Issues with the game; a constructive breakdown.

[BananaHead]

I'm considering leaving this game forever. I don't want to, per se, but it feels as though the game is fighting against me; every second that I am logged in, it fights harder for me to logout and never return. The general experience is quite an unpleasant one - there are many issues, some of them lingering since launch, and a lot of them either caused by or perpetuated by NCWest.

 

This is not a whine post, or a hate thread, so please do not respond here if you are blindsided by absolute righteousness - this is where we apply logic, rationale, and constructive criticism to encourage NCWest to support the game as they should do, not as they currently are. Here I will be outlining some very glaring issues with the game. Constructive criticism of the game and all its issues is welcome here.

 

Firstly, we have the main in-game social issues: Almost all of these issues have very simple solutions and can be solved relatively easily; the alienation of individuals with subjectively 'low' attack power (1),  progression and economy relative to the rate of content updates (2), the large amount of bots intruding the most played aspects of the game (3).

--

1. The alienation of individuals with subjectively 'low' attack power.
The cause for this alienation is seemingly the increase in HP that NCWest applied to our version of the game, supposedly due to complaints in Beta that the content was too easy. The problem is the enrage timer - technically, all of the heroic dungeons have weapon requirements, and all of these requirements were implemented with purpose by NCSoft Korea. That is to say, they are enough for the dungeon they are the minimum requirement for - before the increase in HP by NCWest. NCWest, however, increased boss' HP without adjusting the minimum required weapon, and without adjusting the enrage timer in accordance with the increase in HP.

 

What this means? This means that the weapon requirements on heroic dungeons are too low and those meeting the requirements are not enough to beat the enrage timer, or that the increase in HP was too high and that the required weapon would be enough to beat the enrage timer if it weren't for the increased HP. As a result, players are being bullied and excluded from running certain heroic dungeons, making the experience for these players a very negative one. This hinders their progression by disallowing them access to quests and materials that earn the most gold, thus not allowing them to upgrade their gear and actually run these dungeons - an endless cycle - decreasing the likelihood of them continuing to play the game.

 

Solution: Either revert the HP values back to the original Korean ones and allow the social dynamic to revert to its intended design, or increase the weapon requirement to match the increased HP. However, increasing the weapon requirement will cause another issue to occur. It will keep undergeared players behind an eternal wall of catch up. Meaning, if they weren't there at launch, they will never get to current endgame because they will always be stuck behind a method of earning less gold. You could say they would be eternally trapped in outdated content, and stuck in that content's state of economy.

--

2. Progression and economy relative to the rate of content updates.
The release schedule for the content updates seems to have been put into place without making changes to the game's trading system to make up for the time not available, that other regions had in-between such updates. So, although the speed at which we are receiving updates is no issue whatsoever (more content is good), NCWest not making the necessary changes to accomodate the little time we have to catch up between these updates is a problem.

 

What this means? This means that the initial crafting time limits, and the average resource gathering time were designed for long periods without new content updates. NCWest should have reduced such limits on crafting to create the time-equivalent in the shorter period of time we have to 'catch up'.

 

Solution: Let's say Korea received Silverfrost one year after launch of their vanilla client (example, not fact), and we received Silverfrost two months after launch of our vanilla client. We recived Silverfrost about 83-84% sooner than they did. Therefore, the time we had to craft and gather, to upgrade, to catch up, was 83-84% less. The limits on crafting should have been shortened by 83-84% to make it time-equivalent. The drops on materials should have been increased by 83-84% to match that time-equivalent.

 

This would have produced a healthy economy. Not the game of 'catch up or be left behind forever' that we're playing now.

--

3. The large amount of bots intruding the most played aspects of the game.
It started with premium bots, farming PvE content in huge numbers for copper. Then it was Wheel of Fate essences and weapons. Next it was daily quests, Arena for Soulstones and dungeon farming for Moonwater Tears and Merry Potters Recipe. Now we have Soulstone Plains and Awakened Necropolis, on top of the old methods. The only exception to this is Arena.

 

So why are there so many bots? Well, to begin with, bots will always exist, they are in every other region's servers too, however, not to the intrusive extent that they are in ours and at a much smaller number.

 

So why is it different for us? Mainly the economy. It is highly likely that the solutions in the previous two points above would result in much less bots. No solution could ever make it impossible for bots without making it impossible for players too, so there will always be bots, but reducing the number is a simple task and after achieving that goal, the next task is secluding the bots to an aspect of the game that players do not care for.

 

Solution: Fix progression. Fix trade. Fix  the economy. And people won't feel pressured to buy cheap gold from external websites.

--

Those are the three main issues. Next up, I have some personal issues that some may agree with, some may not. However, this is simply a warning that there may be a bit of anger, a bit of disappointment in the following words.

 

NCWest and its communication:
The way NCSoft communicate with us, even directly through the forums, is very disconnected. Like at the beginning when Julianne used to be in the livestreams. She would respond to concerns, without actually responding to them. She showed such little care, and when she was called out on it by the community, she conveniently disappeared from the stream. This seems to be the pattern with the whole company, issues seem to be ignored and brushed off, and when they are responded to, they aren't actually responded to. It's as though you're talking at us, not to us. Are we even here? Is this real life?

 

A recent example of this is Hime responding to the thread for the removal of Gameguard. She was probably not the right person to respond to such an issue. And this leads me to...

 

Gameguard: In the West, is not an acceptable application, and has not been for many years. There is even a stigma attached to any company using it. NCSoft is seen as cheap, ignorant, and non-caring for their customers simply as a byproduct of using Gameguard. Keeping it enabled is nothing short of suicide.

 

Personally, my game stutters every few seconds when Gameguard is enabled. And so far the pattern has been Gameguard disabled>bad performance but no stutters>Gameguard enabled>bad performance and constant stutters. The game runs bad generally, but Gameguard makes it almost unplayable, completely ruining the experience for me.

 

Bots bypass it. Hackers bypass it. Google 'antigg.dll', it's not difficult to bypass at all. Anybody who wants to can with no effort at all. So everybody with malicious intent, like hacking, botting, or even the not so malicious, like modding, don't even deal with Gameguard - they just bypass it. Your legitimate users on the other hand, are suffering bad performance because of Gameguard, and yet you refuse to disable it, despite the fact that hackers bypass it, botters bypass it, and even modders bypass it. The people you're trying to target with it are not even affected by it. It's having a detrimental impact on the legitimate paying users, and you have people like Hime, fueling the fire with that disconnected response again.

 

And finally...

 

The way content is released:
The way NCWest is releasing content seems to be based on when that same content was released in other regions, rather than how much content there is to release. I think that is quite odd. I don't really know what to propose for this, especially with all the issues the game suffers from right now. I will say that, if the main two points were applied, a more practical release schedule would have been Warlock and Bloodshade at release. Mushin floors 1-8 and Naryu with legendary weapon in the following patch. Then Silverfrost, including part two with chapters 33-38 of the story, Chi Master, Cold Storage, Sundered Nexus, and the Floating Alter.

 

Chi Master for instance; surely it would have been more practical to have released that in the Silverfrost update. With the current concerns and issues, rerolling a new class is not many peoples' priority. As it stands it is the least played class in the other regions. I think those who want to play a new class have already reserved themselves to it. And the later you release it, the less likely they are to play the game now.

 

Closing notes:
Overall, my experience up to now on EU has been a mish-mosh of unpleasantness. I was one of the first to reach True Pirate (without use of the Currency Exchange) and True Siren Accessories. I was doing 4-man Bloodshade Harbor while everybody else was stuck at Profane. I feel as though the game offers not much reward for anything.

 

On the other regions' servers, it always feels like I have something to do, or something to aim for, that I enjoy doing. There are plenty of costumes, and many unique ones to do different dungeons for. There is a legendary weapon that I can invest into, have fun using, and be proud of having full stop, and with it I can solo dungeons for achievements and even rare drops. There is the new 24-man turtle instance. There is 6 vs 6 PvP, like Arathi basin. There is Arena with all current classes available (Chi Master), and the most recent balance patches, so everybody is able to perform to their full potential. There are skills to unlock that aren't even released here yet. There are more Mushin floors to enjoy (I've always loved that tower), and dungeons, so many dungeons.

 

On Chinese and Taiwan servers, there is no rush to catch up. Everybody (new characters and alts included) can basically get to a gear 'standard' in a short space of time that allows them to do most dungeons without issue, and this is due to numerous differences in how they handle their versions as opposed to NCWest.

 

NCWest's version of Blade & Soul is objectively speaking, crap. It's actually disappointing to see a game I love have its potential ruined like this.

 

Blade & Soul from its first reveal years ago has been a highly anticipated game, and has grown to success in every region that it has released in so far, including our own. If the financial earnings report is anything to go by, Blade & Soul seems to be the second highest earner to Lineage, so it isn't going anywhere soon, as long as there is some core playerbase that keeps spending money on it, just like Lineage.

 

If it's gonna be here for a while, at least take care of it NCWest. Don't make the experience a crappy one for the playerbase. Disable Gameguard. Fix progression. Fix the economy. Get all the classes released and the balance patches out. And give us content to do.

 

I really hope you sort the issues out NCWest.

 

/end

[YukiNagato]

Problem #1 and #2 are tied together and both are a consequence of new content released too fast. Given that I like diversity and I was leveling up different alts with no issue prior the 50 patch, after it I lost all interests in this game due to the flat insane costs of upgrades, unless you start with p2w and buy gold/mats with ncoins.

 

A game can't be a second job.

[NekoNekoChan]

fear of private servers and total greed of NCSOFT, combined with a poor management, were the ruin for the BNS Na /Eu, your know it will be ereased, but it is the reality that I and my friends had,  after china's BNS source code was leaked, i tried a high rate private server, i found some bots in the beginning, of course,  but already at level +30 was rare to see a bot in the chat because they knew that only will sell gold and novice players because they were not familiar with the loot changes on the game, I was in a situation like the other few online players on that server, different Na server we had money and leftover material lacked only level to upgrade itens,really fun,  went up to 50 in a week but could evolve totally my equipment, i never see before how FM are strongest  full upgraded, just getting necessary run for  a better bopae (full crit) the fun was great i wasted 6hrs or more playing, divertinto me in pvp without spam the chat and really feeling strong and happy, as I had never felt here in Na, after this i really never more wanna back here or support this game(Na), including i donated $ 100 on that private to buy some clothes to help the server.

[Bennett]

1 hour ago, BananaHead said:

-snip-

Can I marry you?

[Nilkemios]

While there are more problems, the ones the OP mentions are valid and have a significant impact (especially Gameguard and their stubborn refusal to just remove it).

[Raiya]

Yeah the OP has hit the nail in the head big time on this expecially the gameguard debacle atm which NEEDS to go before this causes significant damage.

As for the economy we could use some adjustments to make it easier to upgrade past true profane it gets much harder after lvl40 or so to keep your weapon up to date because of the costs involved expecially soulstones and enchant stones.

[Eimi]

The boss hp increase has been many a times stated to be balancing the content for our current version skill and gear updates.

Everyone i've seen so far who's experienced the content when it was first released agrees that players are significantly more powerful in the current game build.

 

The issue seems to be more that people are expecting to skip trough content and run anything they want, disregarding their actual ability to do so.

[Lacy]

1 hour ago, BananaHead said:

1 hour ago, BananaHead said:

I'm considering leaving this game forever. I don't want to, per se, but it feels as though the game is fighting against me; every second that I am logged in, it fights harder for me to logout and never return. The general experience is quite an unpleasant one - there are many issues, some of them lingering since launch, and a lot of them either caused by or perpetuated by NCWest.

*snip*

Well said.  This is a great start, but to be truthful, it barely scratches the surface.  NCSoft is guilty of profound ignorance and greed.  Being great in a few areas and a complete failure in every other aspect does not make for a good game.

[Sennen]

Sure, Bots can be annoying.   Speed hackers, frustrating.    (Seriously, lets give people masks to hide behind and weapons capable of AoE 2-shotting groups. Sure you can' r-click and report but gl seeing that person gone.  Even if you submit full support tickets with video/images it can take a week before they are gone).   Gameguard is effectivly useless.  (Google 'how to defeat gamegaurd' and in the first 2 pages you'll find full videos and tutorials)

 

But the thing that gets me the most worried about this game is the quality and almost complete lack of communication between the company and the community.  The OP hit on some of the major things, but basically it doesn't exist.  There is no frequent back and forth.  No visible plan or direction for the community to get behind.  All issues are responded to with the same boilerplate "we are working on it" or "please wait" or other non-answer answers without any meaningful explanation.  Pull up the dev tracker and its almost entirely notices about maint, tech support or closing threads.  Its almost as if NCWest doesn't seem to want to have any sort of relationship with the community.   Of course I'd imagine they'd say otherwise, but that doesn't mean a thing to most people if there isn't something to back the assertion up.

[Fufia]

I agree game have lots of problems like bots bad EU serve GG (i dont have problems with gg but lots ppl have) and bad NCS communication

But when ppl asks for fast stuff i cant agree! Yes farme max gear is boring but shit if you get gear fast what you go do next? End game is boring you go arena all day kill bots (have fun) same for new content yes is nice but ppl go get boring faster.

I like play MMO for years and i dont see me play this serve for years (i get more fun play in RU serve than i get here so far)

[Bumlife]

17 hours ago, BananaHead said:

I'm considering leaving this game forever. I don't want to, per se, but it feels as though the game is fighting against me; every second that I am logged in, it fights harder for me to logout and never return. The general experience is quite an unpleasant one - there are many issues, some of them lingering since launch, and a lot of them either caused by or perpetuated by NCWest.

 

This is not a whine post, or a hate thread, so please do not respond here if you are blindsided by absolute righteousness - this is where we apply logic, rationale, and constructive criticism to encourage NCWest to support the game as they should do, not as they currently are. Here I will be outlining some very glaring issues with the game. Constructive criticism of the game and all its issues is welcome here.

 

Firstly, we have the main in-game social issues: Almost all of these issues have very simple solutions and can be solved relatively easily; the alienation of individuals with subjectively 'low' attack power (1),  progression and economy relative to the rate of content updates (2), the large amount of bots intruding the most played aspects of the game (3).

--

1. The alienation of individuals with subjectively 'low' attack power.
The cause for this alienation is seemingly the increase in HP that NCWest applied to our version of the game, supposedly due to complaints in Beta that the content was too easy. The problem is the enrage timer - technically, all of the heroic dungeons have weapon requirements, and all of these requirements were implemented with purpose by NCSoft Korea. That is to say, they are enough for the dungeon they are the minimum requirement for - before the increase in HP by NCWest. NCWest, however, increased boss' HP without adjusting the minimum required weapon, and without adjusting the enrage timer in accordance with the increase in HP.

 

What this means? This means that the weapon requirements on heroic dungeons are too low and those meeting the requirements are not enough to beat the enrage timer, or that the increase in HP was too high and that the required weapon would be enough to beat the enrage timer if it weren't for the increased HP. As a result, players are being bullied and excluded from running certain heroic dungeons, making the experience for these players a very negative one. This hinders their progression by disallowing them access to quests and materials that earn the most gold, thus not allowing them to upgrade their gear and actually run these dungeons - an endless cycle - decreasing the likelihood of them continuing to play the game.

 

Solution: Either revert the HP values back to the original Korean ones and allow the social dynamic to revert to its intended design, or increase the weapon requirement to match the increased HP. However, increasing the weapon requirement will cause another issue to occur. It will keep undergeared players behind an eternal wall of catch up. Meaning, if they weren't there at launch, they will never get to current endgame because they will always be stuck behind a method of earning less gold. You could say they would be eternally trapped in outdated content, and stuck in that content's state of economy.

--

2. Progression and economy relative to the rate of content updates.
The release schedule for the content updates seems to have been put into place without making changes to the game's trading system to make up for the time not available, that other regions had in-between such updates. So, although the speed at which we are receiving updates is no issue whatsoever (more content is good), NCWest not making the necessary changes to accomodate the little time we have to catch up between these updates is a problem.

 

What this means? This means that the initial crafting time limits, and the average resource gathering time were designed for long periods without new content updates. NCWest should have reduced such limits on crafting to create the time-equivalent in the shorter period of time we have to 'catch up'.

 

Solution: Let's say Korea received Silverfrost one year after launch of their vanilla client (example, not fact), and we received Silverfrost two months after launch of our vanilla client. We recived Silverfrost about 83-84% sooner than they did. Therefore, the time we had to craft and gather, to upgrade, to catch up, was 83-84% less. The limits on crafting should have been shortened by 83-84% to make it time-equivalent. The drops on materials should have been increased by 83-84% to match that time-equivalent.

 

This would have produced a healthy economy. Not the game of 'catch up or be left behind forever' that we're playing now.

--

3. The large amount of bots intruding the most played aspects of the game.
It started with premium bots, farming PvE content in huge numbers for copper. Then it was Wheel of Fate essences and weapons. Next it was daily quests, Arena for Soulstones and dungeon farming for Moonwater Tears and Merry Potters Recipe. Now we have Soulstone Plains and Awakened Necropolis, on top of the old methods. The only exception to this is Arena.

 

So why are there so many bots? Well, to begin with, bots will always exist, they are in every other region's servers too, however, not to the intrusive extent that they are in ours and at a much smaller number.

 

So why is it different for us? Mainly the economy. It is highly likely that the solutions in the previous two points above would result in much less bots. No solution could ever make it impossible for bots without making it impossible for players too, so there will always be bots, but reducing the number is a simple task and after achieving that goal, the next task is secluding the bots to an aspect of the game that players do not care for.

 

Solution: Fix progression. Fix trade. Fix  the economy. And people won't feel pressured to buy cheap gold from external websites.

--

Those are the three main issues. Next up, I have some personal issues that some may agree with, some may not. However, this is simply a warning that there may be a bit of anger, a bit of disappointment in the following words.

 

NCWest and its communication:
The way NCSoft communicate with us, even directly through the forums, is very disconnected. Like at the beginning when Julianne used to be in the livestreams. She would respond to concerns, without actually responding to them. She showed such little care, and when she was called out on it by the community, she conveniently disappeared from the stream. This seems to be the pattern with the whole company, issues seem to be ignored and brushed off, and when they are responded to, they aren't actually responded to. It's as though you're talking at us, not to us. Are we even here? Is this real life?

 

A recent example of this is Hime responding to the thread for the removal of Gameguard. She was probably not the right person to respond to such an issue. And this leads me to...

 

Gameguard: In the West, is not an acceptable application, and has not been for many years. There is even a stigma attached to any company using it. NCSoft is seen as cheap, ignorant, and non-caring for their customers simply as a byproduct of using Gameguard. Keeping it enabled is nothing short of suicide.

 

Personally, my game stutters every few seconds when Gameguard is enabled. And so far the pattern has been Gameguard disabled>bad performance but no stutters>Gameguard enabled>bad performance and constant stutters. The game runs bad generally, but Gameguard makes it almost unplayable, completely ruining the experience for me.

 

Bots bypass it. Hackers bypass it. Google 'antigg.dll', it's not difficult to bypass at all. Anybody who wants to can with no effort at all. So everybody with malicious intent, like hacking, botting, or even the not so malicious, like modding, don't even deal with Gameguard - they just bypass it. Your legitimate users on the other hand, are suffering bad performance because of Gameguard, and yet you refuse to disable it, despite the fact that hackers bypass it, botters bypass it, and even modders bypass it. The people you're trying to target with it are not even affected by it. It's having a detrimental impact on the legitimate paying users, and you have people like Hime, fueling the fire with that disconnected response again.

 

And finally...

 

The way content is released:
The way NCWest is releasing content seems to be based on when that same content was released in other regions, rather than how much content there is to release. I think that is quite odd. I don't really know what to propose for this, especially with all the issues the game suffers from right now. I will say that, if the main two points were applied, a more practical release schedule would have been Warlock and Bloodshade at release. Mushin floors 1-8 and Naryu with legendary weapon in the following patch. Then Silverfrost, including part two with chapters 33-38 of the story, Chi Master, Cold Storage, Sundered Nexus, and the Floating Alter.

 

Chi Master for instance; surely it would have been more practical to have released that in the Silverfrost update. With the current concerns and issues, rerolling a new class is not many peoples' priority. As it stands it is the least played class in the other regions. I think those who want to play a new class have already reserved themselves to it. And the later you release it, the less likely they are to play the game now.

 

Closing notes:
Overall, my experience up to now on EU has been a mish-mosh of unpleasantness. I was one of the first to reach True Pirate (without use of the Currency Exchange) and True Siren Accessories. I was doing 4-man Bloodshade Harbor while everybody else was stuck at Profane. I feel as though the game offers not much reward for anything.

 

On the other regions' servers, it always feels like I have something to do, or something to aim for, that I enjoy doing. There are plenty of costumes, and many unique ones to do different dungeons for. There is a legendary weapon that I can invest into, have fun using, and be proud of having full stop, and with it I can solo dungeons for achievements and even rare drops. There is the new 24-man turtle instance. There is 6 vs 6 PvP, like Arathi basin. There is Arena with all current classes available (Chi Master), and the most recent balance patches, so everybody is able to perform to their full potential. There are skills to unlock that aren't even released here yet. There are more Mushin floors to enjoy (I've always loved that tower), and dungeons, so many dungeons.

 

On Chinese and Taiwan servers, there is no rush to catch up. Everybody (new characters and alts included) can basically get to a gear 'standard' in a short space of time that allows them to do most dungeons without issue, and this is due to numerous differences in how they handle their versions as opposed to NCWest.

 

NCWest's version of Blade & Soul is objectively speaking, crap. It's actually disappointing to see a game I love have its potential ruined like this.

 

Blade & Soul from its first reveal years ago has been a highly anticipated game, and has grown to success in every region that it has released in so far, including our own. If the financial earnings report is anything to go by, Blade & Soul seems to be the second highest earner to Lineage, so it isn't going anywhere soon, as long as there is some core playerbase that keeps spending money on it, just like Lineage.

 

If it's gonna be here for a while, at least take care of it NCWest. Don't make the experience a crappy one for the playerbase. Disable Gameguard. Fix progression. Fix the economy. Get all the classes released and the balance patches out. And give us content to do.

 

I really hope you sort the issues out NCWest.

 

/end

Cant put it more clearly, gently and objectively.

Primary Root Cause (not to mention others like bots, etc..):
Pace of releasing contents without adjustments to its economical, cultural and mechanical impact on every other content/aspect of the game and its players.

I can suck(barely) it all up but the Progression Wall or Eternal Catch Up Syndrome or being Stuck on Outdated contents I think is the most hurtful to the player base. All I think is due to the Pace of Releasing Contents.

[BananaHead]

50 minutes ago, Eimi said:

The boss hp increase has been many a times stated to be balancing the content for our current version skill and gear updates.

Everyone i've seen so far who's experienced the content when it was first released agrees that players are significantly more powerful in the current game build.

 

The issue seems to be more that people are expecting to skip trough content and run anything they want, disregarding their actual ability to do so.

This is technically irrelevant, it has no bearing on the point in my main post whatsoever. The point, is that the minimum weapon requirement is too low for the increased hp, or the increased hp is too high for the minimum weapon requirement, as it is currently impossible to do with the minimum required weapon to enter the dungeon.

 

Now, I appreciate any contribution to this thread, however I specifically warned against posts like yours. I said, " This is not a whine post, or a hate thread, so please do not respond here if you are blindsided by absolute righteousness - this is where we apply logic, rationale, and constructive criticism to encourage NCWest to support the game as they should do, not as they currently are" - take note of the part in italics.

 

I don't want to be abrasive or mean, but please, in future do not post in this thread without having thought about what you're going to say.

[tyrsar]

1 hour ago, Eimi said:

The boss hp increase has been many a times stated to be balancing the content for our current version skill and gear updates.

Everyone i've seen so far who's experienced the content when it was first released agrees that players are significantly more powerful in the current game build.

 

The issue seems to be more that people are expecting to skip trough content and run anything they want, disregarding their actual ability to do so.

I'm going to go ahead and say it cause you're dancing around the issue:

• Compared to other Asian countries, our skill level is much lower

There is countless proof to this based on the relative dominance of Asian country teams compared to NA/EU in esports. 

 

Then why, praytell, do you make the game harder for the people with less skill? If anything they should make it easier for us to "skip through content."

 

I agree 100% with the OP in that the HP values need to be lowered. In fact why stop there? We actually should have:

• 15% less HP compared to other regions
• 10% additional higher stats on all gear
• 50% reduction (or more) in materials to upgrade gear

We as NA/EU regions are inferior in skill level. Please start treating us that way. 

[Eimi]

14 minutes ago, tyrsar said:

I'm going to go ahead and say it cause you're dancing around the issue:

• Compared to other Asian countries, our skill level is much lower

Sure, we've had the game in our regions for far less than it's been out elsewhere.

It's entirely expected that our skill level would be lower, although we have years of experience from other regions to learn from & help quicken the process.

Not to mention the fact that countless people playing on na/eu have already played the game on the other regions and are already comfortable with the gameplay from them.

 

The game wasn't made harder for us per say, it naturally became easier over time due to the skill and gear rebalancing.

The changes we got were meant to bring the game experience back to the intended difficulty ~

[YukiNagato]

1 hour ago, Eimi said:

The issue seems to be more that people are expecting to skip trough content and run anything they want, disregarding their actual ability to do so.

When the "ability to do so" is either p2w or grind till you bleed, specially when you have multiple alts, there is a problem. 

Even Tera is less grindy and more rewarding than BNS and that says it all.

[Tyranei]

3 hours ago, BananaHead said:

1. The alienation of individuals with subjectively 'low' attack power.

 

The cause for this alienation is seemingly the increase in HP that NCWest applied to our version of the game, supposedly due to complaints in Beta that the content was too easy. The problem is the enrage timer - technically, all of the heroic dungeons have weapon requirements, and all of these requirements were implemented with purpose by NCSoft Korea. That is to say, they are enough for the dungeon they are the minimum requirement for - before the increase in HP by NCWest. NCWest, however, increased boss' HP without adjusting the minimum required weapon, and without adjusting the enrage timer in accordance with the increase in HP.

What this means? This means that the weapon requirements on heroic dungeons are too low and those meeting the requirements are not enough to beat the enrage timer, or that the increase in HP was too high and that the required weapon would be enough to beat the enrage timer if it weren't for the increased HP. As a result, players are being bullied and excluded from running certain heroic dungeons, making the experience for these players a very negative one. This hinders their progression by disallowing them access to quests and materials that earn the most gold, thus not allowing them to upgrade their gear and actually run these dungeons - an endless cycle - decreasing the likelihood of them continuing to play the game.

Solution: Either revert the HP values back to the original Korean ones and allow the social dynamic to revert to its intended design, or increase the weapon requirement to match the increased HP. However, increasing the weapon requirement will cause another issue to occur. It will keep undergeared players behind an eternal wall of catch up. Meaning, if they weren't there at launch, they will never get to current endgame because they will always be stuck behind a method of earning less gold. You could say they would be eternally trapped in outdated content, and stuck in that content's state of economy.

This is definitely an issue.  I feel like I have to work extra just to get my friends up to date on gear so we can form groups to run the heroic dungeons.  I have over 500 AP but some of my friends are barely over 400.  They just don't have as much free time to actually make money.

 

I honestly think the best method would be to just remove the enrage timer from 6mans and keep them in 4mans.  6mans should really just be an introduction to the 4mans anyways since that's where all the good loot is.  Having an enrage timer causes players to react by having strict AP requirements in their groups.  Personally, I wouldn't want to do Avalanche Den with anyone lower than 450 AP.  Its not because I'm an elitist, its just from my experience people are pulling their own weight and the higher someone's AP is the greater likelihood they have in being someone who actually tries.  Some people are either just lazy or do not know how to play.  At least with 450 AP their low performance will still be doing more damage.

 

Enrage timers encourage this type of mentality.  If there was no enrage timer I would not mind carrying low-geared players while doing dailies.  Hell, as a BD I can already dodge/iFrame almost all of the Ice attacks when the Yeti is in Cold phase (I'd be able to do better if it wasn't for Gameguard!).

3 hours ago, BananaHead said:

2. Progression and economy relative to the rate of content updates.

 

The release schedule for the content updates seems to have been put into place without making changes to the game's trading system to make up for the time not available, that other regions had in-between such updates. So, although the speed at which we are receiving updates is no issue whatsoever (more content is good), NCWest not making the necessary changes to accomodate the little time we have to catch up between these updates is a problem.

What this means? This means that the initial crafting time limits, and the average resource gathering time were designed for long periods without new content updates. NCWest should have reduced such limits on crafting to create the time-equivalent in the shorter period of time we have to 'catch up'.

Solution: Let's say Korea received Silverfrost one year after launch of their vanilla client (example, not fact), and we received Silverfrost two months after launch of our vanilla client. We recived Silverfrost about 83-84% sooner than they did. Therefore, the time we had to craft and gather, to upgrade, to catch up, was 83-84% less. The limits on crafting should have been shortened by 83-84% to make it time-equivalent. The drops on materials should have been increased by 83-84% to match that time-equivalent.

This would have produced a healthy economy. Not the game of 'catch up or be left behind forever' that we're playing now.

Agreed.  Combined with the Enrage timers, this issue causes players to feel like they have to grind for a long period of time just to be able to participate in the better grind.  Yes, I understand how MMO's work (I'm a FFXI veteran) but the type of grind players have to do is very unrewarding.  They feel like its necessary, not because they want to perform better.  The current economy has everything quite expensive.  Moonwater Transformation Stones are still absurdly expensive for anyone just getting into the game.  Crafting in this game is ridiculous since there are only a few viable crafts to actually pick up.  I don't even want to get into the absurdity of putting recipe drops in dungeons, particularly recipes are that required to upgrade anything.

3 hours ago, BananaHead said:

3. The large amount of bots intruding the most played aspects of the game.

 

It started with premium bots, farming PvE content in huge numbers for copper. Then it was Wheel of Fate essences and weapons. Next it was daily quests, Arena for Soulstones and dungeon farming for Moonwater Tears and Merry Potters Recipe. Now we have Soulstone Plains and Awakened Necropolis, on top of the old methods. The only exception to this is Arena.

So why are there so many bots? Well, to begin with, bots will always exist, they are in every other region's servers too, however, not to the intrusive extent that they are in ours and at a much smaller number.

So why is it different for us? Mainly the economy. It is highly likely that the solutions in the previous two points above would result in much less bots. No solution could ever make it impossible for bots without making it impossible for players too, so there will always be bots, but reducing the number is a simple task and after achieving that goal, the next task is secluding the bots to an aspect of the game that players do not care for.

Solution: Fix progression. Fix trade. Fix  the economy. And people won't feel pressured to buy cheap gold from external websites.

This is probably the only area that I'll somewhat disagree on.  The only bots that are a problem are the Destroyer bots in 1v1s and the AFK Summoner bots in 3v3s.  Those were destroying the 3v3 experience and causing weird issues with 1v1 progression.  A lot of people would get all the way to Platinum fighting only bots, only to suddenly end up fighting players who really knew what they were doing, causing a lot of frustration from losing over and over.  The Summoner bots just made it really annoying queuing 3v3s with my friend.  We'd almost always get a bot on our team.  Though, it wasn't so bad when the other team was all bots xD.

 

The other issue with arena bots was the amount of Soulstones they were generating.  That, however is mostly fixed due to tying Dragon Certificates to 6man heroics (which created another problem: forcing PvP-focused players to go through the steps of progression just so they can actually make money).  All of the other bots don't really bother me.  They're to be expected in MMOs.  In fact, some are indirectly helpful with Essences and player-kills in Misty Woods.

3 hours ago, BananaHead said:

Gameguard: In the West, is not an acceptable application, and has not been for many years. There is even a stigma attached to any company using it. NCSoft is seen as cheap, ignorant, and non-caring for their customers simply as a byproduct of using Gameguard. Keeping it enabled is nothing short of suicide.

Personally, my game stutters every few seconds when Gameguard is enabled. And so far the pattern has been Gameguard disabled>bad performance but no stutters>Gameguard enabled>bad performance and constant stutters. The game runs bad generally, but Gameguard makes it almost unplayable, completely ruining the experience for me.

Bots bypass it. Hackers bypass it. Google 'antigg.dll', it's not difficult to bypass at all. Anybody who wants to can with no effort at all. So everybody with malicious intent, like hacking, botting, or even the not so malicious, like modding, don't even deal with Gameguard - they just bypass it. Your legitimate users on the other hand, are suffering bad performance because of Gameguard, and yet you refuse to disable it, despite the fact that hackers bypass it, botters bypass it, and even modders bypass it. The people you're trying to target with it are not even affected by it. It's having a detrimental impact on the legitimate paying users, and you have people like Hime, fueling the fire with that disconnected response again.

This is my crux.  Gameguard has completely turned me off from the game.  The stuttering has gotten progressively worse to the point where I start getting a headache trying to play.  Gameguard seriously needs to go.  I've already laid out my thoughts several times on these forums and, as you mentioned elsewhere in your post, their responses are very disconnected.  Gameguard is easily bypassed by those playing illegitimately anyways and its only causing frustration with those wishing to play legitimately.  I've already cancelled my subscription due to them re-implementing Gameguard again.  There's no point in my paying for a game I cannot play.

[Raiya]

Wanted to play the game on my laptop but I get this error..... :C

 

[MoeGod]

OP, thank you for pointing these issues. I totally agree with you.

 

This is for NCSoft: I know that every company's goal is to make as much profit as possible. But please remember your profit is like a negative parabola curve, you have to find a balanced point in which your greed = your customer's satisfaction. Right now you are not listening to your customers and people can feel greedy motive behind your actions. This is not a good business model.

 

P/s: My friend who lives with me experienced good fps (constant 60 fps) when GameGuard was disabled. Since when it was enabled again, he has been suffering from fps slutters. It happens right next to me so please consider removing GameGuard. If you choose not to remove it, please provide your reasons. We are not kids anymore so act professionally.

[Nilkemios]

6 minutes ago, Raiya said:

Wanted to play the game on my laptop but I get this error..... :C

 

Phhhffffttthahahahahahaha....that's a good one.

[JJhopper]

2 hours ago, tyrsar said:

I'm going to go ahead and say it cause you're dancing around the issue:

• Compared to other Asian countries, our skill level is much lower

There is countless proof to this based on the relative dominance of Asian country teams compared to NA/EU in esports. 

 

 

Funny when I watch esports I never see a asian win in sports games, shooters or even "who got the biggest D***"

Just because the game comes out way earlier for them does not make them better just more experienced.

 

[Arohk]

you don't even need to upgrade your weapon to enter the dungeon, you just equip the Dokumo weapon and can enter.

[Diebreath]

The upgrade wall is just retarded in this game. Im playin at the newest server. I m semi hardcore player and i achieved max items then in 2 days silverfrost patch came up. Now im grindin my ass to catch up again. A lot of ppls on our server around at 400-450 ap. And im sure they will release more upgrades and push content before i even catch up.

 

When we get the 700 ap i cant think of a new player startin this game at all. Those players at the current system can never catch up. And no new incomers while old ppls leavin game means game will eventually die.

 

You know at other regiions as i read so far at dungeons those frozen venom stufs drops up to 40x. They nerfed drop rate while we are havin new content 5x faster? Also im sick and tired of farmin SSP (yes im makin 200 gold per day for what?). Dungeons are worthless against SSP. Cant u just make dungeons profitable against SSP so we can actually do different stuff. Also i farmed yeti 4 for 100 times for achi. Only 2 skill book dropped. At BSH at least it was like %10 drop chance for books. Its now %2 around. Good logic..

 

I ask my clan mates how much do they farm per day. And most of them farm around 50gold. Scorpion weapon costs 2000gold (no jokin). Can u imagine they need to farm for a single upgrade for 1month+  and the new patch will come max in 2 months...

 

For the first time in a mmo(over 10 year) im whinin about "releasin" new content. And its just wrong in a lot of way. Either boost drop rates for item upgrade materials or slow down with patches.

 

[Meese]

I completely agree with your points. Right now, those of us with True Siren and True Pirate are able to do all the content quite easily, there's enough damage there that this isnt an issue. However, what happens when Pirate Ship is released? Black Dragon Prison? Tomb? Black Tower? If NCSoft wants our region to be caught up with the others within the year, then that's great. However, at the current rate of NORMAL player progression, no one will be able to do this content anytime soon. We cant keep up and people are extremely discouraged by this and leave. NCSoft either needs to redo the upgrade costs for lower-tier equips (to allow for people to catch up to a certain point) or implement events that provide some upgrading mats.

[Fuz]

You forgot quite an huge issue: class inbalance in events like soulstone plains that makes even harder for melee classes to progress, since they can't farm soulstones and moonstones.

Rest is spot on.

37 minutes ago, Meese said:

Right now, those of us with True Siren and True Pirate are able to do all the content quite easily, 

Yeah... remember when people said "upgrade to pirate before patch or you're screwed"?
I'm so glad I took the advice and did it.
But for a whole different reason. My alts are *cricket*ed, though.

[Meiling]

To be honest, pre 50 I never thought it was hard to upgrade. True pirate was very reasonable to get to and took a bit of time. My friend remade a BM recently and is getting to max gear at 45, he barely had the money to start off too since he never took my advice to at least craft MTS's.  Now that 50 content is out it went form reasonable to holy crap that is seriously expensive. It costs 700-800 gold just for your weapon from true pirate to true breeze. Don't know the breakthrough costs though, just goin to add on. Yes, you can say the prices will go down but we all know that is highly unlikely. Each server has a mat that's stupid expensive ( I prefer the moonstones being the expensive one.) The darts make the pricing of upgrading skyrocket. the 190 themselves cost more than the other mats combined, it's a huge difference in prices in such a short amount of time that most people won't be upgrading for a long time.