Mature Players/Role Players Speak Out about D&DO's Future

[Rason]

I just responded to a post asking "Which server is the RP server?"

...

I remember posting about Server transfers, designate one server officially RP sanctioned and allow a one time free xfr to or from it so like minded people can find the best home.

There are scattered RP guilds across all servers, they are still scattered. ****, just label a server and instead of all these +1 Loot/XP, free shards let us transfer already.

My only worry on this is they would need to give more free transfers for people who are not roleplayers to transfer off the chosen server and onto another. If there was infact another server generated then at least then they are only transferring the roleplayers to that server, the minority out of everyone in D&D Online.

I for one don't want to see any more +1 Loot/XP weekends thrown around because people ask for them or because of maintenance downtime or to gain free dragonshards.. both of these events ruin the economy inside the game and on top of that there are better ways to make us happy.

[Mattax]

I have supported this game from Beta and Headstart. It is the only MMO adaption to the DnD I have grown to love over my 27 years.

That is disheartening about the lack of presence at the Turbine booth. That is really sad. People were saying that might happen with Turnine banking on LoTRO being thier "main game." Frankly I think the gameplay mechanics are better in DDO. Much better. Plus the lack of wizards in LoTRO makes for a boring video game IMO.

DDO has everything it needs to be a GREAT game. Heck, even the BEST Fantasy MMORPG. But it needs more options. Evil alignments and conflict are a must for immersion. And even if you aren't an RPer everyone likes to be immeresed in thier game. Right?

More emotes, sitting in chairs and stuff are small things that we need. A more dynamic world would be nice as well.

All in all it is Turbine that was going for an MMO that "breaks the mold" with this game when it started. They quickly realized that some parts that are traditional in MMOs are there for a reason. They make for gameplay that people are willing to pay for.

Well us RPers are willing to pay for a product that support our playstyle. DDO has failed us so far. I really hope to see it at least TRY and attempt to meet some of our wishes that are not too hard to implement.

[Snike]

You could have discussed the DDO at PAX issue without making it another doom/future post which the forums seem to have a bombardment of the last couple months. So excuse me of calling it another stupid doom/future post.

[Attomic]

Just one question to offer, and please understand that it is no way a criticism of RP-oriented players in DDO:

How do you make up for the lack of a living, reactive, creative DM in an MMO? Much of the life of RP at the table comes from the live interaction of players and DM. Don't get me wrong - I understand that a lot of RP can happen even without a DM, but much of the most important, story-advancing RP is created between the players and the DM.

Again, not criticizing; I just don't get it and am genuinely curious.

[Rason]

You could have discussed the DDO at PAX issue without making it another doom/future post which the forums seem to have a bombardment of the last couple months. So excuse me of calling it another stupid doom/future post.

Well, this thread started without even knowing anything about PAX. It just happened to be a mature topic that has come up and we want to discuss. Just because this thread so far doesn't sound all positive, doesn't mean we have a heart for DDO.

Our discussion about PAX is moreso just to get some steam behind Turbine or our wheels on working out why they didn't do it and what we can do to help Turbine. At least that is how I look at the grand picture.

I hate 'doom' threads and I didn't intend this one to be that way, if you believe it is, feel free to go elsewhere while we try to help out Turbine/DDO in some way shape or form..

[Attomic]

Well, this thread started without even knowing anything about PAX. It just happened to be a mature topic that has come up and we want to discuss. Just because this thread so far doesn't sound all positive, doesn't mean we have a heart for DDO.

Our discussion about PAX is moreso just to get some steam behind Turbine or our wheels on working out why they didn't do it and what we can do to help Turbine. At least that is how I look at the grand picture.

I hate 'doom' threads and I didn't intend this one to be that way, if you believe it is, feel free to go elsewhere while we try to help out Turbine/DDO in some way shape or form..

I do wish Turbine would put as much into DDO as they do into LotRO.

[Rason]

Just one question to offer, and please understand that it is no way a criticism of RP-oriented players in DDO:

How do you make up for the lack of a living, reactive, creative DM in an MMO? Much of the life of RP at the table comes from the live interaction of players and DM. Don't get me wrong - I understand that a lot of RP can happen even without a DM, but much of the most important, story-advancing RP is created between the players and the DM.

Again, not criticizing; I just don't get it and am genuinely curious.

Don't apologise. It is a good question!

The way I play DDO when I am heading a RP party is that because most of us have run missions a number of times, we use creative licence. Some people change the quest they are about to do to be slightly different to allow for more creativity like adding more detail into the quest that doesn't hamper it in any way (mostly pre-quest meetup with this) or you just go with the flow.. Sure we don't have a DM but the party leader can be one to help feed information that spurs RP that may even be irrelevant to the quest like "Who did this.." etc.

It definitely is difficult to anticipate having a replacement for the DM chair in the game but all in all, with the games I've done, we all help each other to move the game along RP wise just as much as a DM does..

Sorry if this is mish-mash, at work at present..

[Rason]

I do wish Turbine would put as much into DDO as they do into LotRO.

Here here! I browse over their boards and it reminds me of how DDO used to be with the forums. I want those days back.

[LordFancyPants]

This has been mentioned several times on these forums, but I will put it in this thread as well. Turbine doesn't handle the marketing for DDO. Atari does. Turbine does handle the marketing for Lotro.... which is way they appear to market it more. If you want to know why this game isn't at PAX, ask Atari. Just an FYI.

[Rason]

This has been mentioned several times on these forums, but I will put it in this thread as well. Turbine doesn't handle the marketing for DDO. Atari does. Turbine does handle the marketing for Lotro.... which is way they appear to market it more. If you want to know why this game isn't at PAX, ask Atari. Just an FYI.

Thanks! I don't check all posts generally so I had no idea, thank you for this input

[Falco_Easts]

Biggest thing i would like to see is your choices reflected in what happens. You smash X% of crates in a quest and you slide towards chaotic. You choose complete a quest this way instead of that way and it has different results when you go back to quest giver or try to move onto next part of quest. Would take a lot of work coding that sort of thing but think it would be worth it.

[Rason]

Biggest thing i would like to see is your choices reflected in what happens. You smash X% of crates in a quest and you slide towards chaotic. You choose complete a quest this way instead of that way and it has different results when you go back to quest giver or try to move onto next part of quest. Would take a lot of work coding that sort of thing but think it would be worth it.

Alignment Change: Now out of all the ideas on the forum THAT one has to be the best

As for the mission paths, this is very much how Tabula Rasa is doing their missions with their Ethics System and it is something I would love to see in D&D Online since it is a genre which SHOULD have those sort of choices.

[Valdieron]

I think for the most part, DDO is what you make it. People will always have differing expectations and 'wants' from a game, but you can rarely (if ever) get them all, especially when there are so many variables for an Online game.

From what I have seen, people have been driven away from DDO by the loot wh*#ing which pervades nearly every group. I mean, who hasn't been in a group where someone "undeserving" has pulled a set of +5 Mith FP after doing nothing to help the group, where you might get your ghost touch shield for half an hours furious key-pressing to keep the rest of the party alive?? When people see this, they tend to get bitter. This is why guild groups do raids in small numbers, not only because they are greedy, but to decrease the feeling of let-down when the loot goes to someone else. With games like LOTR where the loot is 'fixed' ie you know what choices you can get at the end of the quest, and where 'in-quest' loot is the occasional potion and silver, you know that when you get done with the quest you can get the item you most feel like. In LOTR there is no 'rinse and repeat' for uber gear. Some people enjoy that. Me, I love running pop dozens of times in the chance of getting something good, that's what draws me back. Am I a loot w*#@e? Probably :-) But I like gaming that way. I'm not big on voice chat, I don't feel the need to express my opinion on every role of the dice from go-to-woe... "Awww did you see me vorpal that guy!", "my spell just hit for 75432 HP!", "Wonder what will happen if I press this button"... DDO for me is fun, testing my characters against the game and trying to get the best loot. I don't care too much for the RP side of it, if I did I would go back to PnP.

From someone who plays both DDO and LOTR, I think you will find people will be back. yes they leave DDO to play LOTR, but they will be let down. While good, LOTR is by no means great from an enjoyment point of view (beyond the 20 - 30 hour mark anyway). Combat is cheesier than my mums Lasagne, at least in DDO you can jump around and attack and fire bows and cast spells. People say "OK try moving in real life and firing a bow", but who the hell wants a game that simulates real life? Go play SIMS. This is what makes a fantasy world, abilities which defy what we as normal human beings are limited by. Where DDO is a grind from repetitive quest point of view, LOTR is a grind from the "OK I need 50 more ore, let me wait til it respawns" point of view. People will enjoy it or they won't. Like Everquest, it's not the be-all and end-all of a MMORPG.

So what will make DDO better??

Chain quests... More chain quests.... Quests where if you get to the end of the chain, the loot isn't necessarily RAID loot, but based on the difficulty of the quest and the fact you have fought your way to the end. Maybe quests where you know what the end reward will be, before partaking. Classed-based rewards are also cheesy, as they in no way reflect classes properly.


Crafting... Crafting in LOTR is monotonous, but good when you want to pass the time without questing or dealing with people or when the servers are quiet and your mates are all at the footy. What fails in LOTR is that the craft items are 'generally' **** compared to what you get for quest rewards. Unique recipes are what's needed, where anybody can find a recipe and then be able to quest for the items needed for said recipe. People need not be skilled in crafting, but be able to take the items to an NPC and pay for an item to be made.

SETS... I'm talking groups of items that add bonuses the more items of the set you have. ie, Dragoncrafted Armor, Dragoncrafted helm, dragoncrafted shield, dragoncrafted boots.... get em all, and give you a dragon-like ability to breath fire (and not piddly burning hands). Give us something worth grinding for.

Guild Halls.... Already been discussed. Many features you could bring with guild halls that would make people enjoy DDO much more.

Random Quests... Imagine you are standing in the Wayward Lobster, and instead of clicking on some goon, you are approached by an NPC who has a quest for you. You have 1 minute to assemble a party or he goes elsewhere. OK this might be biased towards guild groups, but hey get in a guild if you're not, and if you don't want to, then tough, you just miss out if you can't get a group formed.


PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE don't make me walk for 10 minutes to get somewhere! I really don't care to stretch my legs in the wilderness for more than a minute or 2. Threnal is good, a few goons to kill on the way, but I don't feel like I am running for half the night just to get to a quest! People will leave for that very reason. Some don't have the time to run for 15 minutes to get somewhere. Or if you bring in an instance like that where you can run / fight / loot / farm on the way to a location, at least make it so people can choose not to. yes you might have some where you need to run for 20 minutes fighting mobs every step of the way, that might actually be entertaining, but the dreaded Point A to Point B won't wash with a lot of people.


Anyway, I've babbled on long enough. Just a few reasons why I think people will be back to DDO (or its Replacement) and a few things I think would make it a better game. Please take what I have said with a grain of salt, and take no offense if you feel differently, these are just my thoughts and feelings.

Cheers,

[Kanai]

You could have discussed the DDO at PAX issue without making it another doom/future post which the forums seem to have a bombardment of the last couple months. So excuse me of calling it another stupid doom/future post.

I'll retort and then let this exchange die. I don't frequent these forums...and I'm not aware what is on other threads. Nor do I care. I am here to support a guildmates thread, and all my feedback is legit, based on fact and experience, and I can express whatever views I **** well please.

You, in turn, are interjecting in a well-stated, legit conversation in this thread with baseless criticism. No one is forcing you to read this thread, so just don't. It's really quite simple.

[Rason]

I think for the most part, DDO is what you make it. People will always have differing expectations and 'wants' from a game, but you can rarely (if ever) get them all, especially when there are so many variables for an Online game.

Just today this talk has occured on Sarlona's boards with concerns to RP actually..

From what I have seen, people have been driven away from DDO by the loot wh*#ing which pervades nearly every group. I mean, who hasn't been in a group where someone "undeserving" has pulled a set of +5 Mith FP after doing nothing to help the group, where you might get your ghost touch shield for half an hours furious key-pressing to keep the rest of the party alive?? When people see this, they tend to get bitter. This is why guild groups do raids in small numbers, not only because they are greedy, but to decrease the feeling of let-down when the loot goes to someone else. With games like LOTR where the loot is 'fixed' ie you know what choices you can get at the end of the quest, and where 'in-quest' loot is the occasional potion and silver, you know that when you get done with the quest you can get the item you most feel like. In LOTR there is no 'rinse and repeat' for uber gear. Some people enjoy that. Me, I love running pop dozens of times in the chance of getting something good, that's what draws me back. Am I a loot w*#@e? Probably :-) But I like gaming that way. I'm not big on voice chat, I don't feel the need to express my opinion on every role of the dice from go-to-woe... "Awww did you see me vorpal that guy!", "my spell just hit for 75432 HP!", "Wonder what will happen if I press this button"... DDO for me is fun, testing my characters against the game and trying to get the best loot. I don't care too much for the RP side of it, if I did I would go back to PnP.

I am completely the same. Without my PC working at present and with all the whining around and the fact that DDO lacks some aspects I would love to see, I was ready to go to LotRO. Now though with all the PAX discussion, I am instead staying. I am very stubborn and for sure I won't let anyone push me away till my pants are set on fire from the ship going down.

Role play is very much a very big aspect for me and I want to try and get Turbine to listen to us to implement some features that are already in another aspect of their G3 engine, so why not put them here too.

From someone who plays both DDO and LOTR, I think you will find people will be back. yes they leave DDO to play LOTR, but they will be let down. While good, LOTR is by no means great from an enjoyment point of view (beyond the 20 - 30 hour mark anyway). Combat is cheesier than my mums Lasagne, at least in DDO you can jump around and attack and fire bows and cast spells. People say "OK try moving in real life and firing a bow", but who the hell wants a game that simulates real life? Go play SIMS. This is what makes a fantasy world, abilities which defy what we as normal human beings are limited by. Where DDO is a grind from repetitive quest point of view, LOTR is a grind from the "OK I need 50 more ore, let me wait til it respawns" point of view. People will enjoy it or they won't. Like Everquest, it's not the be-all and end-all of a MMORPG.

As above, I was about to go but I am too stubborn to leave.

So what will make DDO better??

Chain quests... More chain quests.... Quests where if you get to the end of the chain, the loot isn't necessarily RAID loot, but based on the difficulty of the quest and the fact you have fought your way to the end. Maybe quests where you know what the end reward will be, before partaking. Classed-based rewards are also cheesy, as they in no way reflect classes properly.


Crafting... Crafting in LOTR is monotonous, but good when you want to pass the time without questing or dealing with people or when the servers are quiet and your mates are all at the footy. What fails in LOTR is that the craft items are 'generally' **** compared to what you get for quest rewards. Unique recipes are what's needed, where anybody can find a recipe and then be able to quest for the items needed for said recipe. People need not be skilled in crafting, but be able to take the items to an NPC and pay for an item to be made.

SETS... I'm talking groups of items that add bonuses the more items of the set you have. ie, Dragoncrafted Armor, Dragoncrafted helm, dragoncrafted shield, dragoncrafted boots.... get em all, and give you a dragon-like ability to breath fire (and not piddly burning hands). Give us something worth grinding for.

Guild Halls.... Already been discussed. Many features you could bring with guild halls that would make people enjoy DDO much more.

Random Quests... Imagine you are standing in the Wayward Lobster, and instead of clicking on some goon, you are approached by an NPC who has a quest for you. You have 1 minute to assemble a party or he goes elsewhere. OK this might be biased towards guild groups, but hey get in a guild if you're not, and if you don't want to, then tough, you just miss out if you can't get a group formed.

Crafting is a big must and it should be unique as D&D's system is unique in itself. Although to have a system where it takes days would be impractical but perhaps base the time around where maybe a day ingame may end up being a few hours or such. Therefore our characters can be placed somewhere, started to craft, and in a day our time the item should be done. Perhaps even longer since in D&D the items we make may/can be much more powerful than WoW crafted items or LotRO etc. This will make people whine more but to me as a player and DM it is more logical to lengthen the times.

Random Quests I would love to see, period. Something out of the ordinary where the game engine rolls on an encounter table and it brings up one option: Save a Phiarlan of royal blood. It sends you to an area which is selected from a list much like a wilderness area and you go from there.. I know this is sketchy and will have flaws but its the idea in my head, far from fleshed out.

Guild Halls would be great when we can make furniture, banners, etc.. good ol' crafting at its finest

Sets would be interesting but reminds me a bit of Diablo 2. If it was more for looks, I would be all for it. If it was for extra bonuses, I don't think I would be one to appreciate that in D&D. But nice idea otherwise

Um.. whats left.. Chain quest.. I left this to last since this is an automatic hell yes.. the chain quests are the most enjoyable part of D&D Online and to have more variety in this department, more creativity, would be a life saver to a great game. It would be good if the Devs would approach people on the forum to give concepts for quests, not necessarily make it from scratch but give the general idea of a plot outline, possible monsters, encounters, etc. Then they could run with it or dump it.

I'd be up for helping on that if they ever offered. I would care not how the mission ended up except that I helped with spurring the brain juices in creativity

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE don't make me walk for 10 minutes to get somewhere! I really don't care to stretch my legs in the wilderness for more than a minute or 2. Threnal is good, a few goons to kill on the way, but I don't feel like I am running for half the night just to get to a quest! People will leave for that very reason. Some don't have the time to run for 15 minutes to get somewhere. Or if you bring in an instance like that where you can run / fight / loot / farm on the way to a location, at least make it so people can choose not to. yes you might have some where you need to run for 20 minutes fighting mobs every step of the way, that might actually be entertaining, but the dreaded Point A to Point B won't wash with a lot of people.

I would like to see more missions that have you walk to the quest like Threnal, etc. Maybe have a scattering of subquests that all happen along the way. More of that I would love with some nice scenery or locations, etc. I know we have them but those honestly are what I love to see while we have some shorter missions where you enter a door and voila, you are there, for when we don't have so much time to play (i.e. a work night, etc).

Anyway, I've babbled on long enough. Just a few reasons why I think people will be back to DDO (or its Replacement) and a few things I think would make it a better game. Please take what I have said with a grain of salt, and take no offense if you feel differently, these are just my thoughts and feelings.

Cheers,

I enjoyed your reply immensely Phew.. anyway.. my day is almost over at work. This is it from me for now.

[Anastasios]

Let's take a look at the big picture, just a couple of things I've noticed recently that makes me wonder about the future of the game.

1. Go to any video game store, or your normal buy video game enterprise and take a look at the shelves. No DDO, no Prepaid cards. You will see LOTRO games and cards, but a big negative on DDO.

2. Server Merge, the removal of half the servers on DDO, of course we can only wonder where they went, lol...

3. Delays of monthly updates.

4. Go to the Turbine Employment page, take a look at the job postings and look for any information pertinent to maybe new hires for DDO, although there will be none specifically stating to work on DDO, it can be safe to say that the openings have no real bias towards a game already over 1 and a 1/2 years old.

Now let's put some reasoning together. Turbine is a private company and of course being a private company you have limited resources at your expenditure-layman's=deep pocket's aren't really a private company's strength. So Turbine has put most of it's available resources into LOTRO, this is a no brainer, and it's trying to ride LOTRO for all it is worth, because in the grand scheme of things, Turbine only made so much money from DDO since it's inception. Think of the licenses, think of the wages, think of everything possible Turbine has had to pay for in regards to DDO, and for those who have been around since beta and day one, think of how much of a failure this game in regards to how many people this game had the first two months, and how many they have right now.

Now think of how much LOTRO has cost Turbine. I personally think they paid double the total amount for the licenses than DDO, and probably put more money into development than DDO. I haven't touched LOTRO, but I'll tell you what, I see a lot of shelf space dedicated to it at Best Buy, I see jobs offered at Turbine in regards to it, and I bet the population on the LOTRO servers are at a higher number than they are here at DDO.

If Turbine were forced to keep only of these two games, which would be the one. Some might say LOTRO, some might say DDO, but we all really know the real answer, Frodo would not be homeless and Velah would surely recieve a kick to the curb. No sense to ride the old horse in the Derby when you got the young Filly ready to go. It's almost safe to say DDO was the test platform for what not to do, and LOTRO is the resolution of righting the wrong. That is how I look at it, or I would hope for Turbine's sake, that is what is going down.

Now, does DDO make money at this stage in its life? Of course I mentioned Turbine is a private company, we may never get the real answer, but I believe it would be safe to say overall, it has, but I would imagine within the past year it has made substantially less than its first 6 mos. Of course taking resources from DDO to LOTRO is something I've mentioned a few times, I would imagine the servers went there, I would imagine that is where a lot of the customer service personnel are at (think of when it was a 5 min window to get a GM, now think of how long it takes), and I would imagine that is where Turbine's focus is at in general.

So I believe it is safe to assume that DDO is in what you call a long term development cycle, and long term meaning that the initial plans for DDO are nowhere near the timeline they were 6 months ago. Monks, Half orc's, Guild Housing, these were all part of a plan, that plan has drastically changed since the launch of LOTRO, and I can only think that the incorporation of these ideas may someday hit but then again they might not. The future of DDO is going to be based on the success of LOTRO in my opinion, and that is what troubles me because if Turbine stays successful with LOTRO, then they will want to put more into that game. If Turbine starts losing on LOTRO, then they will want to put more into LOTRO UNLESS they have another game up their sleeves, and if they do not, they will push LOTRO more than DDO because of the popularity of LOTR, and because they have put more money into it.

The only way I see DDO ever making a comeback is if one of two things happen. The first being that LOTRO becomes the MMO to play, Turbine then might consider funneling money and resources into an expansion for it's 'dead' franchise. This would breathe new life into a good game, although it would be a risk, because of it's track record. The second thing would probably be a buyout of Turbine by a much larger company, think of WoW for those who know Blizzard's history, of course I believe any company that did put money and resources into DDO would only do so knowing they would make money and might change the game for the better or for the worse.

I think that I can only say that DDO is a MMO that is nearing its judgement day, and I believe that the financial bads easily outweigh the good in this game's situation. The recent changes, the recent delays, the recent other happenings at Turbine only reinforce this aspect and it is safe to say that DDO is not priority one, it might not even be priority two, and that does not necessarily mean bad for DDO, but it also does not bode well.

Eventually we might get some 'good' news in regards to DDO that has some real bearing upon this game, but why tell people this game is dead as a company when you can still make a buck or two. Not saying that that is happening here, but you never know, business is business, and they won't ever tell us the obvious, which we all already know-this game does need people to survive, and due to our population, I can only think that more people will leave due to boredom by the end of the year than there will be new players coming and playing this game and actually staying.

And when you really think about it, other games have much more to offer than this game anyways, I don't blame anyone for not sticking around and playing this game, considering the fact that most of the population has run these quests over and over and over again, I'd rather play something new with other new people and learn with them.

As for your role play server, good luck, good idea for alot of the RPer's, sad part is, it could have been an easy thing for Turbine to do that would have breathed new life into this game, especially since they just did the server merge and EASILY COULD HAVE incorporated this. Sorry about your luck, although there are many other games that will accept you.

[Dingo123]

This game requires far too much in terms of player teamwork for it to last much longer.

I mean I WANTED to play recently...

but I couldn't.

First I set up my LFG flag.

And waited.

Then I tried to create my own team.

And waited.

Finally I started scanning for teams that I could just take part in with my character at all.

Nothing.

So I began scanning for teams my OTHER characters could take part in... but by then all that was left was two high level teams.

I logged off in frustration.

This is on argobar... one of the most populated servers...

I want this game to succeed SO BAD... but the Devs keep mucking it up.

[Attomic]

I'll retort and then let this exchange die. I don't frequent these forums...and I'm not aware what is on other threads. Nor do I care. I am here to support a guildmates thread, and all my feedback is legit, based on fact and experience, and I can express whatever views I **** well please.

You, in turn, are interjecting in a well-stated, legit conversation in this thread with baseless criticism. No one is forcing you to read this thread, so just don't. It's really quite simple.

FYI, proclaiming that your part in a discussion is "well-stated" and "legit" does not necessarily make it so. Self-analysis, brother.

[Anastasios]

This game requires far too much in terms of player teamwork for it to last much longer.

I mean I WANTED to play recently...
........................
.......................

I logged off in frustration.

This is on argobar... one of the most populated servers...

I want this game to succeed SO BAD... but the Devs keep mucking it up.

It's sad, you try doing something or getting something done, but most people are content with their 'peeps' or really don't like new blood. They'll tell you 'join our guild, we rock' and then you'll have the same problem coz IMO guilds end up limiting you to a certain degree. I wouldn't call this a dev problem, I'd put this up as a population issue, and in this game, it is a sad truth that this happens to people. Of course I'm guilty of it, but noone can tell me I don't outlet or mingle with people I don't know, I've been pleasently surprised recently by certain groups so hopefully you have better luck in the future.

[bandyman1]

FYI, proclaiming that your part in a discussion is "well-stated" and "legit" does not necessarily make it so. Self-analysis, brother.

FYI, I found his viewpoints totally legit. And I also see that he has more than enough experience with the game to offer some insight into this discussion. He's been here since the game launched. That gives him lots of understanding of the workings of the game with which to offer input.