Slight update: Altpocalypse slowdown

[niltrias]

What we have here is a play-style dependent on other people, and which hurts those people, which is banditry. And a play style not very dependent on others, which is production. Due to imbalances in both the ease of theft and the ease of punishment of theft, banditry became broken to the point that using alts was the only viable method of theiving, and once you decided to use alts there was no limit to the extent to which you would steal, because the fact that the alts doom was imminent meant that you may as well take everything you could carry before death came swirling down. This, in turn, led to dissatisfaction among the non-thief player base that thieves depended on in order to play, which was seriously hampering the game.
So yeah, I`m very glad this happened, and I see it meaning nothing but good for newbies, unless those newbies were joining only for the thieving. Even for them it is good, because the number of producers was dropping rapidly, and thieves cant play very well without someone to steal from.
That said, as a very temporary patch I`m happy with it. I am, of course, looking forward to a more fleshed-out system in the future. In the mean time, potential thieves who are now unable to get their desired skills as quickly as hoped...go build something. Its a fun way to play the game as well, and it will give you a lot of LP for when the black arts eventually become cheaper.
BTW, I am using a HIGHLY impersonal "you" at all points during this post.

[Raephire]

Why dont you fucking whiners on both sides get a clue?

Real thieves can make out like FAT CATS now, just not against highly developed civilizations. Logout behind your damn brick wall, Pallisades are time consuming to bust now, means brick walls are absolutely unreasonable, I personally wouldn't break down a brick wall. If JTG came on with his main and left him afk out of archery range and advertised that he was carrying a backpack full or bangers.

[kobnach]

This is not a carebear game. It is harsh, brutal, unforgiving.

I do not want to play World of Haven & Hearth.

No it's not. There are a handful of players here looking for a game that's "harsh, brutal, and unforgiving." There seem to be others who claim to want this, at least for others, but whine like babies when anything goes against them. But the majority of players want the possibility of pvp - for spice, or as a way to deal with anti-social behaviour not covered in the game mechanics - but don't want the world to be a matter of grind-till-I-can-attack-others, then attack-till-I-get-killed, then lather, rinse, and repeat.

[poltifar]

You have a point Raep. But I guess they deserve it for actually being REAL thieves. They'll get away with some stealing. But I'm sure that if they step on too many toes, they'll just get killed eventually. If they steal not-too-much at a time, they'll get away with it, and then it would be exactly what we wanted thieves to be, right?

Besides, even REAL thieves would have a hard time breaking brick walls.

[Raephire]

This is not a carebear game. It is harsh, brutal, unforgiving.

I do not want to play World of Haven & Hearth.

No it's not. There are a handful of players here looking for a game that's "harsh, brutal, and unforgiving." There seem to be others who claim to want this, at least for others, but whine like babies when anything goes against them. But the majority of players want the possibility of pvp - for spice, or as a way to deal with anti-social behaviour not covered in the game mechanics - but don't want the world to be a matter of grind-till-I-can-attack-others, then attack-till-I-get-killed, then lather, rinse, and repeat.

I agree to a point with them, This unforgiving brutal gameworld is what I've always wanted, but it's going through phases of being very unbalanced.

But, these WHINERS are complaining about it being unbalanced.. They forget that it isnt really a game yet, it isnt really a beta..

IT'S AN ALPHA TEST RELEASE, and we are TESTERS, not PLAYERS.
The fact that Jorb and Loftar allow for BUGS to be ABUSED, is not a matter of SURE GO AHEAD, it's more a matter of THEY DONT HAVE THE MANPOWER OR RESOURCES TO ACT AGAINST IT WHENEVER IT HAPPENS.

So when they realize something needs to be fixed, at least temporarily with a placeholder, what do they do? That's right, instead of PUNISHING the ABUSIVE TESTERS, they instead, MAKE A TEMPORARY CHANGE TO GAME MECHANICS to help balance issues.

I mean, shit.

[Sacro]

I don't think anyone complaining missed the fact that this is an alpha test. Feedback on a wildly unpopular temporary fix is bound to come off as whiny, but as others have already said, people are vocal so that this temporary fix doesn't get segued into a permanent one.

Thievery and murder and tracking are all prominent features of this game so far, and doing away with them is silly.

[kobnach]

I don't think anyone complaining missed the fact that this is an alpha test. Feedback on a wildly unpopular temporary fix is bound to come off as whiny, but as others have already said, people are vocal so that this temporary fix doesn't get segued into a permanent one.

Thievery and murder and tracking are all prominent features of this game so far, and doing away with them is silly.

So then I guess I should post - equally often - full of praises for the change, and how this is just about the balance I want, except for the difficulty of getting at smart thieves (those with brick walls) to execute them

Seriously, I want thieving to be difficult and I want it to be high risk. I want "stealing the whole hen house" to be insanely risky. _And_ I want mechanisms that prevent risk shifting - no throw away alts or innocent neighbours becoming the fall guy for the theft. (With regard to innocent neighbours, well, there's been at least one posting about someone leaving stolen trackable objects in a third party's homestead.)

[StewineBeef]

The one thing I do find funny is that the thieves are complaining about its to hard yet I bet most of them are using alts for storage? Its still possible for you guys to steal, its impossible for us to get at those alt storage's.

Get rid of your alts then complain.

[poltifar]

The one thing I do find funny is that the thieves are complaining about its to hard yet I bet most of them are using alts for storage? Its still possible for you guys to steal, its impossible for us to get at those alt storage's.

Get rid of your alts then complain.

Yes. Until then, you have no rights to whine.

[jorb]

Producers have two jobs: Produce, and hunt the thief. Thieves just have one job: Steal.

Protecting your place *at all* requires at least a palisade and a claim. The palisade costs a lot of time and effort, the claim costs quite a lot of LP. I agree that simply raising the cost of the black skills is less than optimal, but the fact of the matter was that, at least in terms of initial investment, thievery was very cheap. Claims were not a real deterrent in and of themselves, for example.

Balance should generally be in favor of producers. As it is IRL, mind you.