Remove Guild Renown Decay

[madmaxhunter]

I really hate the glib replies to guild renown that it doesn't matter if you're level 65 or 95. This is a game... and being a game, I'm going to work to improve all aspects of my experience in DDO.

I had a guildie come back after a six month break. He went directly to the Wayward Lobster. I summarily booted him from the guild. Another guildie just logs on to say hello and talk about his excitement of the coming of GW2. A third player came back after probably 9 months. But only for moments every few days. I'm about to kick them.

This is wrong. I am wrong. I know it. I have to be fair to the players that are actively working toward the guild's best interest. The player I kicked hasn't logged on since. I'm sure the players I'm about to kick will never play again. Great system there Turbine.

[LOOON375]

When I first started playing, I wanted to try to get into a large guild.

Im glad that I never did!!

Im glad that my friends and I started our own small guild.

We are a 3 account guild. We are totally unaffected by guild renown decay. I have monitored the numbers over the course of the night and compared to see if we got hit. We have never been knocked backwards one fricken bit.

We are hitting level 59 today sometime. And granted, I personally have earned a little over half of our total renown.

The larger the guild, the larger the amount of decay. And if you have a giant monster guild with tons of accounts, you are going to have decay.

Everyday on Argo it seems I see a guild name I have never seen before. I have played with tons of people that have left large guilds to create their own small guild.

[DocBenway]

... I have a small guild as in only 6 accounts....On the flip side, I don't want to invite ppl that don't play a lot as I don't want to increase the number of accounts and thus decay when it is so hard for us to keep up with the decay as it is. ...

The way the decay formula is currently broken, the minimum Modified Guild Size used in the decay calcultions is 10. You could kick 5 or add 4 and not see any difference in daily decay, since the smallest guild size according to decay is 10.

I'd rather not lose renown as double the actual size of my guild, but my harping on it in http://forums.ddo.com/showthread.php?t=362736 went with only other testimony of similar findings and no official response.

[MysticElaine]

When I first started playing, I wanted to try to get into a large guild.

Im glad that I never did!!

Im glad that my friends and I started our own small guild.

We are a 3 account guild. We are totally unaffected by guild renown decay. I have monitored the numbers over the course of the night and compared to see if we got hit. We have never been knocked backwards one fricken bit.

We are hitting level 59 today sometime. And granted, I personally have earned a little over half of our total renown.

The larger the guild, the larger the amount of decay. And if you have a giant monster guild with tons of accounts, you are going to have decay.

Everyday on Argo it seems I see a guild name I have never seen before. I have played with tons of people that have left large guilds to create their own small guild.

I have a 6 account (still considered small) guild and we get decay. We are lvl 57 almost 58. How are you not getting decay?

***EDIT*** Posted this at same time as DocBenway did apparantly in response to decay hitting as if you are at least a 10 account guild.

[LOOON375]

I have a 6 account (still considered small) guild and we get decay. We are lvl 57 almost 58. How are you not getting decay?

Personally I have no clue. A couple of times I have written down the renown number before going to bed and compared it to the number in the morning. Both times there was no change in the number.

Now granted, my play time is more than most can put into this game. I play practically every day.

Ill check again tonight to see if anything has changed.

[ladypummel]

As A leader of a large guild of 245 modified accounts at level 74 -75 i agree the decay system needs to be adjusted. The age old argument about not deserving and so on and so on is extremely unfair i mean we have been well established before and after guild ships and one of the first guilds on the orien server. Our daily decay currently is about 200k so in a week we see 1.4 million renown decay this kinda of number is insane i mean imagine if this was like exp and you worked hard and it kept getting taken away everyday. i mean at this pace we would lose 50 plus million renown in a year

[MartinusWyllt]

i mean at this pace we would lose 50 plus million renown in a year

Also, eventually you could have members that have accumulated enough renown that they could decimate your guild level by leaving since individual contribution numbers don't decay yet the sum does. I don't how how long it would take but, someday, a single player will probably be able to drop you down to 25 if not lower.

Maybe there's protection against that, I have no idea.

[MasterHephaestus]

Personally I would kick the whiners who are pushing me to kick the casual players. You don't NEED the ship or the buffs or the extra perks to get to end game. They're just that: perks. In my opinion, a PERK should never drive how you play your game.

You want better gear? Go get it.
You want more experience? Run more quests.
You want better buffs? Run with people that will buff you or get tomes or re-roll.

I understand that the renown system is broken and needs fixing but, jebus people!, don't let it drive how you interact with others. It's not just the game mechanics that drive away other players....

[McFlay]

The problem is that in the current environment, casual players are totally unwelcome in EVERY well established guild. Has nothing to do with what's available on the ships. Has everything to do with alienating a whole set of players from DDO entirely.

It has everythign to do with wanting a ship full of buffs and perks of being in an established guild.

If it had nothing to do with that, then all the casual players would just create/join casual guilds and guild level wouldn't matter to them.

[SardaofChaos]

Personally I would kick the whiners who are pushing me to kick the casual players. You don't NEED the ship or the buffs or the extra perks to get to end game. They're just that: perks. In my opinion, a PERK should never drive how you play your game.

You want better gear? Go get it.
You want more experience? Run more quests.
You want better buffs? Run with people that will buff you or get tomes or re-roll.

I understand that the renown system is broken and needs fixing but, jebus people!, don't let it drive how you interact with others. It's not just the game mechanics that drive away other players....

On the other hand, if the majority of the population do let it get to them, and continue acting as they are now, the system is far more likely to get fixed :/ Speaking as the leader of a guild that until a couple days ago contained only my father and I.

That bit about minimum modified guild size being 10 is helpful, now I know I haven't screwed myself by letting in a couple friends who decided to try out DDO.

[MasterHephaestus]

On the other hand, if the majority of the population do let it get to them, and continue acting as they are now, the system is far more likely to get fixed :/ Speaking as the leader of a guild that until a couple days ago contained only my father and I.

That bit about minimum modified guild size being 10 is helpful, now I know I haven't screwed myself by letting in a couple friends who decided to try out DDO.

I hear you, Sarda, as my guild only contains my wife and I.

I try to bite my tongue but everyone once in a while it escapes me and I remember why I live like a hermit five miles from my nearest neighbor.

[Tshober]

It has everythign to do with wanting a ship full of buffs and perks of being in an established guild.

If it had nothing to do with that, then all the casual players would just create/join casual guilds and guild level wouldn't matter to them.

Alright, that's true. I should not have said "nothing". But, as others have pointed out, the additional perks above level 62 are pretty weak. It's just that human nature makes people want to keep leveling up their guild, regardless of how minor the additional perks may be. Very few, if any, casual guilds will ever see level 62 though, with the current decay setup.

Despite your correction, I still beleive the renown decay is the root cause for caual players being unwelcome in well established DDO guilds, and that in turn makes them at least feel unwelcome in DDO generally. To them it appears that DDO is only suitable for power gamers or lifers that are always online.

[McFlay]

Alright, that's true. I should not have said "nothing". But, as others have pointed out, the additional perks above level 62 are pretty weak. It's just that human nature makes people want to keep leveling up their guild, regardless of how minor the additional perks may be. Very few, if any, casual guilds will ever see level 62 though, with the current decay setup.

Despite your correction, I still beleive the renown decay is the root cause for caual players being unwelcome in well established DDO guilds, and that in turn makes them at least feel unwelcome in DDO generally. To them it appears that DDO is only suitable for power gamers or lifers that are always online.

Did you ever stop and think for a second what a new, casual player has to offer to an established guild of active players? With decay, they are just a little thorn in the side of the guild with nothing to offer. Without it, they aren't a little thorn in the side of the guild anymore, but they still have literally nothing to offer that guild. There are plenty of good players willing to help noobs, but I don't see where a noob is at all entitled entrance into a high level established guild right from the begining.

I see guilds recruiting every day I log on...why not join a new guild with other new players rather then expecting to jump into a established guild of veterans and have them spoon feed you everything.

Face it, some guilds are always going to have requirements. Some expect a certain level of game knowledge, some expect a certain level of activity, and some expect you just to be a fun player. With or without decay...guilds are still goign to have requirements and expectations of their players. Maybe people should be more concerned about finding a guild with people they enjoy playing with who have a similiar mindset about the game as them instead of jumping right into an "established DDO guild."

[Ungood]

Or at least find some better alternative way to implement the decay.

The current method or farming for guild renown and then having it decay is poorly implemented and actually alienates many potential DDO players.

I have been against Guild renown Decay since it was first implemented, it is nothing but grind for the sake of grind, with no other point of purpose behind it, and while sadly such a mechanic is needed in MMO's curtail the power gamers, it eventually hurts the game as a whole overall.

I proposed an alternate suggestion a while back on how to deal with guilds and buffs, in a way that would boost player interaction. With Guild Alliances.

Anyway.

I signed all the other ones, I'll /Sign this one too.

[Falco_Easts]

I do not understand why a MMO like DDO, that is competing with other MMO's for every available player, would deliberately choose to implement a guild level decay system that, in effect, makes all casual and semi-casual players totally unwelcome in DDO's guilds.

They are not unwelcome in all guilds, just the ones that treat guild level as the be all and end all. Nothing is stopping guilds from forming two guilds and sharing a chat channel.
Legends - Elite
Legends - Casual
All of the benefits of playing with your mates, none of the downside of their casual playstyle.

I would personally prefer they remove all buffs along with renown. That failed update changed what guilds were about and not in a good way.

[Beethoven]

Did you ever stop and think for a second what a new, casual player has to offer to an established guild of active players?

Let me throw the question back at you, did you ever stop to think there could be more to a human being than the amount of time they spend playing a computer game?

Used to be guilds that were open to new players simply for the chance of meeting new and interesting personalities. Also, new players could be RL friends of existing guild members. Casual players could be RL spouses of existing guild members. It's not about entitlement, but about getting penalized for letting them in the guild.

Sadly, that's the effect - say I have me and my nine friends have an own guild and are fairly active. Now I let a casual player in the guild who can only play twice a week, help him/her learn the game and get penalized by additional decay (11 accounts vs 10). Lets assume they each have a spouse who also can only devote one or two days a week and our decay is going exponentially so far that not only their contributions get eliminated but also some of ours (the highly active members).

You could, of course, argue if my wife does not have the time to contribute enough I should not allow my spouse in my guild ... but seriously? You could also argue guild level shouldn't affect people and can largely be ignored. Then again, what good is a system that should be ignored by a good amount of the players? You could even argue the system is front loaded. However, stagnation is not fun. You can also tell the dude who just completed his sixty-fifth EV6 and still did not pull a SoS shard that an epic SoS is not all that important and how his dps is decent enough. It's not going to make him feel less frustrated.

I do understand (and even applaud) were Turbine wanted to go with it, giving the hardcore something were they can set themselves apart from casual players. However, it is flawed and I feel they underestimated how much it contributes to make veteran players seem unwelcoming to new players and how it needless frustrates casual players.

So, /signed.

The far better solution would have been to use guild size to calculate the amount of renown needed to reach the next level (instead of used for decay). So, in other words a guild with 50 accounts would need twice the Renown to reach, say, level 25 than a guild with 25 accounts. It'd have worked as well in slowing large guilds down (as the more accounts they have the more Renown they need for the next level) and it might even worked better to level the playing fields between small and large guilds.

The second part were I feel they went wrong is making the system cap at level 100. They should have left it open ended with some (minor) rewards for, say, each 50 level beyond 100. This way hardcore guilds could have continued to compete instead of getting stuck at level 100 with the only chance to beat another hardcore guild being hoping the other competitors will loose members (or have individual members become inactive enough) to loose a level again.

[McFlay]

But it is about entitlement. If your purpose in a guild is just to enjoy the personalities of various people, then you wouldn't care at all about your guild level, would you?

Furthermore, what's stopping you from grouping with non-guildies? You can still chat with them, quest with them, and invite them to your ship for buffs, and you can even make a private chat channel and invite them all to it.

I think I'd have to agree with Falco-Easts on this one. If they get rid of decay, please just get rid of guild buffs at the same time.

[kclark1980]

I think I'd have to agree with Falco-Easts on this one. If they get rid of decay, please just get rid of guild buffs at the same time.

I have to agree with this also. I can't stand the decay process but it's a balance. If one goes then the other would need to also. I did like the idea of having the guild renown being used to get the buffs but something does need to change.

[Rhysem]

I support anything that reduces pointless grind in game. Guild renown, the current crafting implementation, farming your brains out for super rare drops or 20-raids-till-a-good-reward-list (in theory) or whatever. Grind sucks in a game. If I wanted to grind, I'd go cook something (nothing better than cooking with freshly ground spices).

[Qzipoun]

I have to be fair to the players that are actively working toward the guild's best interest. The player I kicked hasn't logged on since. I'm sure the players I'm about to kick will never play again. Great system there Turbine.

Very true, everyone is shafted by the current system. Turbine most of all because the system is detrimental to those trying to help newbies or returning players