17 suggestions for devs to make Ultima Online PROD server shine like a gem. (Long Thread Warning)

Comments

• Lord_Nythrax Posts: 496

  August 20

  "1: Theres a big need for a new improved classic client to bring the game upto 2024 date."

  
  

  Agreed but they lack the capacity and lately threads about it have been getting locked. Their only realistic option is to endorse an open source client that doesn't have scripting tools, but they're too proud to do that.
  

  
  

  "2: Unfortunately theres notably difficulties repopulating existing servers, thus I suggest merging of the 24existing servers to 7 new region servers, one in each continent."

  
  

  LOL, lots of UO players in Antarctica and Africa are there? Everyone whose house you delete when you close their shard is just going to quit the game, the devs can't afford to throw that money away. I'll skip the next umpteen suggestions that amount to "pull ten times more developers out of your butt to do obvious things."
  

  
  

  "13: Gold sinks. To combat inflation you need some gold sinks, introduce some new items usefull/deco or title to drain some gold. + other gold sinks."

  
  

  There could never be enough sinks to account for the trillions and trillions sitting around hoarded on goldseller accounts at this point. This battle is just lost.
  

  
  

  "14: One common price for UO pr month, be it Gametimes or cc cards, one price for all no matter what country you in. By doing this you eliminate the VPN bs and you can give fair offers to ALL customers around the globe."

  
  

  Differential pricing exists for a reason. If they charge rich country prices in poor countries, they'll lose all their customers. If they charge poor country prices in rich countries, they're throwing money away.
  

  
  

  "15: Once you done all the steps above its time to make all play OSI official servers. Delete freeshards. All freeshard/new OSI players should be given a benefit for chosing OSI and not freeshards. All rights reserved right? dont seem like it."

  
  

  They couldn't do this in a million years if they tried. They couldn't do it back when the game was in its prime, and they certainly can't do it now as a forgotten legacy product.
  

  
  

  "16: Marketing, commercials, adds, whatever just bring in new/returning players. Have an open channel with the players, newsletters, social media posts, streaming, etc Rrecruit tons of new players to the shards."

  
  

  They realize this one, but they don't have the money for real advertising, and that dopey YouTube channel that gets 200 views per video seems to be the best they can do in terms of social media.
  

  
  

  "17: Crafting system is complex and need adjustments, new/returning players dont understand it and you have to look up guides everytime you want something crafted/reforged or refined. This system needs to be made easier to understand, however its not the first priority in this thread."

  
  

  I actually agree here, but over the years I've gotten the impression that Kyronix thinks complexity for its own sake is a good thing, that it somehow separates "real crafters" from just people with crafting mule characters. It's made crafting totally baffling.

  
  

  Basically, you're treating this like a serious commercial product and not a broken-down low-budget legacy game circling the toilet bowl, and a lot of your suggestions just aren't realistic unless you have millions of dollars you're looking to invest for questionable returns.
  
• Pawain Posts: 10,200

  August 20

  9.  They removed it because of privacy policies. (in another country I think)
  
  10 - 12 has been asked for many times to no avail.  EA Customer Service sometimes does not know UO exists.  UO does not get any items on sale.  When they accidently do, players run there to buy while they can.   Broadsword loses money because of these.
  
  7. Please NO, we already have to have 800 skill templates.
  
  Lord Nythrax Did an exceptional job explaining the ones he chose.

  Focus on what you can do, not what you can't.
• popps Posts: 4,035

  August 20

  There is players who spent LOTS, sometimes even real money, to get their preferred UO House on their Shard of choice and they should be forced to give it up for a "chance" at placing who knows on what spot or with what spawn or facing and perhaps even having to compete when trying to place with other players using House placing scripts and having a way much better ping then theirs ?
  
  Thanks but no.
  
  Players should be given, for granted, the same House they have with that location, lack or type of spawn it might have and facing (sea shore, Forest, Snow setting etc.).
  
  That is at least how I see it.
• Lord_Nythrax Posts: 496

  August 20

  I just really like the "seven shards, one per continent" idea. We can pitch the Antarctica shard to people with jobs at polar research stations.
  
• Tim Posts: 826

  August 20

  I'll call it if no one else will 

  image.png 45.1K
• Pawain Posts: 10,200

  August 20

  Lord_Nythrax said:

  I just really like the "seven shards, one per continent" idea. We can pitch the Antarctica shard to people with jobs at polar research stations.
  

   
  
  If you get roped into a time share presentation.  When they ask your dream vacation,  tell them Antartica.
  

  Focus on what you can do, not what you can't.
• TimSt Posts: 1,874

  August 20

  One gold sink would be to have a wealth tax and tax any amount over 1P.
  
• Pawain Posts: 10,200

  August 20

  Accidently wipe all plats!  Oopsy.

  Focus on what you can do, not what you can't.
• Lord_Nythrax Posts: 496

  August 20

  TimSt said:

  One gold sink would be to have a wealth tax and tax any amount over 1P.
  

  
  This would antagonize people right out of the game.
  
• Pawain Posts: 10,200

  August 21

  Isn't this a dream thread?

  Focus on what you can do, not what you can't.
• Garret Posts: 188

  August 21 edited August 21

  psycho said:

  Heres 17 free suggestions from me for the devs to make Ultima Online PROD server shine like a gem.
  
  Note that the points below are not in priority, just a list of things that need to be done on PROD to bring it up to 2024 and let UO continue for decades to come.
  You can maybe exclude a point or two, but sooner or later PROD has to deal with it.
  (Sorry for long text, but the points are needed, and its not too much text under each point, you can really discuss each point all day long, but buttom line is many things needs changed/improved/fixed) and many things have remained unchanged for over a decade or two.
  
  
  
  1: Theres a big need for a new improved classic client to bring the game upto 2024 date. This includes eliminating the need for 3rd party app (including outdated UOAssist, build it in the game client instead)
  On this list 60fps, support for new monitors, higher resolution, zoom, and more features that is in EC and not in CC. Fix the always nighsight hax and fieldhax that is currently rampant and unfair.
  
  2: Unfortunately theres notably difficulties repopulating existing servers, thus I suggest merging of the 24existing servers to 7 new region servers, one in each continent.
  Give all players an unlimited numberof Xfer tokens to use once from existing servers to the new region servers. Then delete the old servers.
  Gives all a fair start to place their houses on the new region servers and the ability to xfer their items(even shard bound ones)
  It would be logical to keep Atlantic and Europa as regional servers, however if you want a fair start for all, create new ones.  This also gives you the opportunity to change the restricted landmass/ocean/zones in the process to better work with housing/em areas/future events/pvp strongholds.
  
  
  3:  Fix the outstanding bugs, this includes party system and VvV bugs.
  
  4: PvP Balance needs, tweak the game so its more balanced in PvP, nerf OP things, improve useless things like primers that are mostly unused(because they suck).
  
  5: Create a PvP system, if VvV is the chosen PvP system then improve it.
  
  6: New BOD storage with books that can contain far more than 500each BOD, how about 5000, 50 000? Can be vet reward, ideally you would want 1x book for each skill, the current 500 is not enough.
  
  7: Make the following skills usable: Item ID, Forensic eval, Herding, Taste ID, Arms lore should be tweaked furether, snooping, Camping, Tracking.
  
  8: Update the quests from NPC, remove useless ones, update text where needed, classify if its for single player or group, updtate rewards. Some quests are impossible solo, texst should reflect that.
  
  9:  Improve the UO webside with a myUO feature like the one from the past. So players can browse guilds, factions, memebers, shards, points or w/e at their workplace when not playing.
  
  10: Old item Cleanup, meanwhile you dont want to remove existing items, make new recipes for items that need old items as ingredient. That way aaaaall the currently useless artis like ilshenar, champ items, brit/vesper donation ones etcetc becomes useful for the recipe.
  
  11: Cleanup EA store its a mess with usefull and useless codes confusing new/returning players. At the same time a possibility to launch a new token with more house space, additional house pr account, 8th character slot, whatever, just something that is very wanted by players and bring in alot of cash for UO to continue the next decades.
  Perhaps a token that allows you to get ALL expansion packs at same time. Atleast cleanup the EA store items.
  
  12: Update the cleanup system, perhaps a new "Cleanup Britannia part III" with exclusive rewards, like the ones two decades ago. (Theres alot of items still not added to the cleanup systems) New improved rewards, remove unused ones.
  
  
  13: Gold sinks. To combat inflation you need some gold sinks, introduce some new items usefull/deco or title to drain some gold. + other gold sinks.
  
  14: One common price for UO pr month, be it Gametimes or cc cards, one price for all no matter what country you in. By doing this you eliminate the VPN bs and you can give fair offers to ALL customers around the globe.
  
  15: Once you done all the steps above its time to make all play OSI official servers. Delete freeshards. All freeshard/new OSI players should be given a benefit for chosing OSI and not freeshards. All rights reserved right? dont seem like it.
  
  16: Marketing, commercials, adds, whatever just bring in new/returning players. Have an open channel with the players, newsletters, social media posts, streaming, etc Rrecruit tons of new players to the shards.
  

  
  

  17: Crafting system is complex and need adjustments, new/returning players dont understand it and you have to look up guides everytime you want something crafted/reforged or refined. This system needs to be made easier to understand, however its not the first priority in this thread.
  

  
  Conclusion:  By having 5-7 region servers instead of 24shards as of now the players will be more concentraded and still maintain the low-lag environment by having a server near them.
  This will also be better for Devs to maintain the servers, and GMs to enforce rules, and you would also need less EM moderators.
  It will bring in alot of cash for UO to continue the next decades, possible with 5-7 region servers with new hardware that can host tens of thousands of players at same time.
  
  
  Estaminated timeframe on all this above? Probably 10years, but atleast start! Log off that New legacy shard, its been 3 years already with PROD on autopilot.
  First new lagacy needs to get done, then supported in bugfixing, then GM/EM support, then new seasonal items/events, then you shatter the shard only to make a new legacy part II with new rules and quests part II that requires a ton of devtime.  It takes too much devtime, PROD players dont like it.
  

  You cant just let PROD servers run on autopilot with a new dynamic event every 4month its killing the PROD servers. Where you think half of the new legacy players come from? Draining PROD. 

  Devs should be happy the players are enganged and offering solutions and tips on how to improve the game, alot of time i.e. went to make this thread, free tips. There are many Heroes of UO offering constructive critisim and tips regarding production servers.
  

  
  
  Thank you, together we make the game stronger!
  
  
  
  
  

  Half of this  is on NL alredy, maybe lets build new better UO and if devs is more focused on NL and keep listening mby we have beter chances by testing this new server and get more improvments for NL and retail servers as well? 
  
  P.S. we have to adapt or we will get nothing.
• Lord_Nythrax Posts: 496

  August 22

  Pawain said:

  Isn't this a dream thread?

  
  

  I mean if we're just fantasizing then I'll join in.

  
  

  1) Invent a new currency. Call it shekels or doubloons or whatever you want. Have 1000 gold equal one shekel, you know, the same way a billion gold equals one platinum now.

  
  

  2) One day with no warning all NPCs start charging shekels instead of gold. An apple from the provisioner now costs 3 shekels instead of 3 gold. That's right, we've increased prices by a factor of a thousand.

  
  

  3) But wait, monsters also start dropping shekels instead of gold. A mongbat that would drop 30 gold now drops 30 shekels. Monster loot has has also increased by a factor of a thousand. 

  
  

  4) Hooray we've functionally reduced the money supply by 99.9% without technically taking anything away from anyone directly. Maybe they won't kill us.