Down to 1 server they need to change something

[NorbertTheOpinionated]

We are down to 1 server as of April 24th folks. That's bad. That means we are continuing to lose players. It has already gotten to the point where it can be hard to find enough people to do a dungeon at certain times of the day. If we continue to lose players, it will only get worse. Wildstar was an NCsoft game too, and it isn't dying. It is dead. Completely dead. Servers are down. You can't download the game. You can't make a character. You can't log in. You can't play. The game is gone. It could happen to B&S too.

 

I don't know about you, but I like B&S. I have put a lot of time into B&S, and I like my character. I also feel like it is still the best MMO out there, and I like MMOs. I don't want to lose B&S. However, if you like the results you are getting in life, keep doing what you are doing. If you don't, then you are going to need to change something, because continuing to do what you have always done is going to continue to get you the results you are getting now. Therefore, if NCsoft doesn't change something about its business model for Blade and Soul, it is only logical that B&S will continue to bleed players. I am worried it could go the way of Wildstar.

 

Yes yes, the graphics increase is coming. Archer is coming. Awakening. Blah blah. Those things are temporary boosts. Do you really believe that the addition of those things will be what the game needs to quit bleeding players long term, and bring in new players, making the population increase steadily long term? Those things are going to make the difference? Nah. What needs to happen, is the game needs to be made more fun or entertaining. Make us want to pour hours into the game because we want to, not because we feel an obligation too. Obligation is a negative feeling on your chest like a weight regarding something you have to do, not something you want to do. We should feel a light happy positive feeling of anticipation about being able to play Blade and Soul because we want to. More replay-abity, not more grind. Yes, that is a tall order. It requires good design.

 

It is on NCsoft to make people want to play their game. How are they going to do that? What is driving people away? Why do they leave? You need to identify that and fix it. My suggestion would be that there is a point where the game yields insufficient reward-to-effort ratio. It is WAY too much reward at first, and then it gets WAY too slow. The curve should be more linear, not so exponential.

 

Maybe consider changing the way the game is monetized? People seem to complain a lot about that too. Don't know if that is the ACTUAL reason they leave though.

 

I know Jonathan and Bethany are gone. Don't know how many other people are gone too. I know we have new management. Hope you guys have a plan. So NCsoft, what are you going to change? What are you going to do differently, or are you just going to continue doing what you have been doing?

[Sherry Kaizer]

The game has become so broken my friend.
Other games got a cap to +15.
Here cap of weapon/soul/pet is 94859485984949 stages.
Thats the only game ive played that need so many stages to reach max stage of an item.
If you play battleground you will get what i am saying.
You have 300.000+ HP and you die just from 1 hit.
Yes one hit boom you are dead in less than 1 second in 1 versus 1.
And if you dont die from 1 hit kill someone will aerial combo you and you die without being able to press a TAB escape.
Is this pvp?
It is like accidently stepping on a small snail and kill it in 0,5 seconds by stepping on it.
Its not fun at all.
Battle royale is fun in the first few times but then you realise people teaming up or playing broken classes to win.
Arena is full of Gold+ players that farming ranks with 10 different charracters.
Good luck killing Gold+ blade dancers/assasins/KFM/Wardens that perma combo you in arena when you are normal Silver player that trying to have some fun.

[Arohk]

28 minutes ago, Sherry Kaizer said:

Other games got a cap to +15.

And if you fail your upgrade in those games you lose your progress.

Like AION, you are at stage 10 and want to go to 11, you fail, mats lost, you fall down back to 9.

and thats motivating?

[Showta]

Can I be real for a second here.

 

I just had yet another friend try to come back to Blade and Soul and do you know what his complaint was?
It was the same complaint I hear from the majority of friends who try the game and quit.

"Players demanded high gear for even lower tier dungeons"

 

I'm sorry, no offense here, but what the hell is NC supposed to do about players being jerkoffs to each other again??? What's the magic solution to that again??
What, give us all more gear?? So players can be even more ridiculous about requirements????

and I love my friends but they end up being part of the problem too because when I tell them, "well just talk to people and join a guild" I hear what I now hear from the majority of NA players which is waaahwaaahh I dont wanna make new friends-then what the hell are you doing playing an MMO?? Go turn on your playstation if you want to sit in silence by yourself, jesus christ. It's like...it's two things. Players insisting that you need 3k AP to clear Pigsty and then also players suddenly getting real shy tucking their tail between their legs acting like they don't know how to type "hi how are you" when they have the courage to type all kinds of freaky things in their search bars every night with their 20 tabs open-stop PLAYING with me!!!!

 

Ok now back at the main issue though.

"What is driving people away?"

Yes, absolutely, the way the game is monetized is caveman tier. The people who run MMOs these days don't even play them and legitimately have no idea what they're doing which matters because it shows PAINFULLY HARD that they NO idea how to actually CATER to their customers because they have 0 understanding of what their customers want. It's like if I opened up a shoe-line for snakes and then acted confused as to why no snakes were buying my shoes. You don't play these games, you don't know why people like them, you're applying things and rules that just turn people off. Yes, that's a problem.

 

But Daddy Korea doesn't care. and Auntie NA can't be bothered either-if they try to be bothered, they probably get snatched up and tossed right out that comical window just like Jonathan probably was every other week.

 

So to sum it up;

It's not just NC, it's the playerbase too. But the playerbase won't change and neither will NC.

Maybe if you stopped treating each other like animals more people would want to stay and play the game, Happy Easter!

[FeralStripes]

Reasons players are quiting BNS(Low server population)

 

PVE: Every levelcap patch, your character becomes weaker with less --crit  --accuracy, after level 60 cap low level dungeons like: IF/EL/Soguns now take longer to kill adds on the map because NC increase add/boss AP/DEF/HP. It feels like you hit a grind wall even after upgrading gear which makes it pointless to upgrade.

 

6 vs 6 PVP: All players got huge HP/def increase so you can't burst down players anymore which destroyed pvp imo, your always waiting for all skills to come off cooldown (it is now pointless to have max endgame pvp gear if you can't burst players down)

 

PVE Quests: Gold rewards from NS-ST are reduced before I would make 100g per day now in only make 70g that is a 30% reduction in gold, (Now forced to run extra dungeons: outlaw island, CS & HM to make my gold back)

 

I had this same problem with a KR MMO called: "Tera" I played that MMO for 4+ years but they also reduced gold quest & made the game very grindy, there comes a point to where you say: enough is enough & leave, you have to make it worth my while too waste my Life playing a MMO for 12+ hours a day! Please keep in mind when NC servers were first released to NA alot of players purchased "Founders Edition" for $150USD, BNS already had 95% of the game codeing from KR so NC west only worked on English translations, all servers were paid in advance(leased servers) for 5+ years, the rest is extra profit.

 

NC makes the excuse its trying to merge servers to help players with raids but this is not the case, what they are really doing it saving money on server costs by reducing it too 1 server since the server lease is up. there are less players in game, so it will save them money only having 1 server, NC is focusing most of their resources into the mobile game market, there are 2 ways to keep bns alive:

1. move BNS to the "Steam Platform" you will get a larger playerbase that way

2. Have better events increase gold rewards for dungeon quest, make the game less grindy as Free-too-play

 

Been playing N/A BNS for over 3+ years now, the only good thing NC west has done in that 3 year period was reduce bots in arena & dungeons, the rest has been one horrible decision after another(domino effect). You would think the old pr manager would communicate on the forums more with the community & listen to feedback, but all I seen was silence, they were not listening @ all & changes were made worse. "NC West Staff" Listen to your playerbase that is your bread & butter, we are the people paying your home mortgage & feeding your family!

 

 Read the Youtube comments in the video below people feel the same about the gold nerf, it sucks, makes the player loose all motivation to play BNS

 

[Sherry Kaizer]

1 hour ago, Arohk said:

And if you fail your upgrade in those games you lose your progress.

Like AION, you are at stage 10 and want to go to 11, you fail, mats lost, you fall down back to 9.

and thats motivating?

I've played Aion North American servers for 7 years and i quited after because the population got lower, all my friends quited, and i had enough of paying reducethelag so i can play to north american region.
I managed to farm 60condition2 gear and make it +10 every part without effort, i was aethertapping for 3 hours per day and i could make a fortune to buy huge amount of enchantment stones to upgrade my stuff.
After they puted 65 officer abyss gears.
I farmed it in about 1 and a half months of gameplay and i managed to +15 every part in less than 2 months of gameplay, by doing katalam/danaria weekly camps+crafting/gathering and playing with the marketplace.
Here i play for 2 years and i only got aransu 9 ,stage 3 BT accessories + vt necklace stage 3, awakened divine bracelet, awakened king gloves, virtous heart, unleashed pet, awakened hongmoon soul.
Thats nothing.
You need 10 alts to farm events in order to upgrade your soul/pet in this game.
Or just pay real money.
Compare the secure way to upgrade your soul by running the same event 10 times everyday to upgrade your items (Blade and soul gear up way) to puting your character crafting while you are AFK or gather materials for 2/3 hours per day. (Aion gear up way (Katalam/Danaria era).
Also dont forget +10 item to +15 was very small damage/defence difference compared to awakened hongmoon soul - true dragon soul.

 

[Kozuki]

3 hours ago, NorbertTheOpinionated said:

I know Jonathan and Bethany are gone. Don't know how many other people are gone too. I know we have new management. Hope you guys have a plan. So NCsoft, what are you going to change? What are you going to do differently, or are you just going to continue doing what you have been doing?

I have serious doubt with the new management. Aside from new stream members and more detailed patch notes, updates started with new management team has been a disaster:

 

-Awk.skill update: White Orb scandal. First, they miscommuniated with KR developers and giving players wrong information about White Orbs and Demon Spirit Stone exchange, resulting in uproar. Second, while they try to mitigated the crisis with free orbs on F10, I think it is better if they just accept White Orb = Ascending Orb exchange instead. Yeah, it may put the market out of their control and mess up some of their planning in future, but if a company makes a mistake, they must try to protect their customers' benefits instead of their own benefits. Take a look at Johnson & Johnson. Some of their Tylenol pills got poisoned by outsider, which was not even their fault, but they recalled every single bottle of Tylenol to protect customers. Thanks to their efforts, the brand did not die, but instead made a nice comeback.

 

-Legend Reborn update: they underestimated the gear difference between NA and KR players, and overestimated their own implement to counter that. They copy-pasted the content from KR to NA without even bother trying to adjust it, and found it easier to just add some fleeting weapons, which was a copy from a TW-exclusive P2W weapon, hoping it will fix the gap. It did not, and their bad decision gates a majority of players out of the event. A event dungeon that requires double DPS to clear TT Boss 4, and a solo one that requires even more DPS. Catering very few percent of players who can clear it and frustrated the rest is a bad move when your playerbase have diminished enough to issue the last server merge.

 

I hope to see the new management team or whatever they call it to spend some more efforts to keep their remaining players happy, so that more people will become and keep the game running. I still want to see UE4 and Summoner's 3rd spec, and hope this game won't die before that.

[i wanna die]

5 hours ago, Kozuki said:

I have serious doubt with the new management. Aside from new stream members and more detailed patch notes, updates started with new management team has been a disaster:

 

-Awk.skill update: White Orb scandal. First, they miscommuniated with KR developers and giving players wrong information about White Orbs and Demon Spirit Stone exchange, resulting in uproar. Second, while they try to mitigated the crisis with free orbs on F10, I think it is better if they just accept White Orb = Ascending Orb exchange instead. Yeah, it may put the market out of their control and mess up some of their planning in future, but if a company makes a mistake, they must try to protect their customers' benefits instead of their own benefits. Take a look at Johnson & Johnson. Some of their Tylenol pills got poisoned by outsider, which was not even their fault, but they recalled every single bottle of Tylenol to protect customers. Thanks to their efforts, the brand did not die, but instead made a nice comeback.

 

-Legend Reborn update: they underestimated the gear difference between NA and KR players, and overestimated their own implement to counter that. They copy-pasted the content from KR to NA without even bother trying to adjust it, and found it easier to just add some fleeting weapons, which was a copy from a TW-exclusive P2W weapon, hoping it will fix the gap. It did not, and their bad decision gates a majority of players out of the event. A event dungeon that requires double DPS to clear TT Boss 4, and a solo one that requires even more DPS. Catering very few percent of players who can clear it and frustrated the rest is a bad move when your playerbase have diminished enough to issue the last server merge.

 

I hope to see the new management team or whatever they call it to spend some more efforts to keep their remaining players happy, so that more people will become and keep the game running. I still want to see UE4 and Summoner's 3rd spec, and hope this game won't die before that.

Well sayd.

[Wataru]

8 hours ago, FeralStripes said:

Read the Youtube comments in the video below people feel the same about the gold nerf, it sucks, makes the player loose all motivation to play BNS

Did you watch the video? It made the change sound fine if not good. The video even forgets to add that there were a lot of dungeon nerfs making them easier.

Edited April 14, 2019 by Wataru

[FeralStripes]

Yes I did watch the video, he is entitled to his opinion the guy plays "multiple" alts & has premium so he says: "the gold nerf does not effect him as much", I'm F2P with no premium, I only play 1 Main & run NS-ST everyday for 3 years, so it effects me more. The reason I linked the video was more for the YouTube comment sections , people even disagree with his point of view on the video. you are getting sidetracked people are furious about having 30% less gold cut from their dailies.