This networking issue is a good example of the difference between the official forums and other forums where outsiders can post. On the official forums a post about networking problems would be full of a bunch of people like Snarling saying, "This isn't a big deal", "the devs have better things to do",  "I don't have any problems playing" or "get a new computer".

"Talking to town cryers to get info and figure quests out on your own ala AC1 are considered too tedious by today's instant gratification, ADHD/ADD crowd."

Besides patch day, were you actually figuring out quests purely through the in game clues? I know some people do play without third party utilites or external sites, but I think these people are rare. Also some  people who do this merely rely on information from other people or they rely on other to lead them threw quests. Those are people are more than likely just getting their information from a third party site.

I made a post about this recently and like the other guy here claims is true in this instance, generally people were opposed to have more explicit quest instructions. I'm not sure why because most of them turn to Maggie's or the new AC Wiki for quest guidance or quest finding. It seems maybe some people like the illusion that they are playing without really specific instructions as WoW, for example, often gives.

Here's the post: http://forums.ac.turbine.com/showpost.php?p=502319&postcount=8

It's a bit lame and you won't believe me, but I specifically said that line because I have talked to people in the game who read my posts and agree with most of what I say. Of course they aren't quite as passionate about it as I am. Not everyone is absolutely opposed to my changes either as you imply. It's mostly the same couple people who seem to reply to every thread I make. I suspect one of those people. And there are people sprinkled in who agree, but again don't seem to care that much.

This is the thread I was referring to about receiving support when they are minor changes or additions to the game: http://forums.ac.turbine.com/showthread.php?&postid=475768. They actually implemented the rare creature broadcasts in local chat. I also strongly suspect you will see level 8 scrolls one day.

You are obssessed with WoW. Do I say I want the game to be more instanced and raid based? Do I say I want strict classes? Do I want PK to be faction vs faction only? Do I want flying? Do I want zones? No. I want some features added that are already being provided by Decal or third party sites. I admitted in the other thread I see your point about auction hosues being a slightly different experience. So I would not be opposed to some kind of other seller system.

I find it funny too you're so opposed to WoW yet there are defintely many recent additions that inspired by WoW and other games.

My subscription ended today. I play every couple months in hopes that they've improved the game yet I come back and continue to be annoyed. For every step forward they take, they take steps back.

You can admit it, I was right about this networking issue. It needed to be fixed and it should have been prioirty long ago. I also suspect some other things you hate and that I mentioned in other threads around here will be implemented one day if AC kicks around long enough. When the devs make a post about it, you won't argue and will say "wow what a good idea, great job team."

The official forums are full of white knights. It's obvious. I've noticed when I suggest additional features or minor changes, not large changes to things the dev have done or have recently done, they are more well supported. Most of the people on the official forums feel it is wrong to criticize the devs. Surely there must be some change you disagree with? If not you are a boring person.

Also perhaps you didn't know, the official forums don't represent the whole community or people who don't play.

You seem to want to cater more to the existing players than to make the game more attractive to outsiders or new players. Most of the things I come up with are with the idea to make the game more appealing to someone who is not the familiar with the game. I feel like those changes will ultimately benefit the existing players too.

Take the recent armor changes for example. The tailoring system to me seems overly complex. The existing players don't have a  problem with it because it gets the job done at the expense of adding more layers to the game. I'm not alone on the layer issue either. I saw another guy post about the problem with the current team adding too many more layers to the game instead of fixing the core problems.

The ISP/router/modem issues will hopefully be resolved in the coming months. A dev on the official forums has said it is the list of things to be fixed.

Though if it were up to a certain other poster here you would never be abel to play because according to them you represent a tiny group of people.

What's sad is that the only reason this is getting fixed is because one of the devs was actually having problems connecting with their own router at home. If they hadn't run into this issue themsevles, this would still not be slated to get fixed. The current team that runs AC does not prioritize well in my opinion.

This has been a problem for several years now. I don't consider that an acceptable time frame to fix a bug. The same happened with the Nvidia texture bug, it took years to fix. ATI cards still have texture problems after several years.

I think it's rather lame that some shadows have no legs yet they equip leggings and solls. I understand why, it would be imbalanced otherwise (Shadows would have less area to take damage) and they wouldn't be able to equip as many majors/epics. Still it seems very game-ish. And by game-ish I mean it doesn't seem logical. It's only the result of having to address a flaw in the way the game was originally designed. I haven't tested it, but I'm sure it also says in combat "You hit Shadow Person in the foot for 50 damage" even though they don't really have any feet. It doesn't make sense.

Should have only added the ones with legs IMO.

True almost every other MMO has third party apps, but their intrusion is not as obvious as in AC. You don't see portal bots, buff bots, craft bots, trade bots, and UCM's everywhere. You also do not have to depend on these bots as you did in AC. Even though you don't use these third party apps, I know you've said in other threads that you use trade bots. So you  do rely on them to play the game indirectly.

No thanks. Whatever their points were I'm sure could have been summed up more precisely. I'm not going to read an extremely winded story and opinion written 7 years ago about a game I know plenty about. Maybe it would be interesting to someone who is not the familiar with AC.

Skimmed it some more. Saw the gripe about mansion and again I completely agree and many other AC players do too.

Allegiance housing killed towns. So did market place. I would love to see marketplace and allegiance housing removed. It would force people into towns or probably back to subway. In either case, at least you would see more players around instead of having them dispersed in various places.

I skimmed it and saw he complained about not getting a house. Well that's not a problem now. There are plenty of houses available.

Maybe he would prefer instanced housing? I think that's lame. It doesn't make owning a house an accomplishment when there is an infinite supply. Owning a house in AC means something and is valuable.

I also saw him complaining about being able to take on multiple enemies at once. He would rather it be like every other MMO where you fight mostly one at a time? Why? Because it's more realistic? Combat in games is never realistic. You would die or be knocked out in one or two hits from an enemy. That isn't fun. You would also never stand a chance fighting anything much larger or stronger than you.

One point I do agree with is that the devs do increase the players power way too often. I believe this is largely the result of the monthly patch system. The devs are under a lot of pressure to create new content every single month. It's hard to come up with truly unique concepts every month. Instead it's easier to improve existing items.

I'm against monthly patches and would prefer larger patches every three to four months. If they spaced patches out more, players combat power would still grow over time but at a much slower rate.

Also I hope the quality of the updates would improve if they were given more time. Right now a lot of the updates make heavy use of old game assets. They will take parts of old monsters and mash them together to create a new one or they will simply change around the colors of an old monster. They do the same quests and items.

Originally posted by Ballsout

I'll tell ya what won't revive it. I just DLed and tried the 14 day trial. To activate the trial you have to put in a card number, and then cancel the payment before they charge you after the 14 days.... NEXT...

This isn't that uncommon. I know other games do it for sure. I do agree it's crappy to have to cancel otherwise you will get charged. I'm not against requiring a credit card though because there are a lot of kiddies who have no intention of really paying for the game. They just want a new diversion for a couple days.

This download link works for me: http://cdn.content.turbine.com/sites/clientdl/ac1/ac1install.exe

They took off the number of people logged in a long time ago. You can download a Decal plugin though that will show it.

The graphics are far from great, but they aren't THAT bad. Example: http://jaguargames.com/images/knorr.png

F2P or partially F2P is the only realistic option to actually increase the populations. They could drop some money on online ads, but it isn't going to bring in a huge number of new players. Many people suggest "updating the graphics", which isn't going to happen. That's a huge task. Also some people suggest additional content or changes to existing content. That isn't going to bring in a lot of new people. There have been huge changes  to the game recently (socities, new loot tier) and it hasn't done much to revive the game.

Sev just said on the official forums that fixing the networking problems are on his todo list! Just made my day.

Now if only they could fix rubber banding.

Shadows are the new race.

I actually track housing trends on LC. I assume that almost everyone who plays owns a house since there are so many available. The trend on LC is a decline. More houses (this includes mansions, cottages, villas, apartments) open up every month. Leading me to believe the number of subscribers on LC is declining.

The only time this trend has changed in recent times was during the 10th anniversary. It didn't really reverse the trend, but it did stabalize the housing market for two months. After two months the numbers started dropping again and they continue to drop now.

Items are far more restricted now than they were in AC originally. Loot items only had have melee, missle, and arcane restrictions. Now they have level and combat skill restrictions, which is forcing people into stricter classes. True, WoW didn't invent item restrictions, but the point is a lot of recent changes are moving away from the original AC concepts.

You love everything the devs throw at you apparently or you just automatically oppose anything I say. I guarantee if the devs implement anything I mention you will be far more open to the change.

The devs definitely are copying other games. Someone just pointed out on the official forums that they took this new concept of leveling items from DAoC. From Wikipedia about DAoC: "Artifacts, obtained through hidden encounters, only become useful when the player finds the three scrolls hoarded by Atlantean monsters. Furthermore, artifacts must gain experience in order to reach their full potential."

I do not like the fact that FF is constantly recommended. It's beneficial  to new comers since they will be around more people. However, directing people to FF is killing off the other servers more quickly. People like me are not going to move to FF no matter what. At some point I will just quit instead of moving to FF because of the lack of players on my own server.