Forum dramas

Until now I've refrained from naming individual players for criticism, because it's unfair of me to do so from here. But this is a special case, and even if I'd not named him, you'd all know I was talking about Aramax. So here we go. The story. And my thoughts on it.

Unless you've been living in a hole for the past few days, you'll have undoubtedly noticed the fuss Aramax has stirred up on the forums. He's been gradually getting more and more abusive, spammy, annoying even, on the forums for several months. To be honest, he fitted right in with the rest of the people who post in the Lounge area.

Until he decided to post, over 100 seperate times, an image of a dead body on the forums. Vult saw this, deleted them all, then posted an "open" letter to the community venting his anger both a) about the images, and b) about people's bitching about the forums. Aramax's response was that his images were a protest against the lack of moderation, to which Vult replied simply with "gtfo". The debate wrangled on for around 20 pages before Vult decided to delete the thread, presumably to stop the fighting (and stop EO from looking worse than it already is to prospective players/sponsors). A couple of hours later, this popped up. Basically the same letter, with additions, in a place where nobody could reply or bitch about it. Aramax found himself banned, and it seems now that any reference to the letter or moderation is deleted.

So, what have we learned from this? At first I was annoyed that Vult had resorted to detectors in the first place, rather than human mods (see entry further down). Then after this incident, the fact that he decided to slap everyone on the wrist and NOT ban Aramax for it was even more worrying. Now that he's finally done it, I hope that this saga, plus the Sausage hacking incident, will finally convince Vult to wake up and do something about it. At the moment it seems he's moderating it all himself, but he can't keep this up forever, while working fulltime, AND on coding v26. Eventually it will start to slip, people will find more ways around the spam filters and we'll be back to the same old forum, with the only detectors catching innocent people out while the real spammers can do what they want, unchecked.

...much like EO itself.

A word to Aramax: I don't honestly think that you had this planned as a protest all along. It seems to me this was an excuse you thought up at the last second, which people believed and backed - the cause I mean, not the way you went about it.

A word to Vult (not that he's reading this): Stop being so soft with the forum bans. Most of the people who cause trouble on the forum rarely play anyway, so it's not as if they'll miss the chance to post anything useful. Instead of warning, deleting, or whatever, just take them out permanently. Saves a lot of time and future deleting. There are a lot of people on the forum who I personally think deserve a perm ban and won't be missed, but I won't name them here.

And to the rest of you: Give it a break. We've said our thoughts, and Vult's said his. Ultimately it's his game, his forum, and if he wants it to turn to crap then that's entirely his choice. We shouted, we complained, we pointed out the flaws, and Vult read them all, thought about it all, and hit the Delete button and kept on with 'His Way'. I'm fast losing interest in EO and its forums, so this may not be updated as often now. I'll be on RO enjoying a game with decent class, levelling, and PK systems until the much-hyped v26 hits. If you need my MSN for any reason, you can dig it up somewhere.

Random code.

The grandad of EO blogging, Wickedfrost, has returned. WB Wikky.

He created a nice bit of coding for us other bloggers to use. It saves on linking to the other 500 blogs out there in one handy button, which chooses a blog at random.

Code is here:

http://www.endless-online.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=525643#525643

Make your own button for it and put it wherever. I squeezed mine into the sidebar. -->

Btw - the blogs which are still linked, they're for my use mainly. They're the ones I check most often.

The new EO forums.

Ok, I give up. I'm posting it here because ANY criticism of the forums, ON the forums, is deleted. Here we go.

Basically, Vult is making a huge mess for nothing. I understand that the new features are for security, but they're just not working. My 3-paragraph wishlist posts get ignored as spam while the same old people post 'lol at this' topics in the Lounge. The image tag and quote tag limits only hinder the people who have a lot to say. The minimum message limit is too long. The sig limit, too short.

I really can't see what the point is. Why couldn't he just IP range ban Sausage, move onto the new phpBB forums and be done with it? There's no need for all these filters, detectors, limiters, etc, nevermind the fact they're about as effective as a chocolate fireguard.

This is why he needs moderators. HUMAN moderators. Even the best filters and detectors are easy to get around for people who want to spam, while those who just want to post and discuss are caught out by it time after time. If there's just two or three moderators who read the forums regularly, they can delete the relevant posts. Every other forum on the internet does this, and it's 100 times more effective than this crap.

Final note. If this is the kind of filter/detection overload that Vult is going to put into the game itself, then there's real problems ahead for EO. I just hope this will make him wake up and realise. And not just ignore the complaints, delete them and carry on with his head stubbornly stuck in the sand.

This is make-or-break for EO now. Vult, drop the detector plans and go for the conventional human moderators. The reason no other games do things the way you're aiming for, is because it simply DOES NOT WORK.

Just a quick thought, nothing to do with the RO series.

Someone mentioned Flyff. This is a free game with thousands of players, yet KSing and levelling isn't a problem. How?

Multiple channels.

This is basically splitting the server into multiple smaller ones. You keep your character and equips/level, but you have the option of which channel to play.

So players on channel 1, can't see or interact with players on channel 2. It's still the same server, same bandwidth, just effectively two smaller versions of the game.

This will make the game more enjoyable - less crowding, more monsters to go around, a slower-moving global, etc. Even the admins may like it as it splits the amount of moderation needed into smaller chunks.

I might expand on this later.

Guild Network rolls back into motion!

I bet you thought this had fizzled out and died. :P For details, read this entry:

http://notanothereoblog.blogspot.com/2006/07/guild-network.html

Anyway. We finally got it moving now. The forums are up to act as a central hub for it all, rather than relying on word-of-mouth. We're considering opening the HGN up to more than just certain guilds, and even to guildless individuals to help out. So feel free to register and post.

Forums can be found:

http://z9.invisionfree.com/eohgn/index.php

There.

1k

Sometime over the past 24 hours, this blog got its 1,000th visitor. Awesome. :D I didn't expect this to take off like it has, so thank you all for reading my silly rants. =]

Not much to currently update on. Powerbomb requested that I link to him, and said he'll actually keep it updated from now on. So I will do, if only for my own convenience in keeping an eye on it.

Oh, and I managed to instil a few seconds of happiness into global













Moments like this give me hope for the game.

Have fun out there. If not, log off and try again later.

A-maze-ing.

Wow. I think August 16th 2006 has taken the award of 'Longest, Dullest Day In History'. Or maybe it's just work that gives it that feeling. Seriously, it's like the company closed down and nobody told us. That's how slow the day is going.

Anyway, bloggy time. It looks like Arvid has discovered a new hobby: maze editing. He's made a few more changes to the castle maze, expanded it EVEN MORE, and added a few new sections. I checked it out yesterday with a few guild members, and even with Arvid's hints and warping through the harder parts, it still took an hour between us. It started out with three of us, and we met more who were stuck as we went through. We helped them, they helped us, and the group reached about 15 people at one point. There's one part in particular which is a nightmare to get through. It's a large open space with only one safe path through. Deviate from that path and you warp back to the start. Crazy.

Try it. Take a couple of friends and tackle it together. It's not like you have anything better to do while on EO, so why not? :P

PS: A word of note, I've been getting a lot of PMs from people about a lot of things recently. It's only possible for EO to hold two PM conversations at once, so sorry if I'm slow to respond or miss your PM completely. Don't take it personally :P

Things RO has that EO needs: part 2

Yeah, this took a while. I'm lazy and there's no massive rush to push these entries out. Anyway, sorry for the delay.

Part 2 then, one which solves one of the biggest problems on Endless:

Revised EXP System

No screenies this time, because it's a nightmare to explain in screenshots and so easy to explain in words. Besides, the RO server I play has such a strict policy on KSing that I'd most likely get banned just for KSing for the screenshots. x.x

Anyway. EO's current system rewards lazy asses and people who like to annoy others for fun. We all know how it works. Last hit gets all the EXP and drop, and the poor newb who's been chipping away its HP gets nothing at all. This is why KSing is rife, and everyone is constantly arguing and flaming or taunting each other. We see it all the time...

Low level: u ass! wat u ks 4
High level: lol i ksed a newb lmao xDDDD
Low level: stfu
High level: no u stfu
-both hold Ctrl on each other for an hour or so-

Now, this solution may be hard to code, but who cares. The following is NEEDED and is worth the effort. Here's how other games do it.

As everyone knows, each monster gives a set amount of EXP. The EXP given should be directly proportional to the amount of damage the player does. For example, OMGCOOLMONSTER has 100 HP and gives 50 EXP. Player 1 comes along, and starts attacking it. Then player 2 appears and does the same. Poor old OMGCOOLMONSTER had no chance and gets murdered, and 50 lovely EXP points are given.

Let's say player 1 had dealt 60 damage to it, and player 2 dealt 40 damage. With the split EXP, that would be 60% (30 exp) for player 1 and 40% (20 exp) to player 2. Both get rewarded based on the effort they put into it, and nobody is screwed over. Great!

With this system, KSing no longer exists. If you really wanted to push the definition, you could say that player 2 stole some EXP. But he got a LOT less than he would have from finding his own monster and attacking that. Oh, that raises another point:

This system would work perfectly if there was just more monsters around. It would undoubtedly be an improvement with 3 or 4 people fighting over the same monster, but if there was enough monster out there that players would have to share, there would be no reason whatsoever to KS and the situation is solved.

I know Vult isn't reading this and the idea has been thrown about by me so many times on the EO wishlist forum. But I won't stop plugging this until it's added.

One more thing, which I think EO should -not- take from RO. On RO, the drops go to whoever did the most damage to the monster. So it's technically possible for a high level to go over to a low level attacking a monster, hit it once, kill it and take the drop. Not cool. So here's my suggestion for that - again, may make it harder to code, but is needed.

Whoever attacks the monster first gets the drops secured to them when it dies. If the player dies, the drop isnt locked by anyone and whoever's there can take it. With the current way magic works on EO, it would cause a few problems now (eg: mage could hit everything on the map, guarantee the drops, wait for others to kill the monsters then collect the loot), but hopefully v26 will balance it so we'll see then.

I'm out of time. Comment and discuss please.

Originality in EO

Regarding the comments that were left after my 'Things RO has that EO needs' post, I'm turning it into an entry of its own. Because I've been thinking along the same lines recently. So sorry people (aiixo :P) but part 2 isn't up -just- yet.


The comment which got me thinking was from Kamileah. Hope you don't mind me reposting it here, Kam. Also, please note this post isn't directed at you. I'm just using your comment as the starter.

"Well, Vult is trying too hard to make the game totally original, and his "originality" could go a bit too far and use a totally absurd idea, when the best choice would be going for the conventional, maybe a bit twisted, but the conventional.

He tries too hard."

I partially agree with this. It does seem like he's going for something not seen before, what with the introduction of frankly bizarre classes like the skeleton, panda, and orcs (Seriously Vult.. an endangered species, a fictional species, and a dead species?). But apart from the races, there's not that much originality in EO yet. The only two other completely original things I can think of are the fairysoda effect and the idea of moderating the game entirely on detection programs (which I still think is a TERRIBLE IDEA).

The game layout, appearance and general feel is very similar to Dark Ages. But that's been discussed enough in other places, so I won't start here. There's also the argument that items like the Dragon Blade, Ultima Blade and D Armor were copied from other games. If we really wanted to, we could pick holes in EO and establish links to other games all day.

But there's no point. The truth is that no game out there is 100% original. Even the first videogame ever, Pong, was inspired by tennis. With all the creation in the world, some ideas are bound to influence or appear similar to others. It doesn't always mean it's intentional.

Furthermore there's nothing wrong with an idea that works! Taking the example from my previous entry reagarding player shops, the reason most MMOs have these are because they're so popular and work so well. If it was left out of EO purely on the grounds of 'not being original enough', the game would miss out on a great feature.

Which is why I don't see anything wrong with copying ideas from other games. EO can still be different and innovative without having to avoid features from other MMOs. A few months ago Wickedfrost suggested using the softpad technology to make Endless playable on PDAs. How cool would that be? I believe this would also be the first time any online game has tried such a thing, if it were to happen.

One final point. Classes are rumoured to be introduced in v26. I hope Vult sticks to the traditional classes of fantasy games (warrior/mage/ranger/healer) when this is added, and not try to be too original. Looking at the current state of EO, you could easily come up with classes such as: beggar, backstabber, drama queen, KSer, irritating ctrl-humping bard.... :P

Off now. Ta-ta.

Quickie

Just been talking to a guy igame named Kalori. He requested that I check out his blog, so I did. Impressed with the first entry, so duly linked him.

Over there. ------->

Side note: After talking for a little while, it turns out that Kalori is from the town that I currently live in. It's the second time I've met someone with connections to Northampton on EO.

Proof that it's a small world, made even smaller by the internet.

Things RO has that EO needs: part 1

Kay, as promised. I play way too much RO, and it has a lot of features EO would do well to copy.

First off: Player-owned stores.

I know a lot of games have this other than RO, but it's the example I picked. Here's how it works.

Player decides he needs to sell something. Rather than run around shouting "SELLING STUFF", he simply decides to set up a store and wait for buyers to come to him. This way he can get on with other things, and maybe even leave the game running and go off to that thing called "a life".

So. Player sets up a shop. On RO it's a simple case of learning the skill, then pressing the corresponding hotkey... it can work exactly the same on EO. This window appears. At the top is the player's inventory, at the bottom is the soon-to-be store.






Player drags the items for sale into the shop window, sets a price and a name for the store. Please note, I know a piece of empirium is not worth 123 mill... this is just an example :P





Once it's all done, hit OK. The shop appears in a window on the player's screen.





And that's it!The shop closes automatically when all items are sold out or the player dies. Said player is now free to go off and do whatever, and wait for a buyer. And there's NO risk of being scammed (unless you were stupid enough to put the wrong price or item up, in which case it's your own fault).

It really is a much easier, more efficient and less spammy way to advertise and trade. Let's look at it from the buyer's point of view. In this screenshot I've gone to a well known trading spot, where players gather to vend en masse. In EO terms, this place would be Aeven Square. Or maybe get rid of the disco and set up an area there for vending?




Quite simple. The speech bubble is the shop name. Double click it to open the shop, which will look like this.



Items the player is selling on the left. Drag the item you want over to the right and hit Buy to complete the purchase. It really couldn't be simpler.

Implementing this on EO would have a whole variety of benefits.

- Would DRASTICALLY cut down on the number of scams, assuming the seller sets the correct price. Even if they don't, they will not be able to complain as it would be their mistake and no ill-intent from the buyer.
-Reduce the amount of spam selling in Aeven Square and other places.
-Eliminate the last practical use for global, meaning it can be removed and save even more bandwidth.
-Make moneymaking easier for new players.

Do it Vult, you know it makes sense. Learn the skill somewhere - maybe the requirements could include Cha, so it finally has a use. All good salesmen need charisma! Then it works like any other skill. Hit the hotkey and vend away.

I can't think of a reason not to implement this. If you can, comment. Ta.

general idiocy

Not much to update on, since very little happens on EO that's interesting. Whenever I log on, it's a dormant friends list and the same old thing on global:







No matter how many times I see it, it's still shocking. Like a cesspool of stupid.
That's the price of a free game, I guess.

Coming soon: 'Things RO has that EO needs to have'.