Excelsior

My dear friends I love the shard and though as I now have a baby daughter I don’t get to play much anymore I greatly enjoying doing so when I am able. We all have ideas that we think would make our world more enjoyable, some rather hair-brained some rather good but we all know this is +C’s world and as such what god codes in is what we receive. Thunder dome is new to me and it pretty cool, think items fall away to fast but that’s a small thing. If it pleases the court id like to make a suggestion, and hear what my fellow surfs (I mean players) think of it.

If we had something like the thunder dome where huge bosses spawn without loot or tokens or weapons experience, only reward being the fun of killing it. I think it would prove to foster more of a team aspect option to the game. IMO proxy or kronos are one of the badest bosses in game, the other peerless bosses offer no need to band together atall. Lady M can be farmed by someone with young still in there tidal and grizz I can kill with an unleveled bow without the need for Band-Aids or spells (other than chiv offensive ones ; ). You’re supposed to be able to spawn “super” Proxy but last I tried it didn’t work.

What I’m getting at is if we had a place where you maybe had to pay to get-into (if we’re still looking for gold sinks) that had a boss that even Archey can’t kill alone. Maybe rotate the rules on a monthly basis (ie. No pets this month next month ok, use this armor GMs supply this month next use your own ect) that you could only get into as a group or maybe you can try to solo and let the world hear the gongs.

I used to farm proxy because it was fun to have a challenge, not because I got any real loot from him, is still do kronos each chance I get because it’s a rare chance that ppl work together it’s just fun (lord knows I don’t need another 110 fencing). Id like to hear what you all have to think on this, I dought it will happen because even a triple champ blast still requires a lot of codeing and this would be even more but hey maybe if the group comes up with a great idea it may happen….
Nick

*Shrug* I am dead cold on those kinds of things don't assume it is a bad idea, it just not me.

Some things that were worked on in the Early osi.uo Designer Dragon days.

1) Evolve the Local ecology. If the people did not keep an area clear, then Rats would turn to Ratmen to Trolls, to Ogres, Dragons etc. This was both a mob evolution as well as a quantity evolution. Once you cleared the space out, well then the Peace Loving Sheep, Goats, Hines, Cows etc could return.

2) Spell casting Mobs can, Oh My God, Teleport around and even onto Boats and House Patios. This was actually put into and lasted maybe all of one week, before the general uo population was crying very very very loudly to have it stopped.

Some things that were tried, left in, and I do NOT like:

1) Dungeons that you can not teleport out and/ir into. If a Dungeon has anything of value and this is implemented, then what tends to happen is Boss, tough mobs hang out ant the entrance. Only the very best equipped players tend to be able to survive this issue, meaning those that can benefit the most from the "good stuff" cant get into it.

2) Long Term spawn, "BOSS" mobs that drop really really good stuff. People leave spy cams (dead people) to monitor the spawn. Or in the case of PvP monitor the activities of "the enemy". This tends to produce monopolistic groups that gain the really really really good stuff, then filter it down to others at economy busting prices.

Evolving the ecology might have been possible on OSI servers, which had the financial and hardware power to actually pull it off. On EX, where we fight lag daily if not every second, adding a ton of additional computations would *not* get things running more smoothly.
And on a side note - not that many people hunt in the wilderness, I assume it'd be only a few cycles before we'd get all the facets filled with wandering Ancient Wyrms (Paragon where applicable).

The down fall to the evolving ecology was the lag, I suspect that what this shard is running on may in many ways be far more powerful than the original uo.

The lag was for the reasons you stated, in the end, The Mobs Came but the Players didn't. Which oddly enough questioned why are all those mobs just standing out there playing cards or what ever it is they do until we show up.

Nick wrote:What I’m getting at is if we had a place where you maybe had to pay to get-into (if we’re still looking for gold sinks) that had a boss that even Archey can’t kill alone. Maybe rotate the rules on a monthly basis (ie. No pets this month next month ok, use this armor GMs supply this month next use your own ect) that you could only get into as a group or maybe you can try to solo and let the world hear the gongs.

I did suggested a while ago for a dungeon that you will need to pay an admission fee, but it was pretty much put down cause people were saying that they wouldn't pay to get killed... and you do need to pay an entry fee to get into the Thunderdome

Anyways... I totally think that it will be a neat idea to take an existing dungeon and put a harder mob in there. There are a lot of dungeons that are not 100% totally utilized. Whether they want to charge for admission is up to the boss, it will be a neat place to gang up together to defeat evil. Like you, I don't even think that it's necessary for the mob to drop any super duper "arti" or "lotsa moola".. perhaps it should drop like a deco deed or a 50 Luck Deed (stackable pretty pls)... I don't know. Reason why, is because if it drops high end items then you will have the other players that are not relayered or do not have above average gear and will start complaining, ranting, threatening, <insert your negative adjective here>, etc.... because they are excluded from the fun and then most vets will control the market on those high end items. We don't need more drama...

As of now, most vets will hang around Wrong Fel, Umbris Camp, and Sgail... other than the events done by +N & +V (which btw thank you very much! you guys are awesome) there are no other group activities that you can do as a group. Can we have another town invasion soon? The last one was pretty awesome which basically rewarded all type of random ps's, but the most amazing part was that we all of Excelsior worked together as a bunch of angry mob.

Another thing to consider is... make the dungeon too soft, higher end players will get bored... make it too hard newer players will not enjoy being one hit kill again and again. All am saying is for the new players to look at it as if it's a challenge... same thing when I started, I told to myself that one day I will be able to raid umbris camp on my own without pets, so... mission accomplished!