Player retention and you: brainstorming

[Dalmeth]

2) Staff interaction, to me, is also wayyyyy more preferable to staff PLOTS. I prefer you to throw wrenches and what nows into my plots rather than make me feel forced to go in your direction.

You don't get one without the other.  Staff aren't going to be involved enough with the game to comment on your plans if they aren't doing their own plots.  So let staff affect us as players of a game.  Why we don't expect that as is disturbs me greatly, as it seems the ones in authority have crippled themselves.

5) Generic Shit Stirrer Staff Position - Hire a few staff (one for every time zone) to stir shit up, hop into npcs/create characters and fuck with people online, that's all they do, make npcs/chars come to life and start shit. No rhyme, no reason, no real plot (how is the player gonna know any different?) You get to watch people and prod them with your stick of awesomeness.

Stir shit, and shit stinks.  It's a terrible idea to get someone into the game just to be annoying.  You know why?  Because it's annoying, not inspired or exciting.

[ShaLeah]

2) Staff interaction, to me, is also wayyyyy more preferable to staff PLOTS. I prefer you to throw wrenches and what nows into my plots rather than make me feel forced to go in your direction.

You don't get one without the other.  Staff aren't going to be involved enough with the game to comment on your plans if they aren't doing their own plots.  So let staff affect us as players of a game.  Why we don't expect that as is disturbs me greatly, as it seems the ones in authority have crippled themselves.

I don't agree. They're two very different things.
Interaction is optional, staff can watch a player's storyline and decide to contribute to it via whatever means - animation, saving the life of someone your character loves, killing someone your char loves, nicking something off you, whatever. Their actions/contributions to your plot become part of YOUR character's story and while they may even derail your plot, how it affects your character is ultimately your choice.
In a Staff Plot, I feel participation isn't really optional. It's big shit. Wars, city-wide strife, zombies, genocide, GMH market crashes. They want to introduce something into/want something to happen in the game and set up the chess pieces accordingly. It's for entertainment value on a grander, maybe even global scale. I feel obligated to follow a staff plot.

My preference aside I still think that staff plots are not only necessary but a big part of the enjoyment of the game so I'm in NO WAY suggesting they stop altogether.

5) Generic Shit Stirrer Staff Position - Hire a few staff (one for every time zone) to stir shit up, hop into npcs/create characters and fuck with people online, that's all they do, make npcs/chars come to life and start shit. No rhyme, no reason, no real plot (how is the player gonna know any different?) You get to watch people and prod them with your stick of awesomeness.

Stir shit, and shit stinks.  It's a terrible idea to get someone into the game just to be annoying.  You know why?  Because it's annoying, not inspired or exciting.

You don't have to stir shit for it to stink dude. It's shit.

And who said it's meant to be -annoyings-?
I use the term 'stirring shit' to mean 'making shit happen' for the character it affects. How it happens (whether it's via antagonism, humor, fear or joy) is entirely up to the staff doing it. There are a MILLION different ways to impact a character's life on a daily basis. Even if it's just a story to tell.

Inspiring annoyance is still inspiring btw and it's the happenings in the game that keep people coming back. And since it's not a staff plot who gives a fuck if your character chooses NOT to go help my brother who's out in the dessert alone and dying of dehydration somewhere near the western span for 5k, woulda been a cool story and maybe a nice pay day but instead you just met a lunatic at the bar that thought you were stupid enough to brave the sands alone for 5k. Get it now?

I'll also take a million little stories cause that's what Arm is about for me. The stories.

You don't have to like it or agree with it, just wanna make sure you UNDERSTAND what it was I meant and don't base your opinion on information that's not part of the equation.

[Dalmeth]

I don't agree. They're two very different things.
Interaction is optional, staff can watch a player's storyline and decide to contribute to it via whatever means - animation, saving the life of someone your character loves, killing someone your char loves, nicking something off you, whatever. Their actions/contributions to your plot become part of YOUR character's story and while they may even derail your plot, how it affects your character is ultimately your choice.
In a Staff Plot, I feel participation isn't really optional. It's big shit. Wars, city-wide strife, zombies, genocide, GMH market crashes. They want to introduce something into/want something to happen in the game and set up the chess pieces accordingly. It's for entertainment value on a grander, maybe even global scale. I feel obligated to follow a staff plot.

I perfectly understand what you mean, I just disagree as to the consequence of how your stating it.  I tend to think it's a much simpler directive to tell staffers to get out and start affecting the game at will rather than just sit and watch players.

As for the world-ender plots, those are rare enough that I don't mind them.  They may be an example of staff railroading, but it takes long enough to do that it doesn't substantially affect my play.

However, there was one time when staff animated a higher-ranking templar to tell my templar to send several PCs to a dangerous situation where any sane person might have had more caution.  That's not a systemic problem in my opinion, it's just being picky in the moment.  No amount of policy or well-reasoned approach is going to fix that poor decision at the moment of contact.  We, as players, need to be able to slap their hand when they do that and say, "No."

And who said it's meant to be -annoyings-?

I never said it was meant to be annoying, I'm saying someone with the sole goal of interrupting what people are doing by stirring up shit is annoying regardless of the subtleties of how it's implemented.

[Desertman]

On the concept of staff plots. I would like to see the idea of "Too Big To Fail" plots done away with. Yes, you wrote up an awesome plot with an awesome thing and stuff, but that doesn't mean you need to keep throwing resources at it to ensure it gets to where you have predetermined it should go. If it fails, let it fail. In my experience being part of a "Too Big To Fail" plot leaves those who "accomplish" it with a empty feeling in terms of success. "If I didn't do it, the next guy they brought in would have, and if not him, then the next guy, then the next guy...until it succeeded...so it doesn't matter that I did it, not really.". Not to mention if you are opposing the staff ran plot, you eventually just run out of energy to keep opposing it when you realize it's a "Too Big To Fail" plot. It becomes not-fun quickly.

[Desertman]

However, there was one time when staff animated a higher-ranking templar to tell my templar to send several PCs to a dangerous situation where any sane person might have had more caution.  That's not a systemic problem in my opinion, it's just being picky in the moment.  No amount of policy or well-reasoned approach is going to fix that poor decision at the moment of contact.  We, as players, need to be able to slap their hand when they do that and say, "No."

Also this. I would like to see the animation of "Untouchable Level" NPC's reserved for those situations only when you need to stop someone from breaking the game on an IC level. Unless it's something that will literally break the game if you don't put your foot down with an Untouchable Level NPC, then don't animate them.

I've seen it get to the point personally where you just end up feeling like it's "Me vs Staff NPC's", and the NPC's are so high up the rank tree that nothing you could do would ever matter. That's not very fun. Because the NPC is so incredibly powerful, I don't feel like I'm playing against the world anymore, or other players...now I'm just playing against an NPC so high up the mountain that they might as well just be a staff avatar come down to smite me.

It leaves you feeling like it's You vs Staff, which I don't think does anything good for anyone in or out of the game.

[ShaLeah]

That is NOT what I said!

Don't misquote me. However.

Also this. I would like to see the animation of "Untouchable Level" NPC's reserved for those situations only when you need to stop someone from breaking the game on an IC level. Unless it's something that will literally break the game if you don't put your foot down with an Untouchable Level NPC, then don't animate them.

I've seen it get to the point personally where you just end up feeling like it's "Me vs Staff NPC's", and the NPC's are so high up the rank tree that nothing you could do would ever matter. That's not very fun. Because the NPC is so incredibly powerful, I don't feel like I'm playing against the world anymore, or other players...now I'm just playing against an NPC so high up the mountain that they might as well just be a staff avatar come down to smite me.

It leaves you feeling like it's You vs Staff, which I don't think does anything good for anyone in or out of the game.

AND leads to people wanting to leave the game in some instances which is the opposite of what we're trying to do, right?

I've had to take breaks because some staff plots/plot interference didn't make any IC sense to me and left a really bad aftertaste in my mouth. The not knowing why is a big part of it... WHICH LEADS ME TO!

1) Staff interaction is crucial in the beginning of a player's career I think. 
2) Staff interaction, to me, is also wayyyyy more preferable to staff PLOTS. I prefer you to throw wrenches and what nows into my plots rather than make me feel forced to go in your direction.
3) Allow players to play their own offspring when notable characters. I know a Sun Runner who had like 15 kids and the player would do justice playing any one of his daughters OR his one son. Don't even get me started on all of LoDs/Mekedas kids.
4) Change Sorcerer back.
5) Generic Shit Stirrer Staff Position - Hire a few staff (one for every time zone) to stir shit up, hop into npcs/create characters and fuck with people online, that's all they do, make npcs/chars come to life and start shit. No rhyme, no reason, no real plot (how is the player gonna know any different?) You get to watch people and prod them with your stick of awesomeness.
6) Mudsex with Staff ('nough said).
7) Post Mortem Explanation Request Option (for those times when your character death or plot death REALLLLLLY burns YOU the player and you just can't let it go). Yes you can open a regular request and start this process but having it's own category will help when dealing with it, no?

[Dresan]

I would like to see that untouchable virtual power ceiling come down quite a bit. So that things that are occurring around the world feel like they might matter in the grand scheme of things. With these super-powered being existing everything our character do or are working on feels so trivial and inconsequential.

[Marauder Moe]

1) Staff interaction is crucial in the beginning of a player's career I think. 

I, too, think it would be pretty cool if staff went out of their way to animate for new players.  Not that everyone doesn't deserve animations, but I agree that this might be a high-return staff time investiment idea.

2) Staff interaction, to me, is also wayyyyy more preferable to staff PLOTS. I prefer you to throw wrenches and what nows into my plots rather than make me feel forced to go in your direction.

Eh.  On the other hand, we've seen a lot of players react negatively, strongly, and publicly about perceived staff opposition to their plans.

3) Allow players to play their own offspring when notable characters. I know a Sun Runner who had like 15 kids and the player would do justice playing any one of his daughters OR his one son. Don't even get me started on all of LoDs/Mekedas kids.

I think this would be cool, but should probably require karma and take up a special app useage.

[nauta]

2) Staff interaction, to me, is also wayyyyy more preferable to staff PLOTS. I prefer you to throw wrenches and what nows into my plots rather than make me feel forced to go in your direction.

Eh.  On the other hand, we've seen a lot of players react negatively, strongly, and publicly about perceived staff opposition to their plans.

It's an important distinction and staff does do, and should do both.  I agree with ShaLeah, though: my personal preference is for the former over the latter, but I also like to see other players who love the staff-plot dungeon crawl go out and have their fun and come back excited about it; it's a win-win.  (I'm pretty sure people aren't vocally complaining about staff interaction, but something else, e.g., misinterpretations, miscommunication, bad execution, gaps in expectations, and so on.  Besides, staff interaction doesn't always mean 'opposition', it can also mean 'collaboration': LauraMars' example of staff animating someone's mother is a case of the latter... although I guess it depends on the mother.)

On the staff interaction thing, one thing I thought of, just an idle thought: when we transitioned to Leader Character Reports, the rest of us were told to send in a Character Reports just once a month -- I was explicitly told this twice, by two different staffers (even though I was sending in just one character report a month), so I assumed it was a big deal.  But in the back of my mind I had a worry about it.  Roughly, I was worried that if I could only communicate my goals / plans / adventures / stories to staff once a month, there'd be some pretty big 'gaps' which might lead to confusions, misinterpretations, and so on.  (On the other hand, this did compel me to write up more BIO entries: I made them into miniature character reports.)  

Solution?  I know a lot of staff communication / interaction is personal one-on-one and can't be 'systematized', but perhaps there could be a kind of entry (no new code, just prepend: FOR STAFF to a BIO entry) alongside our other BIO entries that we as players write up where we toss staff various hooks for the storylines we are pursuing; they can pick them up and follow-up on them IG or OOC via a Question/Request report or ignore them or whatever.  Character Reports would then just be monthly summaries (so there's less paperwork over-all.)

[ShaLeah]

2) Staff interaction, to me, is also wayyyyy more preferable to staff PLOTS. I prefer you to throw wrenches and what nows into my plots rather than make me feel forced to go in your direction.

Eh.  On the other hand, we've seen a lot of players react negatively, strongly, and publicly about perceived staff opposition to their plans.

Which is why I suggest a post mortem request/discussion. Staff has blocked my characters before. Sometimes it's not a big deal but a couple times it pisses me off and makes me wanna rage quit. Just tell me. I'm a big girl. WHY are you meddling in my plot, why is so and so suddenly interested in killing me, HOW did Amos find out I was the one who stole his kank. My char is dead anyway so it won't change anything.  Odds are the "look ShaLeah, your char was boinking lord templars aide and they found out that she got preferential treatment/got him to kill her enemy/was also the cause of drama with LADY Foofynuts and THAT'S why she's dead" will result in a "DAMNIT! I didn't even see that coming!!!" followed by a couple days crying in my soup about how I suck.

Totally beats thinking "staff ooc decision that makes no ic sense" for 5 years.

[Lizzie]

I've had characters killed and not known why. One time it was like a quadruple-cross. The ribbon connecting the people was so convoluted that I never would've seen it coming and would've thought it preposterous if anyone had told me about it. Another time it -seemed- random, disjointed and disconnected - BUT my gal had a couple of enemies, so it could've had something to do with that. I'll never know for sure. One time my gal was actually SUPPORTING some of the people who killed her (apparently she was killed by a bunch of people, as a group effort), but they never knew that because my gal was being secretive about it. I didn't learn about that til a couple of RL years later, through the OOC gossip web. When I found out, I thought - woah - awesome. That one died a spectacular death, but because she was dead - I never got to see how it ended up. So I was VERY happy to have learned she was the target of some huge conspiracy.

Personally, I -like- hearing about what leads up to my PC assassinations or who killed them or whatever. But I also don't bring it back into the game. Sadly, the same can't be said for every player. There are players who, if they learn what "really happened" and by whom, will take it personally and make it their business to disrupt the RP of those people who PKed their previous character. Even if it's just a few players who are like that, the few can really fuck things up for the many. And so - I'm okay with the policy of not being informed who/what/why. I wish it didn't need to be policy, but I understand why it does.

[The Silence of the Erdlus]

I suppose the one thing which could drive me away from the game is player nastiness for no reason, since I don't want to associate with those kind of people. The other thread comes to mind, about three incidents in the game come to mind. You see it on the GDB sometimes, too, and its kind of sad.

[RogueGunslinger]

Want to retain players? Open up code and mechanics discussions. You want people to focus on roleplay? How can they do that if they're busy going through character after character trying to "find out IC" the proper way to utilize the code's inherent, and often obscure advantages.

No matter how much you try to tell people not to focus on the code it will never happen. There will always be players who focus on achievement and optimization, and that's fine, this isn't mutually exclusive with Roleplay. In fact many of the code's quirks make no sense, in roleplay terms. As there can be no real IC justification for the way the fail-only-system of skill-bumps works. It gets played out in game in either a ham-fisted, often awkward explanation from vet to noob. Or the player testing multiple theories and pulling IC excuses out of their ass to do so.

All this does is make the game harder for newbies simply because they don't have the information the veterans have built up. It's an entirely OOC advantage that can be off-putting to new players. It's like an exclusive club that has to be hard-fought over the bloody dunes of Zalanthas , losing multiple characters or taking RL years in-game on one character, to be a part of. Often times just to know how to match the coded version of your character to the Roleplayed version of them inside of your head.

In this a way this moratorium on mechanics discussions can actually hinder roleplay.

[Lizzie]

There's plenty of IC justification for the fail-improve skill system.  It works just like in real life, unless you're an abnormal phenomenon known as a prodigy. You might read up on the Peter principle, which is primarily intended as a study in corporate management but applies to skills as well.

We rise to the highest level of incompetence. That's the end-summary of the Peter Principle. In other words, when you're "level 1" at something - you are incompetent for level 2. But eventually you become competent at level 2, making you incompetent for level 3. You keep rising higher and higher until you can't get any better - at which point - you are incompetent for whatever is better than that. You must fail, in order to break through to the next level. You -cannot- get better if you are as good as you can get. Each level has a "as good as you can get at this particular level" barrier, and you must get to that point, before you can move further. If you never fail, then you are as good as you can get, and you will never get any better.

[RogueGunslinger]

There's plenty of IC justification for the fail-improve skill system.  It works just like in real life, unless you're an abnormal phenomenon known as a prodigy.

When I said no real justification, I wasn't very clear. My point was in real life, failure is not the only part of learning and mastering a skill, unlike it is in Armageddon.  And it's hard to give examples of what I'm talking about without going into mechanics. Let's just say that there are many more ways the skill system could be more realistic, and that newbies may assume things are a certain way, and they would never know they were wrong unless they were told otherwise, or did the tests over a long time to figure it out.

I read up on the Peter Principle becuase you mentioned it. I don't think it pertains to skill-fails all that much, really.  All it is saying is in order for a worker to do well in a promoted job, you need to be qualified for that job, instead of really good at your current job. If I were to apply that to the current scenario I'd say that failing with axes a bunch of times doesn't make you a badass in pole-arms when it branches. When they talk about highest level of incompetence, I figured they were talking about hiring people based on how much they excel at their worst abilities, instead of how much they excel at their best ability.

This doesn't pertain to skill-fails so much, because there is no major difference between the top of novice and the bottom of apprentice. Peters Principle seems to be dealing with levels of advancement where one skill/job isn't related enough to the next level up for the experience in one to appreciably effect your skill in the other.

[Riev]

The amount in which the Peter Principle does NOT apply to a fail-based system like Armageddon is staggering. If anything, like RGS says, it applies to the branching system which is kind of less the problem. Though the guild and subguild helpfiles you can kind of guess what your PC is going to be getting at some point.

I'm not sure how much I agree on opening up code/mechanics ENTIRELY, but honestly there are some things people will end up doing because there's no other way. I mean, Gortoks in the Den? Maybe I wasn't the first person to figure that out, but I did it because I was not able to find any reliable way to get the weapon branch that was supposed to be part of my PCs core concept. (close range subdue/knife fighting wrestler type). I'd been told numerous times that sitting, or bag-o-rocks training were not allowed, and while I knew it probably wasn't an allowed thing, I did it. Because every way to train effectively for combat is limited.

If there were slightly more mechanics/code allowed, maybe someone could have suggested another manner, something less overtly abusive. Maybe not. But I didn't feel there was much choice in the matter. Playing in/around Tuluk with Advanced skill in my weapons, and pretty buff, there was only so much I could do. And when you hear about Abuzer Kadayif's out there, and the Gypsies with their endless turaals... even if they ARE jokes (and they aren't), what does an idiot like me think?

I don't think we need to talk about branches, and we don't need to talk about the most efficient routes to doing things, but if, for example, when trap was still in game. If we were able to talk about mechanics, it would have been nice to talk about "Alright well, because of the way the skill is, and its similarity to bandage in that the damage is on a wide spread, here is a good way to make sure you can do it without accidentally dying". Because your character would probably have an idea of how much 3 pinches of flash was, but I don't have a clue OOCly, and to lose a character just to find out what the code does? It only takes once before I play a different game for 3 months.

[Jave]

Honestly, I think that every skill in the game aside from weapon skills are pretty straight forward in how they advance and quite easy to understand from the information already available in the help files.

The way weapon skills improve could, in my opinion, stand a good tweaking to eliminate this glass ceiling people hit where they can't fail anymore despite the skill being nowhere near maxed out, and the add on problem of it being exceptionally difficult to then master an advanced weapon skill if they managed to branch that.

There has been staff discussion on this issue over on our board and I wish things could be changed quickly and easily but ... the combat code is dark, and full of terrors.

For the time being, the best way to advance as a warrior without being twinkish about it is to find other warriors who have also hit that glass ceiling and practice with them. It's safe to assume that if you spar a newbie and murderize them in 4 hits while never taking one yourself ... it looks badass ... but you didn't learn anything.

[Saellyn]

And therein lies the problem - finding a warrior who has hit that glass ceiling INSTEAD OF going out to twink their skills up a la what the shadow realm suggests you do. "oh just go fight mob x and mob y and carry 500 bajillion pounds of rocks in a bag and ur all set bruh"

You have to find a warrior who has A) Not died, and B) hit that ceiling with you. That's a real trial, considering how many people play warriors vs how many reach that glass ceiling without dying vs how many people hit that ceiling and are in clans that won't train with other clans be...cause... rea...sons?

It's doable, sure. But it's extremely hard. And it should be. Why?

A warrior with branched weapons is a pretty ferocious sight in close combat.

[Jave]

For the record, carrying around a ton of rocks won't actually make you skill up any faster. Encumbrance cripples learning in the code. It will just make staff think you're being derpy.

But yes, it's doable just ... hard. And it requires at least one other PC to come along for the ride. Not ideal, but it's the best you can do for the moment.

[Saellyn]

Yeah. It's just finding that other player. Other than that (which isn't even an option for some off-peakers), you have to do one of two things: A) Twink your heart out and hope that staff don't nail your karma to the floor and start docking points from your skills and removing branches because you're a dirty, nasty, ugly twink and we hate you. Or B) Fight against increasingly deadly animals that can, and WILL, put you in the dirt. Honestly, option B is how it should be, but there needs to actually BE an option for that rate of progression to even happen. I know it's there, but there's a risk-reward system with that, and some animals just aren't worth the reward when you look at how risky it is to fight them.

Rantarri immediately come to mind.

[solera]

For the record, carrying around a ton of rocks won't actually make you skill up any faster. Encumbrance cripples learning in the code. It will just make staff think you're being derpy.

In that case, it should be kosher to weigh yourself down to even up sparring ?

[RogueGunslinger]

And therein lies the problem - finding a warrior who has hit that glass ceiling INSTEAD OF going out to twink their skills up a la what the shadow realm suggests you do. "oh just go fight mob x and mob y and carry 500 bajillion pounds of rocks in a bag and ur all set bruh"

You have to find a warrior who has A) Not died, and B) hit that ceiling with you. That's a real trial, considering how many people play warriors vs how many reach that glass ceiling without dying vs how many people hit that ceiling and are in clans that won't train with other clans be...cause... rea...sons?

It's doable, sure. But it's extremely hard. And it should be. Why?

A warrior with branched weapons is a pretty ferocious sight in close combat.

I disagree. A warrior with branched weapons isn't any more ferocious than a maxed assassin' who takes CONSIDERABLY less time to master. Sure, they dominate melee combat... So what. Not everyone is going to engage you in melee combat, and flee/run is incredibly reliable for escaping even very badass warriors (trust me, they haven't mastered Bash yet, so don't worry). Rangers have a free-kill-any-NPC skill called Archery, for fucks sake. It is also really damn good against PC's. The argument that warriors need to skill up any slower than other classes because they're strong is bullshit.

[Armaddict]

Warriors aren't skilling up slower.  I'm not sure I understand that assertion.  Their weapon skills go up at the same rate as anyone else with weapon skills.  They just have higher maxes and branch new weapon skills at the upper end of those.

If you're basing all this off of branched weapon skills coming late in their game and thus their offense and defense being high that they don't fail...I think you're missing the forest for the trees, here.

Fuck seeing skill levels.  Only here would there be the instance of 'I kick too much ass for this to be fair because I can't get this word to change.'  IF that is what this discussion about, yet again.  I may have missed there being some new nuance here that is actually valid.


Edited to add:  If you haven't played a character that was routinely hired to kill other PC's recently, I urge you to do so before continuing that line of logic.  Warriors are the biggest 'FUUUUCK' to get hired to go against by far.

[Saellyn]

RGS please don't shove words into my mouth again. I never said they needed to skill up slower.

Again. Don't shove words into my mouth again please.

What I said is that they ALREADY skill up slow, and they DON'T get to branch as fast as some other classes do to reach full utility (rangers branch some of their best utility skills without even having to go into combat.)

For a warrior to hit his pinnacle, and achieve the ability to wield a branched weapon, he has to amass a wealth of time training to the point where he can A) branch that skill and then b) actually be able to train that skill without demolishing everything in front of him. If his offense gets too high, you can basically say goodbye to the dream of seeing a branched weapon skill.

[RogueGunslinger]

It's amusing to me that I make a post about allowing more mechanics discussion, and then this discussions starts, where if we could see the mechanics behind warriors, we would know for sure whether they've made their skills harder to advance in than other classes.

Armaddict:

You're absolutely right weapons skills advance the same rate for all classes. What does this mean? That when it comes to weapon skills it takes even more time before you can even distance yourself from others in that regard. It also deserves consideration that a warrior is going to have a higher chance of hitting, and usually of hitting hard. This means less chances at a miss, and thus less chances to improve. But even that is not really what I mean when I say Warriors take longer to skill up.

We're comparing the guilds here, and as such, PC's vs PC's. This is a discussion about how each guild compares to another at getting to the point where they're useful for their intended tasks.

To a warrior, melee is all. Protecting yourself from the other classes is a hard thing to do, because they have reliable ways of avoiding melee and the ability to kill you without ever going into melee. This means that the one thing you excel at needs to be pretty fucking good if you want to stand a chance at all. The problem is the level of "good" for a warrior in this instance is either when;

A:You're reliably bashing, reeling, and killing things before they can flee
B: Reliably not taking hits anymore and don't have to worry about poisons.

Getting to that point on a warrior takes a LONG fucking time.. Where the other classes get into the game and can do their thing in say 5-10 days played, a warrior only really starts to shine in their expertise around 15-20 days played mark.  

RGS please don't shove words into my mouth again. I never said they needed to skill up slower.

Again. Don't shove words into my mouth again please.

What I said is that they ALREADY skill up slow, and they DON'T get to branch as fast as some other classes do to reach full utility (rangers branch some of their best utility skills without even having to go into combat.)

First off we mean slower when compared to others, not slower than it is now currently, right?

Secondly when you said this:

It's doable, sure. But it's extremely hard. And it should be. Why?

A warrior with branched weapons is a pretty ferocious sight in close combat.

I assumed that's what you meant. My bad for misinterpreting, if it's not.


Edit: Wording, formatting, errors, I really need to proofread.