Serious Game Problem : Gear Gap

[neoVictrix]

I'm a returning player and me and a friend of mine has been playing in morpheus/thunderwing west for roughly around 2 months, we average around 4 hours play time a day but find ourselves playing less and less everyday. We bought patron with real money as soon as we started, and spend our entire day running packs/overseas cargo until our labor runs out. We tried joining pvp content as soon as we hit lvl cap, but realized it was a big mistake. So we grinded gold to reach where we are now which is 4000-4100 GS. And what's frustrating is, after these 2 months of gold grinding and routine PVE content, we felt like everything was in vain. We still get 1 shot by almost any attack, even when we're wearing plate/cloth depending on the enemy. We always come out of war zones with negative honor points gained, feeling like we were disposable 1 hit shield for our allies in any pvp event.

We're not asking for free divine/epic obsidian gears (which would be insulting to people who grinded 3 years for them), but I wish trion would give us new players a chance to participate in majority of these pvp content without being fodder. Even a non up-gradable dead end temporary set would be nice, something we can wear while until our obs/illustrous gear catch up.

Not to mention even in PVE content new players get blocked out, we've been kicked out multiple times when we tried joining serpentis because of our GS. And while leveling experienced and encountered instances of people being kicked out of GR, CR raids for being low level, even when we said we aren't alts. Overall archeage was a jewel at first in the eyes of new players, but slowly realize what it truly is as you dive deeper into the game. And see RNG hell.

As steady as running trade packs are, it's time consuming and not always the best method of doing so (especially if you're outright buying equipment and/or materials from the auction house).

I also have to ask if you're in a guild at all, which would remedy a number of your issues in regards to equipment as well as participation in PvE-focused content. Are you communicating in faction/nation regularly, or more keeping to yourselves? The game's just as much social as it is on forcing people to work together.

I've got a lower level character on west but I'm mostly on East for Thunderwing. Given about three weeks I could probably help out; feel free to send me a PM if you'd like.

[wooglemoogle]

They said in the livestream where they talked about the XL meeting that they were finally able to have a discussion about gear gap (and other parts of the game) with all the major people on the ArcheAge team. Celestrata also posted a comment on Reddit where she basically summed up a lot of the core problems in ArcheAge being tied to gear gap.

So the ball's pretty much in XL's court now, but probably won't be getting whatever changes they're planning/making anytime soon.

[Trubbles]

They said in the livestream where they talked about the XL meeting that they were finally able to have a discussion about gear gap (and other parts of the game) with all the major people on the ArcheAge team. Celestrata also posted a comment on Reddit where she basically summed up a lot of the core problems in ArcheAge being tied to gear gap.

So the ball's pretty much in XL's court now, but probably won't be getting whatever changes they're planning/making anytime soon.

I'm really glad to hear that. I've always been impressed with Celestrata's intelligence and integrity, and hopefully with her promotion is in a good position to be an advocate for the long-term players who love this game and want to see a bit more fun and balance put into it, esp on the PVP side of things (i.e, gear gap closers and more attainable/affordable crafting costs and regrade costs). Oh it's a great gold sink for those elites who already freefarm the end-game... but... for the average casual player, it's punishing and prohibitive and stops gear advancement cold.

Just think, before 3.5 due to gear disparity and P2W versus the average player, like 90% were in obsidian gear. 3.5 comes along and big whoop. Your regrade chances (w/o charm) at the divine (now mid-rng grade) in obsidian is a whopping 6.5% that means 93.5% chance of complete destruction. Come on devs... give your playerbase a chance to play and at least a hope to catch up to the now god-tiered players who dominate the servers and lock them into freefarm mode getting richer, while the 90% get tired of not enjoying ANY end-game content, or having ANY realistic PVP chances, who can't even imagine being able to afford the wealthier players 50k to 100k crafted AH items... and quit when 3-D farmville grows solo and dull.

[stupidgirl]

I'm a returning player and me and a friend of mine has been playing in morpheus/thunderwing west for roughly around 2 months, we average around 4 hours play time a day but find ourselves playing less and less everyday. We bought patron with real money as soon as we started, and spend our entire day running packs/overseas cargo until our labor runs out. We tried joining pvp content as soon as we hit lvl cap, but realized it was a big mistake. So we grinded gold to reach where we are now which is 4000-4100 GS. And what's frustrating is, after these 2 months of gold grinding and routine PVE content, we felt like everything was in vain. We still get 1 shot by almost any attack, even when we're wearing plate/cloth depending on the enemy. We always come out of war zones with negative honor points gained, feeling like we were disposable 1 hit shield for our allies in any pvp event.

We're not asking for free divine/epic obsidian gears (which would be insulting to people who grinded 3 years for them), but I wish trion would give us new players a chance to participate in majority of these pvp content without being fodder. Even a non up-gradable dead end temporary set would be nice, something we can wear while until our obs/illustrous gear catch up.

Not to mention even in PVE content new players get blocked out, we've been kicked out multiple times when we tried joining serpentis because of our GS. And while leveling experienced and encountered instances of people being kicked out of GR, CR raids for being low level, even when we said we aren't alts. Overall archeage was a jewel at first in the eyes of new players, but slowly realize what it truly is as you dive deeper into the game. And see RNG hell.

defense pen will remove 100% of your defense, so don't even bother with gear. Just get level 50 gear and gem it and you will be better off than getting delph set without gems. Then work on pvp gear, and realize that its a few hundred k gold to get gear that will be good for pvp as epic sets and legendary weapons are the new pvp base gear.

[PenguinsFly]

Don't you guys realize that XL doesn't care about combat in this game anymore? : O

ArcheAge is pretty much just a Social Farmville MMORPG and it's doing a pretty good job on that. Log in, do your daily chores, tend your animals, crops, trees, run some trade packs, while chatting with friends!

[britxr]

"They said in the livestream where they talked about the XL meeting that they were FINALLY ABLE to have a discussion about gear gap" this is complete ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ how come xl games allowed russian servers to hand out free celestial obsidian t5 sets before 3.0 patch?? how come they allowed them to let ppl get free t5 divine obsidian sets\weapons+ through ingame events long ago which led to a huge success in keeping a playerbase and getting new players and in result having more population and servers.

you wanna tell me mail.ru has more control on their game version so they could do that stuff and u are not blind and seen that its what needed to be done but couldnt launch same events on ure version because xl games didnt allow u to??? then close the servers already, stop wasting ppl time let them play better versions\servers of archeage that are out there.

[BaconBit]

All of the EU servers' top 100's minimum gear score is 7.1k . The casual players, no p2w players, no mega multi account players, returning players, new players cannot catch or contest with any players right now; because everything is too expensive and you need to be heavy pay to win or you need to own many multi accounts + playing the game like 24/7 days if you want to gear up, catch other legacy players to do pvp or contest with them. Trion made the AA more p2w... One guild owns the whole server and thy make the profit and doing all AA content, so how Trion supposes other losing factions' players and guilds to fight against dominator guilds where almost most of these top 100 players gathered and thy are very organised and too geared comparing to other players and guilds.

Every EU servers are free farms of player nations and other rest of factions cannot do anything against these player nations. Good Job Trion, after merge and with 1 credit free transfers, all servers are ruined much more... If you are not in player nations then do not play AA or if you don't have mega many multi accounts the do not play AA or if you are not heavy p2w then do not bother to play AA. Thank you Trion for making AA like a real life job for players that ppl need to be in game for long hours to earn gold in hard ways like working in a real job... Most of players are doing trade runs or working on their farms mainly, noone is playing for fun or do pvp or fight against these domination guilds etc. anymore... If you don't believe EU servers' current bad condition, please come and check for one time really !!!! @Muzzy, we call you for duty for EU really !!! thank you.

This is exactly what people have been talking about since Player Nations started the downfall. Those in the gear gap who want to have fun without the time for AA to be their job are pointed out in raids as trash players. I guess they are trash if that's how trolls define players who have a real job and other life responsibilities besides playing AA. I personally don't mind my gear score reflecting that I have a life and don't prefer spending real money on a game but apparently to many vocal players I don't deserve to participate in what they see as their game lol.

[BeNice]

They don't seem to care. A new player has no chance to experience the PvP aspect of the game since they die in one shot. They have to farm for 3 years to get close to current players.

That's because new players are supposed to learn fast that they are supposed get out the credit card in order to play.

I don't think anything will be done about the gear gap because it's about money.
That's what player nations are about, money.
"I have 7k gs and going to start my own faction. Any one with 6.5k gs+ that wants to join my guild/nation can join and do most content together a.k.a. dominate the server. Now those of us who grinded the past 3 years like a full time job or spent the last 3 months swiping like a boss have the means to be fully rewarded in all our elitist glory even though credit cards and no job outside of AA has nothing to do with skill."

[Chie]

Reduce the damage , magic magic and heal damage from weapons by half while keep the current armor rate will solve a lot gear gap the problems . It not like low gears player can win , but at less they will not face rolled in 1 combo hit with T1 to T3 celestial buff gears.

[SakuraCalleil]

Its more difficult than most of you realise.
They have to balance the game between being P2W (LOL just oneshot some noob) and new player retention (omg some dude just oneshot me and stole my pack). Like it or not, whales fund this game (throught hundreds of apex and RNG boxes) so not giving them the godlike experience will make them look for another game. The feed (F2P players) are just as important as they also help retain whales, buy apex and keep the economy afloat.

This is the first P2W game I have ever played (Daoc and Eve online being the games before that). So I don't really have a suggestion for a solution. If they ever offered free decent tier gear, I'd generate a hundred extra accounts to profit from them on my main, so counter measures need to be in place to prevent abuse.