Devs...why do you all keep flipping the bird at the casual players?

[Esus]

Seariously, WTF? Why is that the drop rates are so low? Are you guys finally turning your backs on the casual players, or is the constant nagging from the self proclaimed "hardcore players" really that bad? Do you really want to start the whole farming the boss trend to start all over again? Where the party just kills the boss, quits the game, and remakes, just to repeat the process? How can you guys claim to have developed this game for the casual and hardcore, while having players need to spend countless hours grinding for anything worth keeping? Every time a new client update is released and the drop rates have been nurffed, you are turning your backs on the casual gamers that much more...

[Pvp King]

really i hate the drop rates. i spend most of my time pvping once i get my gear and now i got to fight for it for days now because i have little or not enough money to buy more then one peace.

[flaimdude]

It's called Skeller Crunch. ;) If you're that much of a casual player, you won't mind playing lower levels and not level up as fast.

[Esus]

Flaming...shut up you troll, you hardly even play the game... ;P

[flaimdude]

Flaming...shut up you troll, you hardly even play the game.

And how is this helping your cause? And guess what, I AM more of a casual player, so it's me you're "arguing for", and I'm happy with the drop rates.

[Esus]

I'd like to think that Im speaking for the other casual players other than yourself that aren't on the fourms.

[PvP]

Seariously, WTF? Why is that the drop rates are so low? Are you guys finally turning your backs on the casual players, or is the constant nagging from the self proclaimed "hardcore players" really that bad? Do you really want to start the whole farming the boss trend to start all over again? Where the party just kills the boss, quits the game, and remakes, just to repeat the process? How can you guys claim to have developed this game for the casual and hardcore, while having players need to spend countless hours grinding for anything worth keeping? Every time a new client update is released and the drop rates have been nurffed, you are turning your backs on the casual gamers that much more...

I know what you mean but....If you're a casual player I'm assuming you will max out your character. If you max out your character you will still get a few pinks. 40-45 should leave you with a decent amount of pinks, unless you EXP farm and leave. You can trade these pinks for ones you might want, or sell them for cash to buy the ones you want. This should be okay for casual players. The hardcore players on the other hand will over-farm the bosses and make profit + get the pinks they want to move on with. I like it the way it is, but I can't make everyone agree with me. I don't think pinks should drop like candy.

[Furrawn]

Flaim, c'mon...
Be nice...
There are a lot of good players who don't want to just live in skeller. It's much too easy to get pinks & purples there.
I think this whole "Elite few vs Casual Trash Many" is old, tiresome, and unfair.

Casual is someone who plays a few times a week...

A lot of us are on daily- just not as much as the elite few.

Is there really no middle ground?

[Esus]

No t saying pinks should drop like rain, but then again there should be no reason for players to play 5 hours or more just to see a single pink drop that they might not even be able to use. And with such low rates, everyone will be charging over 100k gold for any pink item, and that's just way too much gold, once again it limits the joy for casual players who have neither the time or gold to get the items they want, meaning what the title says, the casual player gets screwed over again.

[Jstizar]

Flaim, c'mon...
Be nice...
There are a lot of good players who don't want to just live in skeller. It's much too easy to get pinks & purples there.
I think this whole "Elite few vs Casual Trash Many" is old, tiresome, and unfair.

Casual is someone who plays a few times a week...

A lot of us are on daily- just not as much as the elite few.

Is there really no middle ground?

Your posts are always so well put together....:D

[PvP]

No t saying pinks should drop like rain, but then again there should be no reason for players to play 5 hours or more just to see a single pink drop that they might not even be able to use. And with such low rates, everyone will be charging over 100k gold for any pink item, and that's just way too much gold, once again it limits the joy for casual players who have neither the time or gold to get the items they want, meaning what the title says, the casual player gets screwed over again.

No offence to you Esus, I like all this feedback BUT I think the casual player should stick with casual purple armor and since he only plays every now and then why would it make sense that he has the best armor? I would be dissapointed if in the future when we have level 100s that play 3 hours a week have the best armor and weapons in the game and so does everyone else. We need some kind of border line and I feel like the border line is drawn between the casual and the extreme. If they were both smooshed together everyone would have great stuff. Maybe 100k is over priced, but then again not everyone will charge that. Its easy to find a seller who will sell general decent pinks for 10-20k a pop. In that scenario it seems like the casual player gets the casual rewards he's earned.

[Cascade]

No t saying pinks should drop like rain, but then again there should be no reason for players to play 5 hours or more just to see a single pink drop that they might not even be able to use. And with such low rates, everyone will be charging over 100k gold for any pink item, and that's just way too much gold, once again it limits the joy for casual players who have neither the time or gold to get the items they want, meaning what the title says, the casual player gets screwed over again.

The devs can't please everyone. If they are going to nerf something why not nerf the person who is flaming. Be happy that you even have AO2 the devs have been working their butts off so don't let them down with all that freaking trash talk.

[Furrawn]

Jstizar~
If that's a compliment, Thanks:)
If not, I'll try to improve:)

[Kingofthebear]

Sigh, you can't please anyone. lol

[bmc85uk]

I've played through about 7 or 8 levels now and I've seen 6 pinks drop so far, as far as I'm concerned, that's about right. And as a casual player you shouldn't expect to have the best items in the game so easily, there has to be some reward for people who play more.

[Druc]

The devs can't please everyone. If they are going to nerf something why not nerf the person who is flaming. Be happy that you even have AO2 the devs have been working their butts off so don't let them down with all that freaking trash talk.

Cascade, for someone that doesn't play, someone that isn't even going to BUY the campaign, and as much as you have a voice and allowed to share it; Leave this to those that know what they are talking about. Just because someone says something bad about the game doesn't make it a flame or hate, they are expressing their concern and sharing feedback on how they feel and hopefully the Devs will not only see what Esus has to say, but the people sharing the same view.

This isn't flaming or trash talk at all, it's actually completely true. I'm on Esus and team's side on this. this is a casual game, anything that only plays on a two hour battery charge (even when plugged in) is a casual game and really should be targeted towards the casual player. Pinks should not be un-attainable and reserved only for those that are able to devote their life to the game.

I myself play a solid 2 hours a day, have a couple 40's and some gold. I still don't consider myself a 'hardcore' player. I have a full-time job and although yes, it allows me to be on the boards for most of the day, I'm still not playing but being a part of the community.

When I'm off work, I want sit back, play a bit with friends/guildmates and level up/collect gear....who doesn't want to do that?! Who doesn't want to achieve something and collect the 'best' even when they casually play a game on their iPhone? This isn't WoW folks, it never will be, and if you want to be hardcore and complain that pinks should be out of the reach of casual players like the Epics in WoW I do see your point as that's the hardcore mentality. But we're not all <20 year olds here and have something other then the game, but we do want to use it as an escape every so often. I can see folk leaving for this reason as it's 'too hard' to play and gear up when the 'hardcore' players are running around them bragging and trying to sell them something for more gold then they've seen in their existence of playing...

Just my two bits...

[ed anger]

I know what you mean but....If you're a casual player I'm assuming you will max out your character. If you max out your character you will still get a few pinks. 40-45 should leave you with a decent amount of pinks, unless you EXP farm and leave. You can trade these pinks for ones you might want, or sell them for cash to buy the ones you want. This should be okay for casual players. The hardcore players on the other hand will over-farm the bosses and make profit + get the pinks they want to move on with. I like it the way it is, but I can't make everyone agree with me. I don't think pinks should drop like candy.

completely agree with this.

[bmc85uk]

The devs are aiming this game at both casual and hardcore players, hardcore players simply wont want to play a game where casual players find it easy to get the same gear. If you make pinks easy for casual people to get and don't put in another grade of item, you're basically excluding hardcore players from your audience. I'm not saying that items should be as hard to get as epic items in other MMO's, I have no interest in weeks of farming/camping bosses/quests hunched over a tiny 2 inch screen, but after a few weeks of maybe a couple of hours a day, I want to be satisfied when I finally get/trade for that last piece i've been looking for. And if people want to spend hour after hour of farming to achieve the same in under a week, then great, let them.

When I first downloaded PL I played pretty much non stop for a week, got to 40 and didn't bother playing because I wasn't interested in how easy it was to get the loot, after they changed it for AO1 it became as bad if not worse than the original campaigns and so I stopped playing again straight away. Now with AO2 I've played a few hours at most and seen about 6-7 pinks drop, some of which I can't wait to get my hands on, knowing that the droprate seems good enough for me to see that many in a short time has sparked my interest back up to a level where I don't want to put the game down anymore.

In my ideal world, I'd either leave the droprates as they are, or add another grade of item as a substitute for the 'Legendary' loot that everyone has now come to expect.

[Jstizar]

Jstizar~
If that's a compliment, Thanks:)
If not, I'll try to improve:)

hahahaha, it is a compliment. Not that I stalk your posts but whenever I see them they are to convey something and usually not spam or flaming.

[King Richie]

In a perfect world a pink should have a 10% drop rate meaning 1 drops per 10 bosses =) that would be nice !

[Mahk]

Good points on both sides, really. Can't wait to get home and try AO2....

For my 2 cents, low drop rates. Even though I LOVE having awesome stuff, I like even more playing these types of games, and going after the good gear is just one more reason to play....

I played WoW from Day One for a year solid, Shadowbane before that, simply had to quit I was so addicted. I was nowhere near my elite gear at that point, there was always something else out there I wanted to get. Ran some of the instances 2-3 times a night for several weeks trying to get the right drop, to never attain it.... (ahh, skin of The Beast, how i hate you to this day!)

And yet, my gear was good enough to get by just fine. If you can take a full party into Swamps with all greens and oranges, and maybe one or two pink or purples total ... this game is just fine.

As I said in another post -- when an elite, hardcore player deigns to join your party all tricked out in full pink gear, it should make a noticable difference.

"When everyone is special, then no one is." -Syndrome

[Azrael]

Seariously, WTF? Why is that the drop rates are so low? Are you guys finally turning your backs on the casual players, or is the constant nagging from the self proclaimed "hardcore players" really that bad? Do you really want to start the whole farming the boss trend to start all over again? Where the party just kills the boss, quits the game, and remakes, just to repeat the process? How can you guys claim to have developed this game for the casual and hardcore, while having players need to spend countless hours grinding for anything worth keeping? Every time a new client update is released and the drop rates have been nurffed, you are turning your backs on the casual gamers that much more...

This post is below you Esus.

The drop rates for once are very good. And even if they have to tweak them a little bit, its much better that they start low on the first day rather than start too high and completely ruin the economy and deprive players of any reason to play.
This game is ONLY for casual players. There is NOTHING for hardcore players to do after the first 2 days of a patch release. Hopefully keeping the drop rates where they are will allow us to get atleast a week out of the campaign.
I don't mind complaining, but this is just wrong.

[Cascade]

Hopefully quests will keep hardcore players busy when they come out.

[flaimdude]

Hopefully quests will keep hardcore players busy when they come out.

I'm sure the devs will make easy quests and hard quests. :)

[Furrawn]

Cascade, for someone that doesn't play, someone that isn't even going to BUY the campaign, and as much as you have a voice and allowed to share it; Leave this to those that know what they are talking about. Just because someone says something bad about the game doesn't make it a flame or hate, they are expressing their concern and sharing feedback on how they feel and hopefully the Devs will not only see what Esus has to say, but the people sharing the same view.

This isn't flaming or trash talk at all, it's actually completely true. I'm on Esus and team's side on this. this is a casual game, anything that only plays on a two hour battery charge (even when plugged in) is a casual game and really should be targeted towards the casual player. Pinks should not be un-attainable and reserved only for those that are able to devote their life to the game.

I myself play a solid 2 hours a day, have a couple 40's and some gold. I still don't consider myself a 'hardcore' player. I have a full-time job and although yes, it allows me to be on the boards for most of the day, I'm still not playing but being a part of the community.

When I'm off work, I want sit back, play a bit with friends/guildmates and level up/collect gear....who doesn't want to do that?! Who doesn't want to achieve something and collect the 'best' even when they casually play a game on their iPhone? This isn't WoW folks, it never will be, and if you want to be hardcore and complain that pinks should be out of the reach of casual players like the Epics in WoW I do see your point as that's the hardcore mentality. But we're not all <20 year olds here and have something other then the game, but we do want to use it as an escape every so often. I can see folk leaving for this reason as it's 'too hard' to play and gear up when the 'hardcore' players are running around them bragging and trying to sell them something for more gold then they've seen in their existence of playing...

Just my two bits...

I love you, Druc...
Along w Charlie & Claire:)

Thank you for speaking so eloquently and comprehensively.
If the devs just read ur post, I'll be happy.

Justizar- thank you:)

King Richie- I agree.

[tjornan]

Im in the elite few group! :)

[vulgarstrike]

yeah think about this.. if you're a casual player, you don't use pinks. pinks are for those who truly play a lot. I mean, if everyone in the world had a lamborghini, even hobos, what would be the point? some drive Mercedes (purps), some drive Lexus(orange), some drive the Honda (green), some drive Chevies(white) and some people don't work overtime so they get exactly what they worked for. I mean, if you're a casual player you can't really be whining about pinks, or you'd be a lazy hardcore pplayer. it's one side or the other. also, you have to realize the core of every developing teams fan base lies within the hardcore players. pl has casual and hardcore alike, and you get what you paid and played for.

[bmc85uk]

Bah, you are so full of it you know that?! Lanborghinis have like, a 50% drop rate, I have a full set of Lamborghinis of Thoth that have so much fuel regen the police cant even catch me, now I'm so bored with life I'm just gonna kill myself.

[Staffed]

although i have to say that i do like the smaller drop rates. i dont think that the game is as fun when everyone has everything.