Guild Renown Changes

[Chaos000]

I want to argue against your proposal:

It's fine. Was just a suggestion to allow for both a leveling and ranking system. No real way to make everyone happy so currently all we have is to spout new ideas to be considered.

As far as selling crystals... because crystals are a set permanent purchase, making ships more easily attainable may boost sales short term but once everything has been purchased, the revenue will start to decline.

Making guild renown potions more "worth" purchasing while making renown gain continue to be relevant after everything has been achieved makes sense for long term sales. The new system makes guild renown potions much more worth purchasing for larger guilds who before have been avoiding them because they could not advance despite the use of renown potions. Smaller guilds that are not able to advance due to the limited membership and no desire to add in numbers, have less reason currently to purchase renown potions as it will not result in sustainable growth.

I am ok with tying decay with ship size. Bigger ship = increased decay, smaller ship = reduction in decay, smallest ship = 0 decay. At least this way players that want the highest rank "could" reach it and have some control over how much "work" they have to do.

If it's a system of no decay until a guild reaches a certain threshold, it makes sense to require battling against decay in some form in order to maintain the very best buffs and/or the biggest ship because realistically some guilds care only about the "best" buffs and once that is achieved will no longer purchase the gold amenities with turbine points or the renown potions for level progression.

I like the definition of smaller guilds being expanded however, if decay is reduced or eliminated entirely there is no longer a need to allot a bonus based on guild sizes.

[slarden]

The chief concern is that now there is strong incentive to merge pretty much all guilds into a few super-guilds per server. I see it happening on Argo, and gotta say, not a fan.

We've had large guilds recruiting from small guilds on Sarlona also. I don't mind if people want to switch guilds, but I don't want it to because the system heavily favors large guilds.

[slarden]

Turn it around. You've stated that there is effort required to grow a guild (particularly true if you wish to only add likeminded players). Why shouldn't this effort be rewarded? Why should players in a larger guild be penalized by not gaining renown for the time they spend growing their guild?

I think guilds that wanted to be large recruited heavily and became large. This is something they did because they wanted to spend their game time doing so. I received numerous random recruitments on my bank toons. Mostly from large guilds where this is the culture. They want to be big and that is fine.

No I don't see a reason why it should be rewarded as a person's contribution to this game has nothing to do with guild size and everything to do with what they do in quests/lfms/pugs/channels/etc. There is much more to this game than guild chat.

[Blue100000005]

I have people join, then say "until a bigger guild recruits me" after they accept. These people are ******s, they leave and take 25% of renown earned, and leave me with one more person on my roster for 14 days. The big guilds are wielding too much in game power.

I also hate how people always ask for ship buffs when not in a guild. If the buffs are important enough to ask for, join a guild for them. I refuse to allow people not in my guild on my ship if they decline a guild invite. I would LOVE to see the invite removed also.

[psykopeta]

there's a dumbass part of the guild renown equation: 6 members guild needs same renown than a 138123623 members guild

the petition was "don't punish large guilds that invite even to npc ingame" cause nobody asked for a limit of players

the reality was "let's **** small guilds" cause the change they made... now decay isn't affected by guild members, good idea

decay isn't affected by guild members? good idea
renown needed isn't affected by guild members? -_-UUU awful idea, let's invite like mads, oh true, remove penalization for leaving guild, inactivity, etc

this way the less players, the worst will be for the guild, doesnt matter the time they spend, in a 6 members' guild they will get same renown as a 24 members guild, that leaves from 25 to infinite, the big piece of cake

is this useful turbine? no, in fact seems u did it only for leaders worried about their guild lvl(when before other guilds reached 100, nowadays every korthos army hits 100, yeah turbine you made it so easy that now we need more than 100 lvls)

if 6 members from a guild kill a dragon, the renown they get is based in the guild size, the question is: why the renown needed isn't based in guild size? the trouble was decay, i've seen what decay does in a big guild, could remove all the work of the guild in a week (in fact this guild shouldn't get higher lvl if others guild reached 100 the reason is it was possible, am i wrong?XD) so they complained and turbine changed the decay, didn't remove "cause it will make renown too easy" only applied the decay of a 6 member guild

reall reall really? 400 members (average size since the decay change) getting same decay as a 6 members guild, but "it's not making renown too easy", in fact every member of the tiny guild "just" has to PLAY as 16 players of the big guild (having in mind that tiny guild guy gets 4 times the renown they get in the bigger guild)

luckily tiny guilds never will come to complain, or will never heard (cause if there are 6-10 members for guild... why should anybody hear them?XD) , that reminds me some political situation that happens very often

turbine should remove the renown system til they have something that worths the effort on it, if they are giving something to some players, they should give the same to all players, til they have something with equalty for players, not satisfying cryers, satisfying cryers is the 1st step of the decay... of a game

[Chaos000]

I'm pretty sure that the moment a character capped guild hits 100, the system will be reworked because now turbine has a benchmark on exactly how long it took for a guild that benefited most from this change to get to 100 along with what is a reasonable expectation of activity in a character capped guild. If the bar was lowered too far, it'll probably be raised for all of us.

I fully believe there are some qualitative diminishing values that result in guilds increasing in size. How it will play out is just speculation at this point.

They've already mentioned that they will continue to tweak the system, it will probably take about as long as the promised increasing the xp on the house c challenges but it'll happen... eventually.

I do hope that if they do change the system back to "daily decay per active player" that the player that has not logged in since the last decay hit is no longer considered "active." I would even be ok for a casual player to have the option for their renown gain reduced by 50 to 100% but count as inactive for the purposes of guild count (basically not being factored in for bonuses or decay penalties). Until such time guilds of 10 or less should at the very least gain (by decreasing decay) the equivalent benefit of a guild of 11.

[Nestroy]

Since the debatte is nearing a dead end here, I think it is time to draw some general conclusions / outline some suggestions here. Please feel free to add to my post. I am sure I will not give a 100% complete overview.

1.) Guild renown decay as it has been the last 2 years before the latest overhaul had been an issue for both big and small guilds. Big guilds leveled fairly fast and could never reach lv. 100. Small guilds without super active players leveled slow and never could reach lv. 100. Most never reached even lv. 50+. Small guilds consisting of super active players only (Zonixx, you proved it!) could level fast AND reach lv. 100.

I think it is safe to assume we all agree that the old system was very bad for almost all guilds and had to be changed.

2.) Guild renown decay now allows for all big guilds to eventually reach lv. 100. Small guilds without super active players still do not reach any significant levels / still cannot level fast. So the system did not change at all for small guilds and only gradually changes into positive (less and less renown decay per player) for guilds as they get bigger and bigger. Guilds of 300+ players get the most out of the new system.

While the changes are basically well accepted by all players, from small to big guilds alike, most small guilds now feel like getting the shaft. The problem from the past for big guilds is solved now. The problem from the past for the vast majority of all guilds (small guilds - slow leveling AND not being able to reach lv. 100) still remains.

The discussion is somewhat heated here.

+ Some are arguing that nobody forbids small guilds to grow and get big. Well, whis might be true theoretically, but leaves out 2 essential points. First, there is only a playerbase per server that big. So any growth can only be done by canibalizing other guilds or by fighting for any new player entering the server. And already advanced and bigger guilds have a distinctive advantage here. Second, small-guilding is a form of play style as well. Not everybody likes to be a member of an anonymous mass. But many that like to be in smaller guilds would like to have the best buffs / best ship / best levels available as well.
+ Some are arguing that because guilding is a play style, the DEVs should do something to help small guilds as well. This is argued against by many on the base of principles of equality. There already is a renown bonus for small guilds. This bonus might not be enough, some say. This bonus is already much to high, others state. The debatte is heated here and will not find a conclusion, if not several base principles have to be decided and communicates by the DEVs on that topic sometime soon. Any futher discussion without that basic decission + communication will be moot.

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Base Principles to be discussed / communicated:


1.) What is the purpose of decay anyway now?

+ For weeding out inactive guilds, decay is much too low and kicks in much too late. This always has been that way.

+ For giving any incentive to go over the top. This might have been holding truth for the decay system before the last overhaul. Now I just have to max out my guild to get over the top. Thing done. Is this really WAI and what about the vast majority of small guilds? Is their doom WAI? Is it WAI for any upstart guild to be doomed from the begining because their best players will get lured ayway by bigger and more advanced guilds as soon as they get known by the other players? No incentive for small guilds any more to go over the top. They are doomed anyway, except for small guilds consisting entirely of one player holding 6 accounts (like Zonixx).

+ Any other reason we cannot see at the moment - then the faithful player base would like to know more from the DEVs on why renown decay makes sense.


2.) Is the guild renown system a leveling system where everybody eventually reaches the highest levels - then why decay?
Or is the system a ranking system with WAI on only a selected few beeing able to reach the highest levels - then why that unfair boost for big guilds and for big guilds only?


3.) In how far will the new system hurt / increase sales, not only for pots, but for ships and ameneties as well?

+ Some people were arguing in this thread here that the new system in the long run will hurt sales because of the big player base is organized in small guilds, not in big ones. Now the small guilds get the boot and are canibalized by the big guilds. Big guilds do not need pots, they reach lv. 100 anyway. Small guilds cannot compete and one day or the other will stop to level. Then pot sales will dwindle. There will only a few ships be sold on Astral Shards to the bigger guilds and overall sales will go down. WAI?

+ Others were arguing that small guilds will buy more pots in order to compete with an ever increasing number of large guilds. Maybe that is correct. Perhaps in the short run. But in the long run a small guild cannot compete with the big ones and it would be save to bet that in the long run the pot sales will go down anyway.


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Any suggestions, solutions discussed in that thread and any furhter discussion would need to be based on the DEVs giving direction and advice on the 3 base questions mentioned above. So there will be no solution section frm me here. We already have hundreds of suggestions in the last 98 pages and none would be of much use without further clearance on the way the guild renwon system is intended to head in the future.

[slarden]

Nestroy brings up some really great points. +1 for that if I am allowed to give him another +1.

The development team asked for feedback during a short test window. The feedback was mostly that large gulds love lowered decay and small guilds don't like that their decay was not lowered and the new ransack penalty actually makes things harder. This is certainly the response that would be anticipated.

The big problem with decay is that it altars actions since there are in-game rewards associated with guild levels. We saw big guilds trying to optimize levels before the change and I am sure small guilds will continue to try and optimize level. For small guilds the easy-button answers to continue moving forward are:

1) don't take any chances recruting if you are already moving forward.
2) Solo, short-man, zerg to get through content as quickly as possible which generates more guild renown but means that experienced players won't be able to carry less experienced players through content and LFMs will decline
3) Replace players that don't generate much renown with players that do generate renown which allows those guilds that want to remain small do so while improving renown generation. Large guilds have stated this is because of small guild bonus because they want to make it even harder for small guilds. In reality it's because of decay. Guilds only worry about progress rate when they stop moving forward which only occurs because of decay


Right before this change our guild was starting to move up very slowly compared to previously when we had less decay. We finally gained a level and then were barely able to hold it because of the new increased decay ransack penatly which is what led me to this thread in the first place. Prior to that I had no idea this change was even made.

Since I studied up on the mechanics of the system I recently have been soloing more rather than trying to form parties and our renown is moving up again at a good pace. I am also now using a second ftp account to pike in quests when I solo to generate more renown. This combined with the holidays has allowed us to advance again and even after my vacation ends in mid-January we should still be able to move forward. I prefer starting parties but this will allow us to get to 85 in 12-18 months and then I can go back to my normal way of doing things. I also now have to "bank" end-reward renown so that we can hold our level.

I also want to point out that the large guilds often host guild-only raids and parties. If more people leave small guilds and join those large guilds, it will be harder for those of us in small guilds to find open raids.

To Turbine directly - I would like to see more transparancy. You asked for feedback and ~ 100 people from small guilds commented - mostly with similar concerns (1) Decay is an issue for small guilds and (2) the new system is not fair to people in small guilds that have been working for months/years leveling their guild. The stated test/feedback period is long over and you haven't indicated whether this change is permanent and what changes (if any) will be made to help small guilds have the opportunity for the same ships/buffs that large guilds now have.

[slarden]

One other point. The idea that people will stop buying elixirs if decay is elminated makes absolutely no sense.

A 10 person level 60 guild gets 1,655,640 decay per year. If a level gulid was stalled at 60 it means they were generating rougly 1,655,640 per year. This means it would take roughly 23 year to reach level 100 if decay was eliminated if there is no change in activity.

On the other hand a large guild of 200 that was stalled at 60 was getting over 16 million in decay per year. This also means they were generating over 16 million renown per year. Even at level 80 they are only getting 7 million decay per year under the new system so the advancement rate will still be rapid at level 80 for the large guild. The small guild stalled at 60 would take 10 years to reach level 80 if decay was elminated entirely. The large 200 person guild that was stalled at level 60 will reach level 80 within a year under the new system. As to Nestroy's ponit, why keep decay at all when getting rid of it will have much less of an impact on advancement than the current change already had?

Decay isn't necessary for people to buy xp pots and it isn't necessary for gulid renown pots either. If anything peopel are more likely to buy elixirs if they know they get to keep the extra renown they earn.

[Dandonk]

Happy New Year, and yay, I'm back again...

... so, any news, Turbine?

[aeroplanefly]

I don't know if I see many differences for the guild I'm in...

We are a very active large guild of 292 people on Khyber, of which almost 200 had been logged in with in 24 hours. I'd probably say 75% of the 200 are alts. We kept our guild size at 200 until mid December, when we increased our max guild size to 300.

I joined when the guild was at level 55 in March 2012. We had two raid days a week, one for new players (Tempest Spine) and one for the rest of us (Usually Shroud). We encouraged new members to join and had a 'don't worry about failure' attitude. It was also a way to train new players in the basics of the game.

((The renown dropped from Tempest Spine was nearly 3x more than I would get from Shroud since so many people were over level 20))

The raids filled most of the time with 10 to 12 guildies, and we saw our level go from 55 in March to 62 or 63 by August.

We probably saw three officers go within that time due to Real Life issues, including myself in August. I returned in mid December to find our guild level at 65. We're nearing close to 68 now.

So that's our story...
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On inactive accounts,
I believe the changes create some challenge for guild leaders. We still have a one month inactive policy in our guild despite the changes in guild decay rules. If we let two or three accounts go inactive for over a month, it might give the impression that it's ok to go inactive (despite our policy in our guild).

On decay,
We probably generate enough renown on any given Saturday or Sunday to cover our decay for the week. This is not because we are a large guild, this is because we are a large (albeit now a very large), organized guild. I'm more than happy to bow out of a shroud run to form a full party of guildies around level 5-10... the benefits here are in both guild cohesion (which we have) and renown (which comes with guild cohesion).

We can see a change to the decay. In about three weeks we've nearly gained three levels. In my opinion, it should be much harder to go from level 65 to 68. Even at the pace that we gather renown, having 30 active members online on a weekday evening for instance, we shouldn't be leveling on a weekly basis.

On ransack,
I don't think it would apply to us, while we have been gaining a level a week for the past three weeks, we don't gain any more than that.

------------------------------------

If I were to say that we are leveling too fast (which I agree with), here is how I would change it to level the playing field with other guilds that don't gain levels as fast.

Alter the ransack- Change the ransack on a formula of the guild level. I can imagine a guild at level 12 jumping to level 15 and having a three day ransack kick in. I can't imagine a guild at level 65 jump to 68 in a matter of a day, so if we're going to make ransack work for every one, make it work for larger, high leveled guilds too.

Change the XP table for guilds- This should be easier... just increase the xp needed to reach a level for all levels. Start off small for the lower levels and increase the numbers as they go up. Bear in mind that from level 45 to 49, +2 ship buffs cost TP and it's not until level 63 that guilds can pay for buffs with plat. I would say that the curve in xp should increase from the start, but it should be noticeable around level 49 to 63, less so at level 49, moderately at level 57, and more so at level 63.

I often say this... these are just ideas, I'm not clinging on to them, nor will I defend them.
And bearing in mind, it's likely hard for me to come up with a formula that levels the playing field for small guilds and large guilds, my math isn't quite there yet... but I imagine it's not impossible to do.

[Dandonk]

http://www.ddo.com/ddogameinfo/devel...eveling-system

Quote: "so an important goal for the new system was to support small or casual guilds".

So, Turbine, what has changed?

Quote: "Just as we feel players should be able to solo or adventure with small parties, they should be able to decide what size of guild works best for them".

Why is this no longer the case?

And why do we get no replies here at all? Why are we being totally ignored?

[slarden]

Greetings! We are putting forth modifications currently trying out some temporary adjustments to the Guild Renown system and monitoring the outcome and feedback this week. The intent is to address concerns from guilds and guild leaders regarding the impact of optimizing guild size in order to gain or maintain guild levels. We’ll be making additional balance changes that we think you and your guildmates will appreciate, but for now we have applied the changes without downtime. As of today, you will notice two changes to your renown rates:

1. Renown decay no longer takes guild size into account. This should ease the pressure for guild leaders to “kick” members from the guild to offset daily renown decay rates. Renown decay now only takes a guild’s level into consideration rather than its size.
2. Renown ransack has been increased. Previously when a guild earned levels in a day, it would gradually reduce the renown drop rates. We’ve increased the rate so that a guild can only earn roughly 3 levels in a single day. This should prevent large guilds from completely dominating the field in terms of levels per-day.

There are some balance Pros and Cons to this method, but we’d like guilds to give us feedback about their experiences using the new settings this week. If players like the settings, or feel it is workable with minor tweaks, then we are ready to keep them! If players find the changes make matters worse, then we are scheduled to revert them. So this week, we encourage guild leaders/members to use this thread to give us feedback about how the changes are impacting your guild leveling dynamics. Important feedback for us is points where frustration has eased (or increased). Thanks for your participation as we work to improve our guild leveling system!

The test and feedback period is long over. You still haven't announced whether this change is permanent and what tweaks will be made to allow small guilds that aren't hardcore to reach the levels that all large guilds can reach.

For guilds with 10 or less members the only impact of this change is that it is much harder to keep our levels due to the more severe ransack penalty that was put in place because of how easy it is for large guilds to level.

I am very confused why the development team hasn't announced whether this change is permanent. I am also confused why there hasn't been an announcement in an official release bulletin. Around 100 people from small guilds shared their stories about how guild decay is rough for small guilds. It used to be a barrier that kept almost all guilds from reaching higher levels. It is now a mechanism that keeps only small guilds that aren't hardcore from reaching higher levels.

The purpose of decay is very confusing. Why is there a mechanism in place that is only a significant issue for small guilds?

Can you please respond with what your intentions are and what will be done to help small guilds reach higher levels. The current system is not consistent with the original goal and several of us worked for over 2 years building up our small guilds with the understanding that Turbine supported small guilds.

Paiz: "That’s definitely something that we’re still trying to figure out and balance. There is some help for smaller guilds in this system… we don’t want to exclude a guild that might only include four people. We think that’s a totally valid way to play, and we’re trying not to force people to have 50 player guilds. If you’re in a small guild, you’ll get a small boost every time you pick up, what I call, a “renown token” because we want to make sure those guilds are able to get their airships and things like that.

This is a long term play; you’re not supposed to get up to level 25 in a day. This is more of a long term, stay engage with the game, sort of goal."

[Dandonk]

It's not fair. We still feel it's better to address some of the problem now instead of none of the problem. This isn't expected to address all problems immediately. We're sorry some players are still waiting.

Well, we're still waiting - 2½ months later. Will we get any kind of word on this soon, or has this gone the way of Vast&Mysterious?

[Artos_Fabril]

Well, we're still waiting - 2½ months later. Will we get any kind of word on this soon, or has this gone the way of Vast&Mysterious?

They announced the Enhancement System revamp a year ago, and the most we've seen of it since is the few things that snuck into Lama. And according to the Devs, many of those ideas have been abandoned/scrapped/revised.

Any "fix" for your issue that isn't turning decay off completely is going to take time to code and implement. The next easiest option is to change the ((size, min10)+10) to ((size, max10)+10) to give a small break to micro-guilds, or ((size, max10)*2) for a slightly larger break.

My personal, preferred fix is to go back to the old decay per player formula, drop the "min10)+10" completely, and calculate size as the number of accounts that have earned renown since the last decay calculation. I feel this method is the most fair to the largest number of people, rewarding activity foremost, while not penalizing anyone for being unable to log on, or for logging on only to check in and say hi.

[Dandonk]

They announced the Enhancement System revamp a year ago, and the most we've seen of it since is the few things that snuck into Lama. And according to the Devs, many of those ideas have been abandoned/scrapped/revised.

Any "fix" for your issue that isn't turning decay off completely is going to take time to code and implement. The next easiest option is to change the ((size, min10)+10) to ((size, max10)+10) to give a small break to micro-guilds, or ((size, max10)*2) for a slightly larger break.

My personal, preferred fix is to go back to the old decay per player formula, drop the "min10)+10" completely, and calculate size as the number of accounts that have earned renown since the last decay calculation. I feel this method is the most fair to the largest number of people, rewarding activity foremost, while not penalizing anyone for being unable to log on, or for logging on only to check in and say hi.

I do not object to your preferred solution, as such. Or just turning decay off, altogether.

But at this point, after all the different ideas thrown around, what I would like is for Turbine to pitch in and say something. This started out as a trial, and without even a word, it was suddenly permanent. Hearing nothing further for months does not encourage me much.

[Vyder]

I would love to know why they can't figure out a way to help out small guilds. Our lvl 70 guild is stuck and not moving. I will not spend a dime on renown pots only for decay to take it away. There's just nothing good about decay just admit it already.

[BlkDrgn28]

I would love to know why they can't figure out a way to help out small guilds. Our lvl 70 guild is stuck and not moving. I will not spend a dime on renown pots only for decay to take it away. There's just nothing good about decay just admit it already.

How many people are in your guild that you are having issues moving past 70??? I am in a guild that has 12 Accts and we are progressing just fine and as a matter of fact we just hit lvl 74 last night and still have it today.

[Vyder]

8 accounts. 3 very active the rest casual. I should not be forced to increase guild size just to be able to level. Would love to have a group of 6 that can run as often as our 3 very actives do. We have tried to get a couple more people to play more often but can't seem to get anybody to join us.

[slarden]

How many people are in your guild that you are having issues moving past 70??? I am in a guild that has 12 Accts and we are progressing just fine and as a matter of fact we just hit lvl 74 last night and still have it today.

Progression for small guilds depends on alot of factors. Most small guilds never even make it to 60 so a level 70 guild that is not progressing has still achieved more than most small guilds.

Since the development team was ok with effectively eliminating decay for large guilds, I think a more fair temporary solution would be to turn off decay entirely until they come up with a longer-term solution.

With all the recent server bounces and crashes, guilds are being hit with double decay frequently. While this would be barely noticable to large guilds under the new system, it's very rough for those of us in small guilds. Although previous comments state that the decay is prorated when this occurs, it is definitely not the case with our guild. Somehow the minimum calculation is causing a full day decay on top of the normal full day of decay.

The developers said they wanted a solution sooner rather than later which is why they implemented this solution. Wouldn't turning of decay accomplish the same thing except that it would help all guilds?

The fact is that a guild of 10 or less stuck at level 60 would only gain 2 levels all year if decay was turned off entirely. Larger guilds will gain that many levels in less than a month under the new system with their massive renown earning power.

I really hope Turbine does the right thing and just turns off decay until they develop their longer-term vision for guilds.