Best Game Ever - Ultima Online Legacy

popps · September 2022

Petra_Fyde said:

What veteran reward I will get has no impact whatsoever on my decision to keep playing, and nor should it. I keep playing because I enjoy playing.
When assessing the number of IDOCs one must also take into account
1. How many of them are in fact the result of the owner placing a new house elsewhere and
2. How many of the are instantly replaced by new homes.
I understand that on Atlantic those houses may be replaced by persons selling them for profit - but there still must be someone to sell them TO, otherwise they wouldn't do it.
Instead of spreading doom and gloom referring to 'dead shards' and forecasting the end of the game take the time to actually go out and count the number of houses spread over the shards, because for every house that isn't falling, there is an active account paying for it!

What veteran reward I will get has no impact whatsoever on my decision to keep playing, and nor should it. I keep playing because I enjoy playing.

Not all players are, and think the same.... while it might have no impact for you, don't you think that, among the UO players out there, there might be a number out there to whom, instead, the quality of the Veteran Rewards which they receive for their long years of custmer loyalty might have an impact ? With this in mind, shouldn't therefore, Veteran Rewards be Design with some consistency about what Year of customer loyalty active age they are intended for ?

Instead of spreading doom and gloom referring to 'dead shards' and forecasting the end of the game take the time to actually go out and count the number of houses spread over the shards, because for every house that isn't falling, there is an active account paying for it!

Well, not exactly, considering that, I heard, some players might play the "90 days" game to keep multiple Houses up but minimizing their subscription costs.... so, I would not go as far as to say that "every" House out there necessarily means a subscription that is earning resources to UO...

Yoshi · September 2022

“Forget the vet rewards, they just need to fix the bugs so people can play.

i hear in discord whenever there is a new player, the third party client set up is so complicated they have to screen share just to install the game.

you should be able to just download the game from UO.com and play it, should not need to download this complex third party crap from untrusted sources just to play without bugs”

loop · September 2022

popps said:

JohnKnighthawke said:

People's ability to deny reality never ceases to amaze me. The article's couple of paragraphs on the Trammel go something like this.

1-90% of population goes to Trammel and doesn't look back.
(So logically that means most people didn't want the Fel lifestyle.)

2-Someone says that somehow this was the "beginning of the end."
(What? Based on all available empirical data it helped, not hurt.)

3-Someone else says subscriptions doubled after Trammel.
(So not only does this mean most players don't want the Fel lifestyle, but that Fel was actually a problem for the UO brand name. People stayed away because of it.)

4-Same person then says Trammel was somehow a problem because it cost UO the hard-core PKers.
(Umm...what? Based on the information provided, they were a problem...)

First thing someone says here? "Trammel isn't needed anymore."
(Umm....What?)

Oh well. We're living in the post-fact, post-truth world now. When UO finally does shut down these folks will blame Trammel even though the available evidence suggests the polar opposite and even though the end of UO by definition will have occurred decades after Trammel.

It might be interesting to read what, to my understanding, a Developer who was there when it happened, remembers....

https://community.crowfall.com/topic/102-gordon-walton-are-you-the-one-who-brought-us-trammel/?tab=comments#comment-1610

A paragraph which I found very much interesting to read, was this....

We were not successful in bringing back the (literally)100's of thousands of players who had quit due to the unbridled PvP in the world (~5% of former customers came back to try the new UO, but very few of them stayed). We discovered that people didn't just quit UO, they divorced it in a very emotional way.

This is why, to my opinion, game Design dealing with PvP should be dealt with with a ten foot pole.....

The perspective that Trammel marked the end of UO is more spiritual than it is material. The "spirit" of UO as a sandbox fantasy world changed to something a little bit more engineered. When bringing things back to reality, it can be hard to temper these immaterial feelings about how you might remember things versus how things really were.

That said, as much as Trammel made sense within the context of an imminent shutdown, we shouldn't determine the success of updates based solely on their impact to subscription numbers. Something can be hugely popular but poor in design. From a design standpoint, the Felucca/Trammel split was a lazy way to deal with the emergent sociopathy of a persistent online world. From a utilitarian standpoint, where a solution was needed quickly to improve the player's experience and avoid a shutdown, it made a lot of sense, and I do not think we would have UO today without it.

In fact, a lot of controversial changes to UO make sense when viewed in context. Item Insurance makes sense if you move to a more item-based, Diablo-style foundation. Shard Transfers make sense as populations dwindle. Vendor Search makes sense from a usability standpoint and in the context of more complex itemization, at the expense of the virtual real estate market. Others, like abandoning Kingdom Reborn and settling on the Enhanced Client, are harder for me to understand.

I'm interested to see whether Broadsword, being the official custodians of the game, will use New Legacy as a platform to create an experience that they have full ownership of which, in some sense, puts them even more in direct competition with private servers that cater to a classic experience, some of which are very well produced and which receive high quality updates. My hope is that Broadsword will be in a better position to learn from UO's past and that New Legacy's success brings greater resourcing to improve the CC/Enhanced clients or at least a more transparent reckoning with the really amazing work going on within the private shard community.

popps · September 2022

loop said:

popps said:

JohnKnighthawke said:

People's ability to deny reality never ceases to amaze me. The article's couple of paragraphs on the Trammel go something like this.

1-90% of population goes to Trammel and doesn't look back.
(So logically that means most people didn't want the Fel lifestyle.)

2-Someone says that somehow this was the "beginning of the end."
(What? Based on all available empirical data it helped, not hurt.)

3-Someone else says subscriptions doubled after Trammel.
(So not only does this mean most players don't want the Fel lifestyle, but that Fel was actually a problem for the UO brand name. People stayed away because of it.)

4-Same person then says Trammel was somehow a problem because it cost UO the hard-core PKers.
(Umm...what? Based on the information provided, they were a problem...)

First thing someone says here? "Trammel isn't needed anymore."
(Umm....What?)

Oh well. We're living in the post-fact, post-truth world now. When UO finally does shut down these folks will blame Trammel even though the available evidence suggests the polar opposite and even though the end of UO by definition will have occurred decades after Trammel.

It might be interesting to read what, to my understanding, a Developer who was there when it happened, remembers....

https://community.crowfall.com/topic/102-gordon-walton-are-you-the-one-who-brought-us-trammel/?tab=comments#comment-1610

A paragraph which I found very much interesting to read, was this....

We were not successful in bringing back the (literally)100's of thousands of players who had quit due to the unbridled PvP in the world (~5% of former customers came back to try the new UO, but very few of them stayed). We discovered that people didn't just quit UO, they divorced it in a very emotional way.

This is why, to my opinion, game Design dealing with PvP should be dealt with with a ten foot pole.....

The perspective that Trammel marked the end of UO is more spiritual than it is material. The "spirit" of UO as a sandbox fantasy world changed to something a little bit more engineered. When bringing things back to reality, it can be hard to temper these immaterial feelings about how you might remember things versus how things really were.

That said, as much as Trammel made sense within the context of an imminent shutdown, we shouldn't determine the success of updates based solely on their impact to subscription numbers. Something can be hugely popular but poor in design. From a design standpoint, the Felucca/Trammel split was a lazy way to deal with the emergent sociopathy of a persistent online world. From a utilitarian standpoint, where a solution was needed quickly to improve the player's experience and avoid a shutdown, it made a lot of sense, and I do not think we would have UO today without it.

In fact, a lot of controversial changes to UO make sense when viewed in context. Item Insurance makes sense if you move to a more item-based, Diablo-style foundation. Shard Transfers make sense as populations dwindle. Vendor Search makes sense from a usability standpoint and in the context of more complex itemization, at the expense of the virtual real estate market. Others, like abandoning Kingdom Reborn and settling on the Enhanced Client, are harder for me to understand.

I'm interested to see whether Broadsword, being the official custodians of the game, will use New Legacy as a platform to create an experience that they have full ownership of which, in some sense, puts them even more in direct competition with private servers that cater to a classic experience, some of which are very well produced and which receive high quality updates. My hope is that Broadsword will be in a better position to learn from UO's past and that New Legacy's success brings greater resourcing to improve the CC/Enhanced clients or at least a more transparent reckoning with the really amazing work going on within the private shard community.

The thing is, at least to my opinion, that if the New Legacy Shard will bring on new, or returning players, then things will get better as more subscriptions might come and, thus, more resources be available for more Developers and all that....

But if the New Legacy Shard will get most of its players from the current Production Shards and from Siege/Mugen, players who already have a subscription, this might cause gameplay problems to current UO players remaining to play the Production Shards and Siege/Mugen because not having interest in the New Legacy Shard the way that it was Designed to play out, leaving them to play on Production Shards and on Siege/Mugen which could get further depleted and more deserted of players because spending most of their time, now, on the New Legacy Shard rather then on their home Shards.....

If this was to happen, is my worry, especially if the limited Developers' time was mostly directed at the New Legacy Shard rather then at current Production Shards and for Siege/Mugen, this might end up seeing some of the players of these Shards not being interested in the New Legacy Shard, finding themselves playing on Shards further impoverished of players and with less new content to enjoy, and some could decide to thus end their UO gaming experience and go play other games, thus closing their subscribed accounts.... that is, I worry, that not only active subscriptions might not go significantly up but, there could even be a loss of active subscriptions due to the impact what the New Legacy Server might have on current, existing Production Servers, Siege/Mugen, and to their players....

So, is my opinion, it remains to be seen what the impact of the New Legacy Shard will be on Ultima Online..... time will tell..... I sure hope for the best for Ultima Online, though.

McDougle · September 2022

No one else notices or finds odd the complete lack of mention or updates on NL...

KHAN · September 2022

The easiest way to know that UO is shutting down is to watch and see when the gold sellers start cleaning out their "inventory". Because I'm willing to bet they WILL be given an advance "heads up". Allowing them to "cash out" before the general UO players knows. Watch and see!

loop · September 2022

But if the New Legacy Shard will get most of its players from the current Production Shards and from Siege/Mugen, players who already have a subscription, this might cause gameplay problems to current UO players remaining to play the Production Shards and Siege/Mugen because not having interest in the New Legacy Shard the way that it was Designed to play out, leaving them to play on Production Shards and on Siege/Mugen which could get further depleted and more deserted of players because spending most of their time, now, on the New Legacy Shard rather then on their home Shards.....

Agreed. New Legacy could very well have a negative impact on the game if there is no significant influx of new revenue and if the resources spent on its development come at the expense of players who are not interested in it. If the server fails, the team's best hopes is that they simply shut the server down "no harm, no foul", but I doubt they could so in that fashion.

I may be overblowing things, but New Legacy is a fairly important development in Broadsword's oversight of the game. If you were to take the official servers side by side with the most popular private server and just focus on the optics -- the website, the experience of initially downloading the client, setting up your account, visibility on social media and streaming platforms, the updates and roadmap, the supported client applications -- not even getting into the interesting debates that can be had on the game's systems (Felucca vs Trammel, Age of Shadows vs Renaissance vs Second Age) -- it would be hard to argue that the future of UO is in Broadsword's hands. New Legacy helps make the case, though.

We should also recognize that niche game doesn't need a super large population. Hell, subscription-based games don't even need an active population. Broadsword can have it both ways: New Legacy can be an engine to attract new players, but it can be a platform for an alternative business model that doesn't disturb the existing servers. What I hope is that Broadsword doesn't fall victim to the unfortunate trends we see among MMOs -- compartmentalized experiences, exploitative microtransactions, to name a few. UO is still the best MMO, and it's always been a vanguard of interesting ideas.

McDougle · September 2022

It's 25 years the gaming world is interested and paying attention why haven't we seen one interview with mesanne??

loop · September 2022

McDougle said:

No one else notices or finds odd the complete lack of mention or updates on NL...

I don't blame the team for not giving an update on New Legacy. There is no benefit to offering "we have nothing to show right now". If anything, they would likely be heckled and bashed.

I think the gaming industry is unique among the tech world in that we expect development teams to interface directly with customers, but these interactions require training in community relations. I've literally seen people on this forum who have no visibility into the codebase or architecture follow up their demands with "it's just an if-check" or "you just write a SQL query". As a software developer myself, I would have little patience for this.

What I do fault the team for is not getting ahead of things and hiring someone to manage community expectations, develop roadmaps, and share media. When you post a screenshot of UO on any gaming subreddit, it immediately generates a ton of chatter. Right now there certainly is a gap in communication.

McDougle · September 2022

loop said:

McDougle said:

No one else notices or finds odd the complete lack of mention or updates on NL...

I don't blame the team for not giving an update on New Legacy. There is no benefit to offering "we have nothing to show right now". If anything, they would likely be heckled and bashed.

I think the gaming industry is unique among the tech world in that we expect development teams to interface directly with customers, but these interactions require training in community relations. I've literally seen people on this forum who have no visibility into the codebase or architecture follow up their demands with "it's just an if-check" or "you just write a SQL query". As a software developer myself, I would have little patience for this.

What I do fault the team for is not getting ahead of things and hiring someone to manage community expectations, develop roadmaps, and share media. When you post a screenshot of UO on any gaming subreddit, it immediately generates a ton of chatter. Right now there certainly is a gap in communication.

JohnKnighthawke · September 2022

loop said:

we shouldn't determine the success of updates based solely on their impact to subscription numbers.

Umm.....UO is a business. It's here to make money for EA. The fact that we enjoy it is just sort of a means to an end. And besides, in this kind of context what's "better" is pretty subjective. The PKs and their friends loved the old game. But there weren't enough of them to make it successful that way.

loop · September 2022

JohnKnighthawke said:

loop said:

we shouldn't determine the success of updates based solely on their impact to subscription numbers.

Umm.....UO is a business. It's here to make money for EA. The fact that we enjoy it is just sort of a means to an end. And besides, in this kind of context what's "better" is pretty subjective. The PKs and their friends loved the old game. But there weren't enough of them to make it successful that way.

Thanks -- I understand this perspective but disagree with it, even while I think Trammel was beneficial to the game from a user and business perspective. Changes to subscription-based services can increase clientele in the short term but have detrimental impacts in the long term, and viewing software development in a Machiavellian, purely output-driven way means you might as well just be mimicking the most popular model of the day. The predatory systems I see in more popular MMOs are models that should not be emulated, and I would not want to see them in UO.

I really don't think you're playing a 25-year-old MMO because it's a means to an end. I think you play it because it has a magic unlike any other game. I concur that UO is a business, but the revenue it generates for EA amounts to pennies in the grand scheme of things.

popps · September 2022

JohnKnighthawke said:

loop said:

we shouldn't determine the success of updates based solely on their impact to subscription numbers.

Umm.....UO is a business. It's here to make money for EA. The fact that we enjoy it is just sort of a means to an end. And besides, in this kind of context what's "better" is pretty subjective. The PKs and their friends loved the old game. But there weren't enough of them to make it successful that way.

The PKs and their friends loved the old game. But there weren't enough of them to make it successful that way.

Not only that....

According to a Developer who, to my understanding, was there back then (see my post here https://forum.uo.com/discussion/comment/81606/#Comment_81606 ), it looks like that many PvPers who enjoyed targeting PvE players who were weaker, did not like so much to then end up having to face tougher nuts to crack.... that is, experienced PvPers.... and so also stopped playing...

https://community.crowfall.com/topic/102-gordon-walton-are-you-the-one-who-brought-us-trammel/?tab=comments#comment-1610

The bad: Without the "sheep to shear" the hard core PvP'ers were disenfranchised. They didn't like preying on each other (hard targets versus soft targets), and they became a smaller minority in the overall game. The real bad though was that the intensity and "realness" of the game for all players was diminished. This was the major unintended consequence.

Urge · September 2022

My honest opinion is that Tram helped and hurt the population at the same time. It shielded the population from unwanted pks but also paved the way for all the afk farming we see today. With the lack of support there almost isn't a downside to hitting that macro and doing something else.

The biggest thing in my mind that hurt UO was going from that simple game to what it is today with all the needed items, funky mechanics you almost need a doctorate degree to decypher and total lack of bug fixes. That's why all these pre-insert era freebies are mostly successful. Simple is better.

Yoshi · September 2022

“I hope NL provides a boost to the subscribers.
But I am interested to know why posters here are so interested in NL.
Surely they won’t allow current active subscribers to join it and ruin the experience of new players. It will hopefully be for brand new customers only”

Rorschach · September 2022

Yoshi said:

" ...
Surely they won’t allow current active subscribers to join it and ruin the experience of new players. It will hopefully be for brand new customers only”

How would you manage this? I am certain many current subscribers are looking forward to New Legacy.

popps · September 2022

Urge said:

My honest opinion is that Tram helped and hurt the population at the same time. It shielded the population from unwanted pks but also paved the way for all the afk farming we see today. With the lack of support there almost isn't a downside to hitting that macro and doing something else.

The biggest thing in my mind that hurt UO was going from that simple game to what it is today with all the needed items, funky mechanics you almost need a doctorate degree to decypher and total lack of bug fixes. That's why all these pre-insert era freebies are mostly successful. Simple is better.

Well, I found this from another famous Ultima Online Developer, Raph Koster....

https://www.raphkoster.com/games/interviews-and-panels/live-forum-qa-with-raph-koster-1016/

I do believe in a crime/punishment system. But everything we tried did fall prey to new accounts and killers who just didn’t care. If they have no emotional attachment to losing (e.g., don’t give a shit) then there isn’t any in-game punishment you can offer up. I don’t know if you were around for it, but I tried for a LONG time to get that balance right in SWG. Bounty systems became high score tables. Rewards were claimed by dummy accounts. Most everything we tried became a tool for the bad guys. And the good guys literally had no way to win, because the bad guys could just come back the next day, over and over, and just wear your spirit down.

To my opinion, that is where the problem lays in MMOs that want to "mix" PvP and PvE players in the same one Environment.... their crime/punishment system is not effective.... either players use dummy/disposable accounts, or the punishments associated for being a criminal are too lenient and not sufficient to contain the problem basically, what causes the issue is that these players "e.g., don't give a shit .....".

In order to be able to Design a functional and working (sustainable) common gaming Environment that was to mix PvE players with PvP players, the Design and mechanics associated would need to indeed, make players behaving as criminals in the game, "have to give a shit" for the punishments associated and not be able to just shrug their shoulders caring nothing about those punishments associated to in-game criminal behaviour....

popps · September 2022

Rorschach said:

Yoshi said:

" ...
Surely they won’t allow current active subscribers to join it and ruin the experience of new players. It will hopefully be for brand new customers only”

How would you manage this? I am certain many current subscribers are looking forward to New Legacy.

@Rorschach

Do we realize that, if many current subscribers will join the New Legacy Shard, inevitably, if they will spend their leisure time on the NL Shard, they won't spend any longer much of their playing time on their home Shard....

This will inevitably mean, for those current subscribers NOT interested in the New Legacy Shard and thus continuing to spend their playing time on their Home Shard, that they will have their gameplay further impoverished by lesser players being around on their Home Shards (because they went to the New Legacy Shard...) and, thus, also a poorer and more stagnating economy with less items being bought and less being sold....

Can the New Legacy Shard be limited to only brand new accounts and, thus, customers ?

I do not know.... as well as I do not either know whether it would be more or less beneficial to Ultima Online as a whole to do that....

Notheless, I do worry if a significant number of the current subscribers will spent most if not all of their UO playing time on the New Legacy Shard rather then on their current, Home Shard.... because I worry much that this might further impoverish the playing experience for all of those UO players who will actually remain on the current UO Shards and not migrate to the New Legacy Shard....

Not an easy solution to the problem, me thinks.....

Yoshi · September 2022

Rorschach said:

Yoshi said:

" ...
Surely they won’t allow current active subscribers to join it and ruin the experience of new players. It will hopefully be for brand new customers only”

How would you manage this? I am certain many current subscribers are looking forward to New Legacy.

"From my understanding it's a new shard, they could just make the new shard not accessible to current subscribers, same way they deal with High-seas content etc if you have the expansion you can access this or that, except this way would work in reverse.

There is no business advantage to allowing current subscribers to play NL (not that everything is about money)

If someone wanted to open a new account subscription just to play NL then that's fair game"

dvvid · September 2022

Stop worrying. What is that going to do? People will use both their home shard and NL. How much of each is entirely on them. What are you suggesting? Discontinue NL? Also the suggestion of having it for only new players is absurd.

There are plenty of reasons why people will still be logging into their home shards. Events like the Treasures of events, Halloween, Christmas, champ spawn events, etc will always bring people to their shards, for example.

Yoshi · September 2022

"one of the reasons people left the game is because of the unpleasant people, so what we are left with is generally unpleasant people.

Why you would want to ruin new player's experiences by subjecting them to the unpleasant current player base?

they will log off immediately

let the new players have a fresh new nice experience"

McDougle · September 2022

Yoshi said:

"one of the reasons people left the game is because of the unpleasant people, so what we are left with is generally unpleasant people.

Why you would want to ruin new player's experiences by subjecting them to the unpleasant current player base?

they will log off immediately

let the new players have a fresh new nice experience"

There has been zero advertising how do you feel any new players would even know about it..

Yoshi · September 2022

"i imagine when they have a release date, they might advertise"

Arnold7 · September 2022

Yoshi, think, on my shard anyway, there are many more pleasant and helpful players than jerks. Many already grandparents and my age although not all. But what you said about an unpleasant player base forming on NL is absolutely true. From what I understand one of NL’s goals is to get players into groups, like guilds, and to bring back the days of the guild wars. Think from what I have read here those groups that prey on weaker and experienced players have been around since year one for UO. Think since they are already formed and know how to build templates quickly and how to play together unless UO can find some way to put the brakes on there is a real possibility that they will rule the shard.

Urge · September 2022

Rorschach said:

Yoshi said:

" ...
Surely they won’t allow current active subscribers to join it and ruin the experience of new players. It will hopefully be for brand new customers only”

How would you manage this? I am certain many current subscribers are looking forward to New Legacy.

I was but yearly shard wipe is a major turn off for me.

Lord_Frodo · September 2022

Arnold7 said:

Yoshi, think, on my shard anyway, there are many more pleasant and helpful players than jerks. Many already grandparents and my age although not all. But what you said about an unpleasant player base forming on NL is absolutely true. From what I understand one of NL’s goals is to get players into groups, like guilds, and to bring back the days of the guild wars. Think from what I have read here those groups that prey on weaker and experienced players have been around since year one for UO. Think since they are already formed and know how to build templates quickly and how to play together unless UO can find some way to put the brakes on there is a real possibility that they will rule the shard.

There is suppose to be a PvP switch in NL so everything you said can not happen unless you want it to. Also I have read and listened to everything put out by UO about NL so where are you getting this group thing from.

Arnold7 · September 2022

Have not read everything about NL but last I looked, it looked like this would be a guild oriented shard and that groups would be encouraged to fight one another. PvP would be voluntary but if you wanted to advance you would have to engage in it unless you were going to be a crafts person. That’s the message I got. Could be wrong. Would hope that would be the case. Don’t really plan on playing there. Just don’t have the time commitment so I have not followed it that closely.

Lord_Frodo · September 2022

My 2 cents on NL.
Everybody can play NL, old and new and yes even EJ
Transferring items/char to prodo shard should be for paid accounts only.
All items that can be transferred from NL should be account bound only
Can't wait to play a pre AoS shard where GM Skills meant something.

McDougle · September 2022

Lord_Frodo said:

My 2 cents on NL.
Everybody can play NL, old and new and yes even EJ
Transferring items/char to prodo shard should be for paid accounts only.
All items that can be transferred from NL should be account bound only
Can't wait to play a pre AoS shard where GM Skills meant something.

So will you leave the character there to be wiped cuz if you transfer to a production shard you suddenly have just another under geared under powered character...if you're playing NL you won't have time for the next TOT so you miss out on leet gear that is more and more necessary..

Victim_Of_Siege · September 2022

McDougle said:

Lord_Frodo said:

My 2 cents on NL.
Everybody can play NL, old and new and yes even EJ
Transferring items/char to prodo shard should be for paid accounts only.
All items that can be transferred from NL should be account bound only
Can't wait to play a pre AoS shard where GM Skills meant something.

So will you leave the character there to be wiped cuz if you transfer to a production shard you suddenly have just another under geared under powered character...if you're playing NL you won't have time for the next TOT so you miss out on leet gear that is more and more necessary..

and so begins phase two, getting said character geared and ready for a normal shard.

Howdy, Stranger!

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Best Game Ever - Ultima Online Legacy

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