Wish you were here

[darnokpl]

I still dream of a reset, either in Salem or Haven.

Yeah, but reset in Salem right now would be bad idea, we need more mechanics to be finished and more new content that will add new mechanic that needs to be tested and balanced before we start over, unless you want to be in same point (after few nerfs that broke peoples feeling about balanced game)


Maybe at least they would make world 7 in hnh.

[ysbryd]

My opinion barely matters, but I think you guys are doing the right thing. Wekly updates were fun, but not at the expense of your overall vision for Salem.
I loved HnH, and I love this game too, although I havent had much time to get in there lately, and I would rather see a longer more cohesive process, than just what can we throw at them thursday.
You guys know where your game wants to be, I agree, take a step back and look at the bigger picture and find the path again.

All that being said, where the HELL are my COWS?
Keep up the good work Jorbtar, we love you really... kinda.... in a troll in the cupboard sorta way.... now go catch some rays.

[Toorimakun]

MAIN CHARS:
main chars should be able to gain MOST skills rather quickly... pretty much all the skills in the game right now.
but i think that there should be more skills added...

building up a char is also part of the fun of the game... so i wouldn't say that making them more disposable is the way to go... i would say make getting your skills back quickly is the way to go.
but the skill levels should have a better impact on things such as the purity of things found in the wild/stumps for instance to make it so that there is still reason to try and level your main up.
and/or like the higher your S&C skill is the more of a bounuse to the purity of the fields that you plant... and/or some thing like for every 10 levels of S&C you get 1 extra seed from your crops and every 50 levels you get an extra crop item.


COMBAT ALTS:
i think it should be easy to get to say 75 biles so that people can group agropelter hunt... but after that make it so that they foods you eat need to have better infuance to get to 150 biles and then from there the purity of foods makes the difference to 200 biles...

200+ biles should require rarity foods made from rare ingredience and probably a lot of those ingredience.. the tier of farmable ingredience and the purity as well... i think that if some one puts in the effort to get this far with their char then they should be able to get to 300 biles.

BUILDING/VILLAGES:
for building i think that it should take a lot more effort to destroy a building that you do not own...
villages should have better management tools integrated
the raiding format right now is ok... but a village shouldn't be able to be leveled with in a couple of minutes... the buildings should take say.. 30 minutes to an hour at least to destroy... if not longer.

the decay of a village seems fine to me tho...

also should add some things that are high level buildings.... these would require rare resources and also a high amount of bile to place the sign...
say:
Inn: allows a member of the village to tellaport to boston from any where in the village claim or Inn aura.
*rare resources and high tier boards.. i think sanded boards are the highest tier they are talking about making.*
would require say 224 Phlem to place.

Grand Cross: biles slowly regen with in the aura...
*supper rare resources*
would require say 299 Phlem to place

Holy Well: allows a player to tellaport to an other Holy Well
*supper rare resources*
would require 299 phem to place
a player can only own 2 at a time and/or some kind of bar that fills up over time and a little bit of it gets used every time you tellaport and/or only (X) amount of people can use it and must wait 24 hours after each person change before you can change people again..... or some other way to keep these from getting abused.

[Droj]

The goal should not be to impliment systems to allow others to catch up to the monsters of this game. In my opinion, this game would benefit from making characters More disposable. Lower the top end of the humour system to the 200s so that the toughest toons only hit for around 30s. Then any group of midrange playerz could be trouble for anyone. As it stands the high end toons can one shot KO almost anyone. Pvp is nonexistant. Honestly, i love some aspects of this game, but as it stands, this game is stagnant. There is nothing to do, and with the super powerful prepurity patched toons taking advantage of high purity flour + high purity veggies + tier 3 goods, out there collecting scents, this game has become farmville. Snore...

pretty much what I tried to discuss before 'over zealous mod' inappropriately locked my thread.

Nevertheless I look forward to more meaningful updates.

it wouldn't be very jorb-like if there wasn't a sweater or beanie present.

[Kaleb]

Thanks for the information about updates.

Ever hear the expression "can't see the forest for the trees" ? I guess that's what happens when you try to set a weekly schedule for updates.

I have been playing for about 2 months and love this game even though it is still classified as BETA. Although all my mains are only 30 - 40 biles, this game is totally playable.

Also, shouldn't all these suggestions for game changes go to the suggestion area and stop cluttering up the announcements

[Jalpha]

My wouldn't that turn the suggestions forum into a mess

[darnokpl]

Main chars:

I thought about skills trees right now it is a little mess, but if we get simple skill trees for different "jobs/profesions" it can be used to boost character level up.

Something like personal belives in hnh you have few levels, you can switch it after some time...
idea is simple create char, pick skill tree for example "Farmer lvl1" then all skills requested to make a farm (agri, cotton and cabbage planting, botany, hori etc etc) will require 10% less profs, if you go further and pick "farmer lvl2" it can lower skill cost by 20%, of course to switch from level 1 to 2 you must wait few hours and if you would want to pick different tree you have to decrease farmer level one by one to 0 (or maybe to some low value*).
At some level it could boost farming, so if you are one week (more time = higher level) farmer you could get faster or more crops than first level farmer.

*To make game playable we would need few low level profesions per single char, so maybe it could work with cap max 10 "jobs/profesions points" and we would be able to split them on jobs we need on our character. If max job level would be 5 then single character would be best only in two different jobs (like farmer and forester for example, or hunter and fisherman, or miner and blacksmith etc etc I picked those that are somekind related, but it wouldn't be rule).

Of course proficiencies level would matter all the time or even better higher proficiencies you get more "job points" you can assign
Job level would be to boost it a bit at start, so groups that would split their roles would get everything faster and cheaper.

[Toorimakun]

Main chars:

I thought about skills trees right now it is a little mess, but if we get simple skill trees for different "jobs/profesions" it can be used to boost character level up.

this would kinda get rid of the sandbox feel of the game

[bigmageusa]

Expand your team.

Add a few new devs to replace the bulk of the work you do now.

Hire a product/project/community manager.

Start taking a less hands on role (in terms of coding), but...work closely with your new team to make sure Salem stays true to your vision. Create a development pipeline, maintain it, make sure its what you guys want to avoid situations like the one you seem to be having with gluttony. Use it as a basis to set expectations for the community. No more of this " we are considering this" or " see this soon", set clear timelines and milestones while making sure they are adhered to.

The game has a lot of potential, but this could be that pivotal moment where the final outcome is decided. More people, more ideas, better ideas, more content and likely a better game.

I happen to be a professional producer/product manager that can also add to any development (I code and do art too) who is looking for work at the moment if this is the stumbling block. Aside from blatant self promotion, I do like how the game is progressing. However, it seems to have a few good opportunities that are being missed. I'm unsure of the internal politics and arrangements, so perhaps everything is indeed optimal given the situation.

I would also like to point out that 'simply hiring' more staff gets complicated and expensive quickly. I'm unsure about the numbers, but I don't think Salem is quite at the profit level needed to sustain a studio in it's own right. That being said, I think a novel game like this deserves those resources to better complete the game creator's vision. Can't wait to see how this game progresses!

[darnokpl]

Main chars:

I thought about skills trees right now it is a little mess, but if we get simple skill trees for different "jobs/profesions" it can be used to boost character level up.

this would kinda get rid of the sandbox feel of the game

Not really... after week or two you could level up different job tree and enjoy other part of the game.
Current problem with Salem is that anyone can do anything, if we would have temporary jobs/profesions (one week to level up full farmer tree and then second week to get back to neutral point and third week to level up full hunter tree) maybe game would be little more interesting and people would appreciate more in-game content.