please don’t start needless arguments this thread has already had one of them
deckhands arent necessary at all so arguing that they shouldnt be locked behind renown is pretty stupid
this is coming from a player who has several low renown characters and only one high renown character.
i play 95% on my low renowns, having a speed ketch with 0 deckhands isnt an issue for me because im not going to go around chasing people and if someone chases me, i will just fight them or leave, i dont have anything to lose.
rarely any high rep goes out of their way to chase low reps on the sea unless cargo/chests anyways and even that does not happen often (just dont be a dumbass and haul 30+ sealed chests, sell them at 10-15).
aside from all that, players who spend time getting the best gear … will obviously have the best gear. complaining about “sweats” with “good gear” destroying you makes no sense because no shit, what do u want a pvp button ? 
its not hard to get 5k gals to make a bank for saving ur money either. dont grind high renown if ur afraid of losing it, just play other aspects of the game. renown doesnt even do shit anyways why yall afraid of losing it if u dont wanna pvp.
half the players complaining about losing their renown to pvp sweats are probably the same kids who would target easy fodder players to increase their own renown if they got a chance.
tldr; AO doesnt have serious issues for just playing casually. i have played 200+ hours on casual characters like juggernaughts/intensity mages/cannonfist (any class that sucks total ass for pvp) and i have never felt like “OH DAMN I CANT PLAY THIS GAME BECAUSE THE PVP TRYHARDS!!” if you feel that way then that is unfortunate maybe stop caring about renown and just make a guild bank to not lose money 
bleed potions to spawn sharks 
we should get a potion of non-existance
it makes you “intangible to everyone else”( disables PvP )
you dissapear off the bounty board also
That’s just an OP version of the love potion tho. Honestly atp I think we should just get a renown toggle if a pvp toggle is a permanent no-no. If it’s turned off you stay neutral and therefore invisible on the boards. This would probably help some with the ganking, particularly of lower levels since you can get 10k renown by the time you reach Sailor’s Lodge in the storyline.
No . . It’s pretty reasonable that ppl want to be able to upgrade their ship to the best the game can offer for stuff like the Dark Seas and just general seafaring (Traveling to islands, fighting random ship npcs, castaways, etc.).
But in order to get there, you’re pretty much forced to participate in LB just to fully use the feature when many, including myself, don’t even really want to strive to reach LB. It’s just asking to get into the sweatier side of Pvp when it likely isn’t their focus at all and just want to Pve.
(Like how the game was intended to be. .)
I mean . . If it’s not much of an issue for you then great?
But most ppl want deckhands on their ships for the main two reasons above: Dark Seas, and just general Seafaring. Dealing with/running away from people is just the secondary bonus from it.
First-
High Renown players are after your Renown first and foremost. Anything else they can gain is just a nice bonus that happens to be there. They’re very much likely going to jump you whether u had anything on your ship or not.
Second-
High Renown players aren’t going to have too much qualms about chasing you down cause they’re going to have a better ship than u generally. Paired with the fact they’re bothering to go out of their way to find you out in the open sea anyways, that they might as well full commit and the worse that can happen for them is the person they’re hunting logging/escaping and having to just go simply hunt down another person.
Third-
The 30+ chests on your boat is more of a on u thing cause ur more likely to lose stuff like that to Npcs than Players. But yes not turning them in at least frequently is personally pushing it, but u reap what u sow by that point.
Well guess for the same response format about
First-
Well yea, nobody’s delusional about that, grinding for sets and the like isn’t exactly the hardest thing in the world as long as Rng isn’t being a prick.
Second-
The reason why ppl are complaining about “sweats w/ good gear” is in reference to the meta and the current state of affairs surrounding Pve/Casual Play.
I mean this thread exists for a reason alongside the proposed Pve & QoL Thread.
It’s clearly in rather dire straits that the Balance Team and Testers are agreeing that things need to change which coincides to Pvp also being changed and being a better overall experience.
Third-
Pvp toggle has been thrown around for discussion already for a long while and the general consensus is that i can see - or rather what i personally have towards it - is it shouldn’t have to be considered if we can just simply fix the issues we’re facing.
First-
From what i can see nobody is saying it’s hard to get 5k since Galleons are stupid easy to come by, from just, y’know, playing the game. Paired w/ the fact it only sucks to lose a max of 350 Galleons when below the 10k mark as then it starts to quickly become an after thought.
Second-
The thing about making a bank via Clans is that surprise, ur now involved w/ Clans.
Not only do u have the High Renown (Which im describing ppl w/ 250k+ Renown to start being considered High Renown, as getting 100k is nothing and easy to get.) and potentially LB players willing to hunt u down, u now have garnered the attention of Clans being more than willing to contest/fight w/ u for ur infamy.
Clans have limited Bank sizes and at the very least want to get to Avg Clan.
The thing about this though is if ur aware of what ppl have been complaining about infamy for the past while. Is that getting Infamy, especially w/ Island claims, (Cause ur most definitely likely not a Pvp person wanting a clan bank and if u were u’d just go the extra mile to head into the competitive scene and the like. Assuming there really is any as Clan LB seems to be be almost impossible to catch up to now) absolutely sucks.
If memory serves right about seeing a thread awhile back is that u lose a lot more than u have gained for the past hour to half hour of island claiming if u die. Pair that w/ most likely losing the island too once u do and u lose even more.
Sure it’s doable, all u have to do is get to Avg and just maintain that whenever and however possible but that doesn’t mean u have any guarantees of it being an easy road towards it. And ppl that are primarily Pve focused and just want to Pve aren’t immediately going to be on board w/ the idea too greatly.
But i’ll just have to personally wait and see i guess, tell me ur experience as well if u wish and have gone through w/ trying to make one to Avg so i can compare and contrast what is said on the current Infamy and Clan affairs.
Third-
A majority of ppl, including myself, aren’t grinding High Renown and “fearing” of losing it cause we want to reach LB or smth. We’re doing it cause Deckhands are tied to Renown which is intrinsically a thing that both sides of the Pve or Pvp spectrum should have easy access to.
Not like how it is in the current state of affairs where the best we can hope for is upgrading it once or twice for just a simple title increase at best. And then be forced to Pvp when it isn’t our realm of focus when playing AO just to have a better and enjoyable Pve experience and future ones.
Ahem, the Dark Seas is literally coming up in a good 2 and half months from now or so. Pve content that we’ve been wanting to see since Wom and especially when we first heard about it.
Lastly before we move onto the fourth section, we are playing other aspects of the game . . Pve is the major encompassing aspect that AO is trying to have. AO is meant to be a primarily Pve focused game as Vetex stated himself, and we’re currently not there rn given the current Pvp focus as this and the Pve & QoL threads existence shows.
Fourth-
Ur stance on Renown not doing anything is objectively horrifically wrong.
- Deckhands currently are as mentioned tied to Renown which as u put it as well, a Pvp thing. When it very much shouldn’t be.
- The game Organizations have their drip and ranks tied to it, right up to being tied to the very LB.
- And Renown is tied to the majority of the badges u can get in the game and is something ppl use sort of gauge how good a person is. (Even though it clearly isn’t a great nor effective one.)
Lastly, as mentioned before, we only “fear” losing it because it inhibits us from trying to get deckhands. If deckhands weren’t tied to Renown a large amount/majority of us couldn’t care less about losing it since it doesn’t affect the Pve side of things anymore by that point.
Even w/ Deckhands in mind i personally don’t care about losing some since i already got that i can get and i get my Renown back almost immediately by hunting a Rival for charts/gems.
My sibling in Vetex u cannot be objectively wrong again given the existence of this thread, the Pve & QoL thread, complaints towards the recent mobility changes of the Balance Doc (though it isnt’ really too big of a deal.) , the discussion of Pve and Casual play bleeding into other threads if memory serves right and of my own personal inputs.
200+ hours and it’s not enough to show that a good majority of the people whom u say ur apart of very much say the opposite of what u said . .
Nobody is saying they absolutely can’t, as i myself use gimmick files, (28+ and counting amassing a total of 1.3k+ last i counted from Wom and AO) just that it occurs so often and that there are incentives to be forced into engaging w/ Pvp that it makes it difficult to play the game a fair amount of the time.
Pvp isn’t a priority or focus of ours are the game shouldn’t be in the state where it incentives Pvp and forces u to be in a Pvp situation. Especially if stuff that should be equally obtainable for all is and not tied/locked away in one side of the game’s population.
Already listed my reponses to Renown and Clan Banks above and will leave w/ this:
How about instead of giving a seemingly demeaning outlook on ppl u claim to be apart of for this side of the community. We actually acknowledge ppl’s clear complaints including my own and make it where it truly isn’t the case and lessen the need of having these discussions.
Anyways i spent roughly 2 and half hours almost forming this response and i want to do other things. So pardon any Grammatical and spelling errors that might be there.
11 Likes
can you tl;dr that (I read through it but i feel like others and myself have missed most of it)
I can try . .
Basically my point is that there are clearly issues w/ Pve and Casual play, and that saying:
- Just “don’t be afraid to lose Renown” isn’t what’s happening as we’re not afraid of losing it but rather very inclined to keep it given how things work.
- Partake in Clans when given their current state, and the stuff that gets added to ur plate is stuff ur likely aren’t willing to deal w/.
- It isn’t completely impossible to play AO yes, but it is very much difficult given the way things are and how we’re forced into them.
- Ppl aren’t willing to hunt u down unless u have stuff when this isn’t true. Regardless if u have stuff or not on ur boat does not deter whether or not u’ll be hunted. They came out of their way to find u, they aren’t gonna just not hunt u down for ur Renown once they find out u dont got anything on ur boat.
- Renown doesn’t matter, when it currently has importance given Deckhands and Organization Ranks. Paired w/ the fact ppl want to rework it including myself.
- “Sweats with good gear” is being complained about due to the issues w/in Pvp, and the meta. Paired w/ the current conditions of Pve and Casual Play. Not because of the obvious potential of being a one sided match.
- U playing 200+ hours on Casual gimmick builds on ur files and not directly seeing/feeling the complaints that us and many others have said. And essentially telling ppl to get over it and partake in two issues we’re discussing about how to fix. Doesn’t make u look too bright in my eyes and brushing off the issues at hand because u aren’t bothered by it too much/somehow not seeing it.
Not the way to go about things and to clearly look that there are issues, given that us players, the Balance Team, and Testers have said that Pve and Casual play is very much not too great rn.
The Dark Seas, Pve & QoL thread, Balance Doc, should all together if all the changes/additions get pushed help mend these issues. And that we have future updates down the line to continue to try and make the issues non-existent should things still need changing.
Hopefully that was a decent enough tl;dr to the entire 2 and half hour response i spat out. . .
Edit:
Mended some things to make more sense of what im trying to say. aaa
No . . It’s pretty reasonable that ppl want to be able to upgrade their ship to the best the game can offer for stuff like the Dark Seas and just general seafaring (Traveling to islands, fighting random ship npcs, castaways, etc.).
But in order to get there, you’re pretty much forced to participate in LB just to fully use the feature when many, including myself, don’t even really want to strive to reach LB. It’s just asking to get into the sweatier side of Pvp when it likely isn’t their focus at all and just want to Pve.
(Like how the game was intended to be. .)
deckhands dont have that much of a difference (for pve/seafaring) for legendary vs rookie. you can get rookie ones at ~150k renown which isnt hard to hit at all. you dont even need to do pvp all , you can farm 100k renown within 1-2 hours by farming merlot or kai (5k renown per kill, respawns fast). granted this is difficult for most casual players to do solo, with friends it is pretty easy even if you’re all bad, just pop a camp near/on whitesummit and farm merlo.
as someone who aims to get the best of everything in the game, i totally agree that it “makes sense” for players to want to have the best ship stats. what im saying is, its not a big difference, it barely makes any difference in PvE / seafaring and only really helps for ship pvp / chasing other people down. npc ships are fodder to sink, 3 legendary deckhands would take you from 94 speed to 115 which isnt a big difference at all (for pve/seafaring). i totally disagree with the community saying its an issue. in fact most lb players i know dont even hunt renown for deckhands they just do it for fun and the big number (this is a little bias cause its from my own experiences, 700+ hours though of pvp slots).
First-
High Renown players are after your Renown first and foremost. Anything else they can gain is just a nice bonus that happens to be there. They’re very much likely going to jump you whether u had anything on your ship or not.
ah my apologies, when i said “high rep,” “low rep,” i mean high renown low renown. no 1 million player is gonna chase a 50k player across the sea. okay obviously not “none” but the point is thats not normally an issue. you will/might get chased if you’re 100-200k which is easy to hit unintentionally yes.
Second-
The reason why ppl are complaining about “sweats w/ good gear” is in reference to the meta and the current state of affairs surrounding Pve/Casual Play.
yes but that’s not a gear issue that’s an issue with specific builds ie thermo. im with you 100% for that i am well aware of the balance issues. a large majority of classes are unplayable which definitely needs to be fixed.
i meant to say that complaining about “good gear” is stupid though when all the gear isnt that hard to get aside from sunken which isnt a big upgrade from other builds you can make without sunken. btw when i say complaining about XYZ is “so and so,” i am not saying that you or anyone specifically complained about it.
First-
From what i can see nobody is saying it’s hard to get 5k since Galleons are stupid easy to come by, from just, y’know, playing the game. Paired w/ the fact it only sucks to lose a max of 350 Galleons when below the 10k mark as then it starts to quickly become an after thought.
yeah
Not only do u have the High Renown (Which im describing ppl w/ 250k+ Renown to start being considered High Renown, as getting 100k is nothing and easy to get.) and potentially LB players willing to hunt u down, u now have garnered the attention of Clans being more than willing to contest/fight w/ u for ur infamy.
island claiming happens a lot less now in general since the flag system. ive spent 20 hours on random servers farming shrooms the past few days on my intensity wind mage, while having harvest claimed to reap infamy on the side and not once has anyone tried contesting the island (played on USE, USW, USC, NA, EUW). sometimes a big clan will try and take it from u but it doesnt happen often. it happens so less to the point its easy to hit average clan, from there on you can stop claiming islands no big deal.
Sure it’s doable , all u have to do is get to Avg and just maintain that whenever and however possible but that doesn’t mean u have any guarantees of it being an easy road towards it. And ppl that are primarily Pve focused and just want to Pve aren’t immediately going to be on board w/ the idea too greatly.
it is pretty easy though. its not complete hand holding but its not so hard to the point its an issue. the risk of losing infamy from being hunted obviously increases with how high your rep goes. so again back to the core of my argument; stay low rep and its not an issue at all.
ah i just figured out how to quote properly lol. back to what i said earlier, deckhands are such a slight QoL thing for pve/seafaring that it hardly matters. i dont see what the big thing is about not having the best deckhands. rookie ones are like 60% as good as the legendary ones. even with no deckhands , it literally, absolutely, makes barely any difference for PVE and seafaring. say you really want deckhands either way , just look for the ~150k rookie ones then. while i am not against the idea of deckhands being obtained outside of renown, i dont think them being locked behind renown is an issue at all.
yes agreed 100% , there is not enough pve content , never thought otherwise
for point 1) as ive been saying deckhands barely make a difference for pve/seafaring. its not a big deal that theyre locked behind pvp.
point 2) why would a casual player need this
point 3) yes and theyre badges for pvp, badges to “gauge how good a person is” at pvp. why does this matter at all for a casual player.
aside from point 1, which i can understand, the other two make no sense at all. why do casual players need that ? it gives no benefits, no features, nothing. little trophies like “renown badges” are and always will be meant for pvp players.
aside from deckhands i dont see anything else that pushes players into pvp. the infamy thing is only an issue for high reps which again ties back in with deckhands.
i say what i say because i genuinely dont see an issue. the only single point you’ve made which is somewhat valid is deckhands, but like ive been saying, in the case of pve/seafaring deckhands barely do jack. say if something actually important was locked behind pvp then i would be inclined to agree with you and everyone. the point im making continuously is that deckhands barely matter and only really help pvp players , so wouldnt it make sense for it to be locked behind pvp ?
tldr; high renown does not matter. it is not important for casual players because deckhands barely help the casual playstyle. if u want to be mr. got everything perfect in the game then thats your issue.
1 Like
It may not be a big deal, but it still makes no sense. If they don’t matter that much, why gate keep them like that in the first place? Why have them? They serve barely any purpose from your point of view, at least from a pve perspective, after all.
1 Like
First-
Sorry for areas i went too aggro on, was working w/ what i had, especially at the end.
Second-
Also im gonna attempt to to make things more organized and easier on myself and others. And Pve and Casual players can be used interchangeably we’re not really going off the MMO/MMORPG definitions exactly. And only really do when nuanced to be so given context.
First Section: Deckhands
From the current Main Game, i can see why u don’t think it’s currently an issue. But it’s been something that we’ve been having qualms about wayy prior to the Diving Update. We’re thinking in the perspective of what’s to come and not what’s currently here.
The main issue being Lvling as it’s wayy to much of an ask for a Pve player to feasibly do given how Renown is. And then obtaining them being a lesser issue by comparison but still needing at least 100k to pick up the majority of them.
Yes the upgrades from Rookie to Legendary are minor comparatively towards another, they’re intended to be that way.
But outside of this though:
As Mimhere points out, which is also the same sentiment that a majority of us have. Is that they aren’t minor or insignificant at all, especially when u collectively add them. They add up rather quickly and bring up noticeable differences and conveniency when doing Pve/Seafaring rn. And it’s only going to get bigger once Brigs come out as we’ll get a 4th Deckhand.
While sure it’s “intended” to be for those of High Renown which means it’s more catered to a Pvp thing as u figured given how things work rn. It’s really doing it’s hardest to do the opposite and be one where it’s supposed to be relatively accessible for Both Worlds.
We had already selected which Dekchands to use before Dark Sea development and only slightly changed it when it started. They’re a decently big integral part of how we want our ships and how they could be.
But can’t fully realize them or consider them effectively when we can’t use nor see them to their fullest potential. We’re wanting anything that makes the journey to the Dark Seas easier, faster, and longer which is what we’re working around.
And as it stands we can’t fully do so given the way Deckhands are w/ their stats, and how they’re basically locked behind Pvp to even fully utilize them. No Pve player is going to really push themselves up to LB /1.25M Renown. To then put Pvp back on the backburner and reset their Renown if they so wish. (Though rather unlikely to reset it since it took a lot much effort to get there in the first place.)
Before moving on to the Renown section here’s something that we’ve considered doing for lvling up Deckhands. And figuring out what to do with obtaining them in a bit later.
Fleshes them out than simply having them be “go reach this #”, actually bother going around the map more meaningfully, and evens the playing field of both worlds since gatekeeping it towards one side isn’t exactly a good idea.
Second Section: Renown
Renown is forced into a weird spot in the Pve perspective given how it works . .
For Pve/Casual players it shouldn’t and really doesn’t matter to us. But as i stated in me trying to tl;dr the entire mess of my first post, and the Deck Hands section. Because it’s a mostly Pvp thing, that gets tied into to Pve/Casual Play that it becomes an issue.
If Renown actually sticked to just being a Pvp thing only and barely/didn’t affect the Pve/Casual Play side of things. then ppl like us in this category would just shrug it off and just complain about the fact that the person “Rk’d” us and interrupted on what we were trying to do and slightly set us back.
Depending on ones perspective one will argue that it shouldn’t be kept different to bring some interaction of the two worlds, but there’s already wayy potentially better ways to make this happen. Lots of ideas and proposals can be thought of, and this part of Renown is it’s own can of worms and im not really in the mood to go further into it.
It’s own discussion entirely, when u remove Deckhands from the equation.
Outside of this going towards High Renown and Low Renown part, it’s alright, just different metrics of what constitutes towards the two. But yea Renown is rather laughably easy to obtain, especially w/ 150k not being hard indeed.
I personally got to 150k+ for the first time on my Main File a while ago now, but i made it this far unintentionally. I just wanted Merlot’s drops. . I only noticed i was approaching 100k when i was at 85k, and was dead confused. Then i reached 150k by trying to max out Jewel Crafting by getting charts from my Rival.
Moving on from this again, yea it’s normally not much of an issue w/ 1M+ Renown/LB players as they’re more concerned w/ other ppl close to them Renown wise. But as i poorly mentioned in my first post, High Renown for me mostly referencing 250k-500k. Anything after 500k and ur just a LB striving player/LB player at that rate, sicne hunting ur Rival for Renown becomes pointless. (Which isn’t a bad thing as for the Pve/Casual perspective we’re not trying to aim that high unless we’re bored or smth.)
And to the topic of outliers, there’s of course going to be many outliers to anything from both worlds indeed. Some ppl have said that they were hunted down when they were just below 1k by a person that was basically a Mid-High Renown player. And a Pve player may potentially go out of their way and hunt ppl down for a bit, it all varies.
Lastly to the responses to one of the Fourth sections of my first post, I already said my piece and where a majority of us think and say otherwise.
For the second and third point response, this is in the context of explaining just what Renown purely does. Not talking about Pve/Casual players at all here.
Ranks gets talked about and there’s discussion surrounding them, i personally don’t pay much mind to them. Other than seeing ppl say they want to be able to customize themselves better and in general, that the lower ranks outfits dripless, and that some high rank outfits look like a downgrade.
Smth along the lines of this, outside of this i don’t really have much of a stance on it other than i do agree w/ the 3 parts i pointed out.
For the badges, they’re really are just kind there, and idm them being Pvp oriented. I vaguely remember an argument a long time ago of having ways to make make these badges be obtainable w/in Pve means. But i personally think that’s silly and it’s own can of worms that has the opportunity to hold a lot of depth and discussion.
Third Section: Infamy
My stance on Infamy is largely indifference outside of the fact im in a Clan but mostly doing Pve things in our Division system. Im sure other Pve/Casual players are of the same mentality of not caring about it much, if at all aside from making sure ppl are having a good time. And Bounty Hunting which i’ll get into the Ambiguous Section.
Other than that, i hear it’s still something that has some complaints. Mostly in the form of how Infamy can be easily lost, and that Clans can’t really catch up the LB in any meaningful way. Which seems to have been an issue since Wom ig lol. And that it isn’t entirely true, as take “Church of Iris” for example, but still hard to pull off anyways nonetheless.
Either way hopefully they can deal w/ whatever is they’re dealing w/ incase some Pve/Casual player decides to drop Pve for a bit and delve into Clans and Infamy.
For Island claiming i have indeed noticed less of it happening but not really see what happens when someone does claim an island.
But it’s nice to see that its rather easy as i only remember seeing the complaints about Infamy loss i mentioned earlier when they lost a claimed island. Setting them back a fair bit and what led me to believe it wasn’t too easy but still very much doable.
Fourth Section: Ambiguous stuff.
To respond to what pushes players into Pvp, is Bounty hunting.
-
Clans will hunt down a person cause they can gain Infamy. Which has the added bonus of contributing to the LB if their interested in that.
- This addition is a bit weird if it can apply for non-Clan players. But if not then this isn’t an issue, unless a Clan is trying to be a Pve Clan, or if their Pve player “Divisions” get hunted down. In which there’s a lot more nuance at play of how one goes about handling this aspect.
-
LB striving players will hunt down a person down cause they have Renown and it can increase theirs. Simple as that, not really much to add. Other than that this is the main thing that gets Pve/casual players and the like into a Pvp situation.
For Pvp players this isn’t really an issue cause it’s kinda the thing u signed up for. Smth for them to discuss on how to make it a better experience if they wish to do so. More power to em.
But w/ Pve/Casual players dabbling in Renown cause it simply happened to them (wanting to grind Merlot drops for example.) or for quickly trying to get some Deck Hands, causes then to be pushed into Pvp.
Which isn’t exaclty ideal, but can be easily solved by resetting ur Renown after u’ve grinded Merlot and or got ur Deckhands. Having no or little Renown wont save u from a Pvp but it’s just being Rk’d by that point. Rking has already historically talked about on the Forums but it’s different now given Wom vs AO and the unique issues both had/have at the time.
Not the end of the world either way
For the part surrounding gear, i agree that it isn’t the issue, and thank u for clarifying on what u meant. The topic of gear for me personally only really applies to be complained about when im on a Gimmick file that can’t fight back when i get Rk’d.
Even then it’s not particularly a big issue that i see nor much of the others. And that i think ppl are just putting Stat Paths and gear together. I.e stuff like Crystal Warlock, Metal Paladin, Thermo Warlord, etc. And the sets they use to warrant complaints.
I have wrote this reponse for 5 hours straight and redrafted large sections of this entire post . .
I really have to try not to do this kind of thing for so long. . Why must explaining and talking about ur perspective be a hard sometimes.
2 Likes
honestly it just seems like vetex cant pick if he wants a pve/exploration based game or a pvp based game and both sides of ao are suffering because of it.
casual players have to deal with rking pvpheads
because of content locked behind renown
pvp players have to deal with slow balancing and awful metas waiting for updates
nobody wins.
(heavily simplified, but i don’t wanna type out an essay on mobile for the 30th time)
that’s what it seems like to me, at least.
8 Likes
I always preferred this game as a PvE/Exploration game. The current treatment of the casual players is the reason I stopped playing right now, and just waiting for the dark sea. It’s not fun anymore, paranoia makes people fear nothing, and it’s annoying. I just want to explore around the world without a target on my back, and making higher ranks not leaderboard restricted is all I ask. AGR was a really good system that I want back too.
3 Likes
Been seeing this thread while scrolling through the forums and thought why not give my perspective on this, even if nobody is probably willing to read this.
Also because I was recently ganked by 2 metamancing syndicate members who said ‘ez’ when I lost and would like to cope here so theres that
I’m a casual player, used to be a hardcore player hopping on everyday just to play the game because I enjoyed it. And casual meaning like I’d hop on AO just to do some sealed chest farming, maybe some boss gear grinding, farming materials for skills, fishing (Yes, I do fish.), and stuff a casual player would do, and I do enjoy seeing them have fun in this game somehow. But I feel like I’ve been enjoying the game less recently due to a few things that has been affecting my fun.
1. PVE Content
When AO came out and we were all new and fresh to the game, I thought there was a lot to do other than the story, and after thinking for a bit, yeah, there is a lot to do. There’s many PVE activities to do on the side/after the story. Stuff like bounty hunting and assassinating NPCs for renown, boss runs and equipment grinding to get some decent power on your file, gathering materials and resources for cooking, brewing and jewelcrafting skills, fishing, exploring the sea and getting titles (Angler titles, explorer and diver), money making like cargo and sealed chests, getting infamy for your clan to unlock perks, and one of my favorites, making more files to try out builds with. Now, to a new freshie like me around release or anyone who is deeply interested in progressing in the game, this sounds like a lot, and it is a lot to do. They all sound interesting in some way and I have done all of them. However, there are a few problems that can really affect the fun of some of these activities. Which brings us to our next few topics.
2. Repetition
If you’re constantly hopping on AO and doing these every single day since release, that sounds really tiring isn’t it? Doing the same thing over and over can get really boring, even if you really want to reach a goal like finishing the fish compendium or maxing out all of your skills.
Bounty hunting and assassinating for renown can get a little more on the PVP side. I assume most people get renown for the deckhands, which is mostly PVE. Though hunting your rival over and over for ~3k+ renown can get dull and the only way to get a ton of renown for deckhands is to step foot into the PVP part and start fighting players.
Boss runs can be stupid sometimes as luck just won’t be on your side and will refuse to give you the desired item you want.
Gathering materials for skills can be boring too. Ingredients and materials can take a while to get and the high exp requirement for skills can be hard to get to, but I can see why it was made like that. But I don’t think any casual player would want to max out all three skills. Fishing is just clicking again and again.
Fully exploring the Bronze Sea can take a long while and that’s because of exploration tasks, mainly treasure charts. Treasure charts can be easy to get (especially if you have a rival), however are a pain to solve. It’s kinda hard to navigate the directions and stuff so I get lazy and just use the chart website but sometimes that doesn’t work so I just give up.
Cargo runs can be really boring and be interrupted by a max level metamancing player who has 500 hours and 1000 player kills who wants your free AO points. Same goes for sealed chest runs.
Gaining infamy for your clan can be really painful to get. If you’re in a small clan with your friends and just want to use it as a bank, you gotta get infamy. With the recent infamy nerfs, I believe it’s hard for small clans to get to the next rank. And the jumps from tiers can be really high making it even harder for small clans. And with the risk of being hunted by another player who’s in a clan makes it a lot harder.
Making new files and builds, names, looks, etc. can be really fun. What isn’t fun is that I have to do the story again and I plan on making a few more builds. (Woohoo more story for me)
3. PVP Content, Ganking, Metamancers and Sweats
Some of the PVE activities can be interrupted by being ganked and sweats. If you have any high renown, you just accepted that you have a risk of being hunted and I can see that. ‘But what if I don’t want to PVP and all of that renown was from rivals and I want my cool deckhands with 4 speed?’ Well, blame the system. Don’t worry, I also think it’s stupid to have a high renown requirement for a deckhand. Cargo runs and sealed chest runs can be rudely interrupted by a high level player who wants your 400 free renown, and gaining infamy for your small clan can be on the PVP side sometimes.
Back to renown, if you have a high renown count. Yes, you have a risk of getting ganked. Same goes for being in a clan (Rarely, maybe.) However, most players who have ganked me and my friends have mostly been meta builds (Killed by a metal mage while fishing at Ravenna during v1.11, killed by two warlocks while just dashing around at Ravenna during v1.12 and was recently hunted by two syndicate members who were a berserker and a thermo warlord while I was getting pumpkins at Harvest island and then said ‘ez’ over and over). I don’t play the meta by the way so this makes it harder for me to defend myself, and I barely have any agility so running is hard for me. (probably just a skill issue on my end) This just makes me consider resetting my renown. The renown I got for deckhands, only for most to have a really high requirement and marking me as a target for most metamancing bounty hunters who want their free internet renown and infamy. This also just makes it harder for me to gain infamy for my friend’s clan who wants to reach strong tier for a bigger bank.
Sometimes I can’t even enjoy having fun in a game when there’s a sweat who’s actively trying to hunt me down. I try my best to fight back using potions and gels and stuff but whenever I get ganked out of nowhere, my heart just starts racing and I start shaking because of how sudden it was. At least in Munera duels I can feel prepared and ready for a good 1v1, but getting attacked while minding my business by a max level player who’s a tryhard meta slave can throw me off and cause me to lose.
Anyways, used-to-be-hardcore player, now a casual and waiting for the next update. Taking a break from AO because of these reasons.
tldr, lots of pve activities to do, however the activities can get repetitive and be interrupted by tryhard metamancing sweats just for your internet points and say ‘ez ez ez ez ez ez’ over and over again
hi qua, i know youre not a forumer but i know you can see this
Why am I the same way?
But I see your points, metamancers are honestly the dumbest types of players in AO. They’re just using builds they know are good just to see success and they’re being toxic about it.
And I know I’m raising a thermo berserker right now, but I’m doing it because I haven’t even used a berserker yet. I do agree having to do the whole story all over again is super tedious and slow. I plan on giving her cannon fist or sailor style as a second fighting style.
Also, do you know the names of those metamancers (berserker and thermo warlord) who killed you? We could summon somebody to take revenge. For some reason, most of the assassin syndicate members that you encounter outside of munera 1v1s are just super toxic. We met one at the beginning of the update who was using fire iron leg (a mirror of my build at the time) and he just kept running away while his buddies kept dying to us. We had three men, and I’m pretty sure the assassin was clearly terrified of how I could use fire leg far better than he does.
Though, I hope you’ve been doing some nice things while sitting on break from AO. There’s honestly no way to get rid of metamancers besides updates, those blockheads will always be around.
Don’t remember the warlord, but I do remember the berserker. I assume they were both friends and in a party. Anyways, the berserker was definitely something like BaconZeke35. Did a little investigating a little after I was hunted, (Yeah, a little petty but to be fair I was just gonna grab pumpkins then hop off.) and found out that he has a ton of alts with the same user/display name. Probably not important but just wanted to point out.
Yeah, definitely have. Been playing different games with some of my friends who are also taking a break from AO.
Same, but not recently
excuse me what the fuck
he spams n word a lot.
(A lot)