Sorry ahead of time for this long post.
Thank you to Eden Staff for what they are trying to do, however in some places the gears seem to creak and here's my POV on it and some random ideas of possible solutions.
Loyalty:
Whereas started out as a good idea it is essentially meaningless for me now. I could have had good use for it starting out (xp bonus, token bonus) when I had nothing and wanted to equip myself, now I have everything and don’t need neither xp or token. I have all the crafters, I don’t need craft speed bonus anymore – I don’t even wear the crafting gear most of the time anymore.
There is supposed to be a scaling increase in siege damage which seems not to be implemented (and thankfully so with the treb zerg outside any keep regardless of increased weight). Repair bonus also doesn’t seem to be in place (just a couple of days ago the woodworking skill is in play for that, maybe that's the route for that now).
The only influence it has for me is the number on login and the title behind the name when you /who someone.
Personally, it does nothing to me and I dub myself as loyal (never played any other realm on Eden except to bug test at very low level).
Not sure that the gain of a title is enough to bind people to a realm.
ToA Stats:
I expected RR5 to be a game changer but for me I observed only a mild bump. Some classes have RR5 abilities which are good in many occasions, others not so much - but that’s fine. When in Beta the i50 was released it made a huge difference, but there people instantly also got a full template, CL5 stuff and RR5 ability, so naturally it was a huge bump compared to the no-template status a lot of the players had to that point.
Here most of the people (now) enter RvR templated and start out at high level of performance because all the ToA stats are covered already with that. There’s no need to fiddle much with realm skill points unless you’re in a high-performance situation, else it’s just maximize damage output and everyone is ready to go.
It feels like the ability to template yourself to RR6 is basically nullifying the Realm Level cap, with RR4-5 you have the basics aside from Determination 9 and similar setups. For example, to get MoArt6 for 9% cast speed on Phoenix you needed to invest 15 realm skill points for that and you didn’t have any damage enhancement then, let alone actives. For a cleric to have 25% buff and 25% heal and 9% cast speed the investment was 55 realm skill points, which is 6l5. For support/caster dps this is a huge boost at low RRs on Eden, creating a really high baseline.
It also leads to a high density of active RAs from a very low RR on, and those are not evenly spread over the realms (namely Ichor of the Deep and Static Tempest which are very desirable because they can help in a multitude of situations).
To me it feels there is a lack of tradeoffs and it is not compensated by a realm level cap.
Speed in RvR Zones:
I love the accessibility of RvR zones via port, hastener and personal and public boats. Also I hate the accessibility because even though you’ve rooted out an enemy they are instantly back. This is true in the deserter zones (teleporters) and also in BG RvR because through ports, hastener plus sprint and very fast boats everyone is everywhere in no time.
While this is for many reasons very nice to have, it also removes any tactical move that builds on enemy movement time. Towers and keeps lighting instantly when siege is put down any attempt of sneakiness. You ask friends to help you to remove the camper on the lvl 35 epic mob and before the mob pops the same guy is back on the spot three times, easily. It is possible to be at Scathaig relic gate from Albion Catterick Hamlet in 8 minutes on caster speed+sprint and taking a simple realm boat from Sauvage Docks.
Hard to balance this but I feel some slowdown on mobility can’t hurt, maybe start by decreasing the speed of boats by a percentage.
Raids and Currency:
I like PvE, I like raids (once in a while), I don’t mind a currency system as it is in place right now. Also, getting to use bps for currency is good.
However for Albs it is the case that a lot of people jump on any raid opportunity they are given (insert snide comments about Albion being the PvE realm here). Some of the raids require a good number to succeed, especially if they are consisting basically of people who need them to get outfitted and to get access to the merchant. Some of the competed raids like Summoners Hall and Darkness Falls also have quite a big failure rate due to realm enemies.
Upping the amount of currency was a good step but still people scramble after the raids because they need that mythirian or they simply can’t earn enough bounty points to get that currency (or they just like to have a lot of currency to have the feeling of a comfort buffer just in case you want to template your own or a friends toon). The exposure of the merchants in realm war zones (and them being camped) is also a turn-down.
The daily currency quest is okay, however, when you are well enough equipped to weed your way through the campers you’re also past needing the currency.
Personally I’ve resorted to farming plat to buy things and only buy what’s not on the market for dungeon currency because then I can farm when I have time for it and not disrupt anything I do just to chase after the next raid. Also I don’t like to run a security detail just to shop a ring from a merchant.
A suggestion that comes to mind is with the introduction of chest rewards it could be that not gold is the base reward but a random currency. How much? I estimate a lvl 10 keep take takes about as long as killing the endboss of a dungon (including travel time), so the reward could be the amount of tokens Legion/Apocalypse/Grand Summoner/Golestandt (and other realm equivalents) drop. Would not be a free item at the drop of a hat but a decent chunk to serve as a draw to people.
But this constant raiding and disrupting any large scale rvr on the server is really discouraging, especially with the restarts happening just before primetime. When there is 5 raids back to back during your prime time repeatedly it gets tiring. Another suggestion would be to make respawn timers of epic encounters and dungeons independent of restarts.
Reward for Defense
Reward for defense is nothing to write home about. Not only it’s insanely hard to defend with the current siege and RA/TOA system, it’s also unrewarding. If you destroy 10 enemy trebs and killed nobody you get nothing for your effort. It’s easier (and more rewarding rp wise) to just wait until the storm has passed to raid back whatever was taken, especially if you are outnumbered.
On the other hand you get rewarded by taking undefended tower and keeps by being able to garnish capture points with guard quests.
Realm timer and repercussions:
Whatever happened to it?
You can directly move from one realms frontier zone to another without the 1 hr lockout. If you’re capable of killing anything you can play freely anywhere, you only skip on rps from siege for 12 hours – which is still more than earning nothing on the outnumbered side.
What now?
My biggest points of complaint would probably be these:
- Currency is a big time sink with no real alternatives (although it has gotten better) and takes away from RvR substantially
- Very high density of RAs on some of the realms due to popular classes (this has been bad with Static Tempest and gotten worse with another ichor I feel)
- Impossibility to defend when outnumbered and lack of reward for the brave try
- Lack of realm timer
- Lack of incentives for some realms to RvR (esp when outnumbered)
Suggestions:
- Earn substantial currency from RvR via more ways than just bounty points to incentivize people going there (e.g. from keep/tower chests)
- Make a restart not trigger a respawn on Dungeons/Epic Bosses so people don’t get caught in an endless raid loop
- Slow down some aspects of the game like RR progression (RR9 for some in 8 weeks) or maybe even some damage output, else the server may burn fast and fizzle out
- Maybe it’s time to not shovel more onto the pile (add more RAs/abilities/gear/extra procs etc) but also to take some things away esp. in regards to realm abilities
