Ragnarok, and the end of worlds.

[beardhat]

An idea I had when browsing the World Reset thread.

Ragnarok, AKA end of the world.

Now, I am not going to speak as if I know the logistics and technical issues with running a server, because I don't, however, I think the game would be more interesting and fun long term if we had more regular scheduled World Resets, with two servers, 1 "Old World" consisting of the previous world in a state of "Ragnarok", and a new world, which is a standard world.

So my suggestion is Ragnarok, Worlds would have a set lifespan, 6-12 months, or longer, but with a set time range so we have more consistent resets, annual might be best. However instead of just deleting the old world when a new world launches, the old world server is set on "Ragnarok" mode, during Ragnarok, no new characters can be created, any character who dies cannot reincarnate, and all claim protections are disabled, and hearthfires all extinguished, and sacrificial altars similar to the one we had a few years back appear around the maps, spread out so that 1 village would struggle to claim all of them, having 4-9 would probably be best. Any players who sacrifice themselves to these altars would get a unique hat added to their account, as incentive to for players to stick around long term and fight for epeen swag. When all altars are used, or a set time has passed, the old world will finally end.

This solves the 'late game' problem Haven has, after a certain point, the game becomes a non-stop quality grind with nothing really to look forward too, and many villages die because there isn't really anything to stick around for, as well more regular resets would allow for entry points for people to bring in new friends to try out the game.

[Ysh]

I think developer does not fancy consistent reset. Last I hear, they consider this reset to be bug and not feature.

[Sevenless]

Haven isn't balanced around a knowable reset schedule. A lot of the game is quasi indefinite grind, knowing exactly when it ends vastly shortens the interest for most players. There's no real achievements or score that most players could meaningfully interact with. Haven's weird in that it needs resets due to its mechanics, but at the same time resetting causes deep worlder's grief because of those mechanics.

It's a curious game.

[MagicManICT]

Someone made a good post recently comparing a PvP game they play (or had played) that had regular resets, but was such that one or two groups could start snowballing a victory after week one.

Much like the past experiment with a world reset event, someone is going to troll everyone else and say a big "fuck you" and prevent the reset OR find out everyone else is still building up and not ready for it, and end it way too early.

[TerraSleet]

Someone made a good post recently comparing a PvP game they play (or had played) that had regular resets, but was such that one or two groups could start snowballing a victory after week one.

Much like the past experiment with a world reset event, someone is going to troll everyone else and say a big "fuck you" and prevent the reset OR find out everyone else is still building up and not ready for it, and end it way too early.

The OP was suggesting a regular reset rather than a player-triggered one. The way he's worded it, the "Ragnarok" period with sacrificial altars is a post-reset gamemode and people can move to the new world during that period regardless of who controls the altars.

I don't know if it was the case in the previous worlds, but I've seen player-triggered server wipes in other survival PvP games before and, yes, they tend to either get abused horribly by trolls or just never used at all. Having the entire community agree to reset the world when they deem it's a good time is wishful thinking, I've yet to see it work. There's always one group that tries to protect the reset objective forever at all costs, and one group that sees the reset objective as a lulz button and tries to constantly reset as often as possible, as you pointed out. Whichever group becomes the "top dog" dictates whether or not resets even happen. Because of how snowbally PvP tends to be, it's rarely as simple as "overthrow the winning group to get your way" because the winning group becomes near untouchable.

As Ysh eloquently said, world resets are seen as a bug not a feature by the devs. I imagine one of their goals is to fix the problem of "late-world boredom" instead of band-aiding it with regular resets. At some point down the pipeline there may be no need for the world to ever reset, and we'll have a more permanent map to play on.

[Apocoreo]

This always bugs me. World resets are an attraction to H&H to me. They make the game unique. The chance, however remote, to reach that top place, if for a fleeting time. The potential change in the powers that be every world. It keeps things exciting.

Other games I always eventually give up on, knowing I can't reach the height of the pro gamers. Haven's got a lot of potential and I think world resets are a part of that.

[Sevenless]

Someone made a good post recently comparing a PvP game they play (or had played) that had regular resets, but was such that one or two groups could start snowballing a victory after week one.

Much like the past experiment with a world reset event, someone is going to troll everyone else and say a big "fuck you" and prevent the reset OR find out everyone else is still building up and not ready for it, and end it way too early.

Rend died a horrific death. You actually lost if you slept in the first 24 hours because you could get to a point of shutting down the other team's ability to progress.

[Massa]

This always bugs me. World resets are an attraction to H&H to me. They make the game unique. The chance, however remote, to reach that top place, if for a fleeting time. The potential change in the powers that be every world. It keeps things exciting.

Other games I always eventually give up on, knowing I can't reach the height of the pro gamers. Haven's got a lot of potential and I think world resets are a part of that.

It's quite delusional to think that you haven't already lost before the world starts.
First 4 days, not even the first week, sees a massive bloat of players ready to "go hard this time", and they quit within a week. Because this game is full of boring shitty time gates and tedium. As for the potential change of powers, alliances, factions, it's the same shit in a different toilet.
Not that that's a bad thing, but doing new world re-runs where you expect a different outcome than quitting in the first 2 weeks like 90% of the playerbase that isn't unemployed eastern european teenagers is a bit silly.

It's been reruns since world 4 or 5, maybe.

[TerraSleet]

This always bugs me. World resets are an attraction to H&H to me. They make the game unique. The chance, however remote, to reach that top place, if for a fleeting time. The potential change in the powers that be every world. It keeps things exciting.

Other games I always eventually give up on, knowing I can't reach the height of the pro gamers. Haven's got a lot of potential and I think world resets are a part of that.

It's quite delusional to think that you haven't already lost before the world starts.
First 4 days, not even the first week, sees a massive bloat of players ready to "go hard this time", and they quit within a week. Because this game is full of boring shitty time gates and tedium. As for the potential change of powers, alliances, factions, it's the same shit in a different toilet.
Not that that's a bad thing, but doing new world re-runs where you expect a different outcome than quitting in the first 2 weeks like 90% of the playerbase that isn't unemployed eastern european teenagers is a bit silly.

It's been reruns since world 4 or 5, maybe.

Going off of past world statistics, the playerbase drops to 1/2 after about 2 months. Source: http://104.168.47.162/RedFox/Haven/Tracker.html
A significant drop for sure, but not as pessimistic as "90% quit within 2 weeks"

To me, this suggests the problem isn't "boring shitty time gates and tedium" but something that happens a few months into the world's lifespan.

[VDZ]

It's quite delusional to think that you haven't already lost before the world starts.
First 4 days, not even the first week, sees a massive bloat of players ready to "go hard this time", and they quit within a week. Because this game is full of boring shitty time gates and tedium. As for the potential change of powers, alliances, factions, it's the same shit in a different toilet.
Not that that's a bad thing, but doing new world re-runs where you expect a different outcome than quitting in the first 2 weeks like 90% of the playerbase that isn't unemployed eastern european teenagers is a bit silly.

It's been reruns since world 4 or 5, maybe.

Going off of past world statistics, the playerbase drops to 1/2 after about 2 months. Source: http://104.168.47.162/RedFox/Haven/Tracker.html
A significant drop for sure, but not as pessimistic as "90% quit within 2 weeks"

To me, this suggests the problem isn't "boring shitty time gates and tedium" but something that happens a few months into the world's lifespan.

As Ysh eloquently said, world resets are seen as a bug not a feature by the devs. I imagine one of their goals is to fix the problem of "late-world boredom" instead of band-aiding it with regular resets. At some point down the pipeline there may be no need for the world to ever reset, and we'll have a more permanent map to play on.

There is one fundamental problem with that: Nearly all of the fun is in the 'building up' phase of the game. Once you have everything you want, things become a lot less interesting. You say the resets are a band-aid, but I think that instead any 'endgame' content is just a bandaid. You could make the endgame interesting in some other way, but even if you were to succeed it would be a different kind of fun than the progression from fresh spawn to having a base with everything you want, and that latter fun is what seems to attract most players to haven (as evidenced by the playerbase shrinking once things become more stable).