so is dungeons and bosses, both really large and very difficult ones as well as dungeon bosses, which also have loot…
Melee weapons are also being developed I believe.
As for tool specific “enchantments” thats already in the game via Centraforging which supposedly could be expanded upon if the developers so wish.
One word: Heartbeat! 
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The Heartbeat hasn’t turned me off playing yet but it definitely has turned me off mining.
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The main thing that bothers me right now is that skill sets are coupled with your player level curve (which makes them not equivalent to alts), and feeling forced to level alts due to the leveling curve
(Skill sets are soooo close to the right idea)
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death re-spawn which kill the moment, you auto put 50m away where u are same as mining expect u in meteor, and kill by new set of mobs in area you in or if mining should be put where u are
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Some or all of this has probably already been written above, but far too much for me to read. Besides the more people keep saying the same thing, the more significant it might be to retaining gamers.
As a newcomer (PS4) to Boundless (looking for fresh replacement for Minecraft):
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Tutorial objectives are pretty good, but some frustrating gaps for new players. EX: Need glue. Okay, how the heck do I make glue? Google. Having to put down the controller to constantly search for something that should be in game breaks immersion.
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Love crafting. Don’t mind experimenting, once I am past the basics, but I shouldn’t have to memorize 100s, 1000s of recipes. Divinity manages this perfectly. Experiment - if it works then you now have the recipe added to list for whatever you made.
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Getting griefed when you are still just trying to figure out the overwhelming game mechanics. Perhaps some of the frustrating things are resolved later in game, but after a few days of exploring, experimenting, objectives and then come back the next day to discover some jerk had surrounded your little 2x2 house in all directions. Literally had to run in game for a minute or more just to get to anything I could mine, chop, etc… Forced to abandon all my hard learned work. Picked a starting location in middle of nowhere hoping to avoid this.
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Should be some early objective explaining emotes and communication. Someone waved at me a couple times while I struggled trying to find quick emotes. Expected a quick phrase/emote wheel and some method of targeting player to wave at them specifically. Needless to say, they grew tired of waiting, shrugged and left. I can’t remember the last time I played an MMO style game that had such a non intuitive communication system. Final Fantasy XIV has quite a few early quests walking you through chat, tells, emotes, etc…
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Dedicated fans always respond telling new players that X, Y, Z is already explained in some online forum or wiki. Advanced topics, concepts, tactics - sure. Basic beginner stuff should all be easy for new players. Too much frustration and you just want to quit. The beacon/plot mechanic drove me nuts. I used the plot tool (?) to mark out my little startup house. Came back the next day to find my wooden floor was all dirt/grass. Thought something bugged out or I was mistaken. Laid down new floor to repeat the same thing the next day. Then finally started to think that my laid out plot did not include the layer I was walking on. Not exactly intuitive. Who would think, “yeah, I claimed the area above my feet, but not the land I am walking on”. Clearly too late to even consider changing that mechanic, but a bit more clarity, emphasis in the objective tutorials would be helpful. If it was stated then it wasn’t emphasized enough for me to catch on.
A lot of great things in the game I like (stacks, the two hand mechanic and much much more). But some of the frustration points already have me debating trying to restart again.
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on 1. and 2.: There is the knowledge tab ingame that shows you all recipies you can make and blocks/stuff you can gather (with infos on them) … but yes, would be good to have a tut quest which shows it to you explicitly
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That kind of griefing is something you can report through the ingame functions because it’s obvious griefing.
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+1 on this suggestion
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Yes, the regeneration rebuilts all which is not “in” your beacon, so the blocks under your beacon plots are not protected. if you build a block or place a prop you see a frame which is eather green, orange or red. Green is in your beacon, orange is wild/open world and red not possible because another player’s beacon you have no permission for. Don’t know if there is a tooltip/quest showing this.
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Pressing up on the D-pad will open beacon view allowing you to see exactly what’s plotted
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The extra skill sets weren’t exactly clear so I spent all my cubits to get all the sets for one character thinking I could use the 32 odd skill points I have in different loadouts basically. Low and behold my skill points are shared across all skill sets meaning I have 3 skill sets that share my grand total of 32 already used skill points and now I have no cubits for plots to keep progressing on different planets. (Also all my skill points are spent in crafting and moving between planets and nothing else)
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