Lack of interest between arrival in boston and wilds

Forum for suggesting changes to Salem.

Re: Lack of interest between arrival in boston and wilds

Postby five9 » Sun Aug 26, 2012 6:16 am

Sevenless wrote:
five9 wrote:the sky is falling... 3 or 4 people may or may not have stopped playing

they coulda moved or rerolled


and the server pop is misleading , thats current log ins, not total who play , as some log off, others log in and the pop is steady at all hours


If you have a graph of overall characters/players logged in per day it's a fairly good idea. Not perfect, but it accounts for those who play short amounts of time (the key is relative population vs absolute). Doesn't account for multi accounts though.


and this graph is where?
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Re: Lack of interest between arrival in boston and wilds

Postby Tonkyhonk » Sun Aug 26, 2012 6:46 am

five9 wrote:and this graph is where?

thats the point. there isnt one and sevenless said "if".
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Re: Lack of interest between arrival in boston and wilds

Postby MagicManICT » Sun Aug 26, 2012 8:59 am

There actually was one. It's not too hard to set up to do, either. You don't need to do any real programming, just a bit of scripting (and you can probably find canned code for that).
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Re: Lack of interest between arrival in boston and wilds

Postby ElCapitan1701 » Sun Aug 26, 2012 11:28 am

I also notice a high drop off rate off new players after short time of playing Salem. I think there are some reasons for that

1) Salem is complex. Maybe the learning curve could be smoothed (f.e. food for raising low level stats without knowing gluttony system -> later) but on the long run people need to be willing to invest some thought. There are enough games out there, which you can play with brain afk, so I think its fine, if you can`t play Salem like that.

2) Salem is exhausting. F.e. path finding, food preparation, raising stats....it`s a lot of micromanagement. While time invested into building something rewards with some sort of proud, what you have done, those micromanagment things are often felt to be annoying.

3) Salem is - what? Many players are coming with false expectations. Thats the fault of both salem and the players. This isn`t Minecraft - so building or rearranging terrain isn`t a core concept of Salem. Those players leave, when they notice, that you can`t lower river-tiles (and make water flow into them...) or when they build their house and see there is not much more...
But Salem isn`t a real crafting MMO yet either - there is no server economy - no trade - no easy way of selling your goods to other players - and no really need for crafted goods. Most things you make one time to see it`s effects, then you craft it no more. Or you spam things to give it away or use it youreslf for raising stats. Atm a lot of players also can craft everything - why should one player feel important as he can do anything an other can`t?

4) Salem is a group based, time intensive game. To have fun in Salem you need to play in a group with a sync time frame. So players with jobs or families will have a hard time with Salem in the long run.
5) Salem has a lot of possible frustration points. You know, slow progress, getting KOed by small animals, getting robbed, or killed, or...

If you sum up those five points and ask yourself, which type of players do fit in there, my answer atm is: not much. Only pvp loving guys with a lot of free time will be happy with Salem on the long run as it is right now. And I`m not sure, if this is what devs want as ongoing game concept and seatribes impetus indicates, or not, which business model and "crafting MMO" indicates imho.
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Re: Lack of interest between arrival in boston and wilds

Postby Bluestone » Sun Aug 26, 2012 11:53 am

In point 3 you claim there is no trading or economy but I disagree. Trade's happen all the time. And it just got even easier for newer players to buy things like shovels and backpacks and sabres with the new player stalls. Not the entire point you made in #3 but wanted to disagree on that one.

Also. The game is not solely for groups. Hermits can do just fine, they just need to put in more effort themselves to match the output of groups OR be content with lower output.

Basically I think you view the game too narrowly but overall I agree, just not the the same extent. Salem is a bit more of a niche game than mainstream games, but its a niche that no other game does as well as Salem. Top of it's niche (IMHO)
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Re: Lack of interest between arrival in boston and wilds

Postby ElCapitan1701 » Sun Aug 26, 2012 12:55 pm

Yeah - you are right. There are some points which make Salem worthwhile: f.e. to skill per crafting objects is unique and makes a lot of fun. Nevertheless I have the feeling, the group I`m playing with, is more playing Salem because of it`s potential then it`s current state.
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Re: Lack of interest between arrival in boston and wilds

Postby Sevenless » Sun Aug 26, 2012 4:41 pm

ElCapitan1701 wrote:Yeah - you are right. There are some points which make Salem worthwhile: f.e. to skill per crafting objects is unique and makes a lot of fun. Nevertheless I have the feeling, the group I`m playing with, is more playing Salem because of it`s potential then it`s current state.


Considering this is a closed beta, that entirely makes sense.
It's been neat to see the evolution of a game. Salem has come so far, and still has far to go. Although frustrating, I think it's been an experience worth the effort.
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Re: Lack of interest between arrival in boston and wilds

Postby Ketu » Sun Aug 26, 2012 6:18 pm

There may be more of a drop off in playtime after you purchase a vendor stall in town.
Or did someone successfully cock-block the stalls and are griefing the hermits?
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Re: Lack of interest between arrival in boston and wilds

Postby Sevenless » Sun Aug 26, 2012 7:47 pm

Ketu wrote:There may be more of a drop off in playtime after you purchase a vendor stall in town.
Or did someone successfully cock-block the stalls and are griefing the hermits?


Honestly at this point stalls + iron is a license to print more money than you could possibly need as a town. Once you've got all the money... well then what? Competitively there's not much to do at that point. Sure you can grind purity, but you're already insanely rich so why bother?
It's been neat to see the evolution of a game. Salem has come so far, and still has far to go. Although frustrating, I think it's been an experience worth the effort.
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Re: Lack of interest between arrival in boston and wilds

Postby Potjeh » Sun Aug 26, 2012 7:52 pm

Buy food for silver.
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