Players connected at any given time / NPC population

Manuito

Hi,

I started playing the Darkfall trial a few days ago and so far I'm really enjoying the experience. I have already lost a few things to PKs, but that's alright, I was looking for something similar to Ultima Online and it seems that I have found it. The other option is to continue with EVE, which altough very different I have played on and off for one year, so I still have another few days in my Darkfall trial to come to a decision (and that's what this post is all about).

So far the only thing that is not looking great in Darkfall for me (no offence, just my opinion!) is the population. These days I have had to cross the main continent from side to side a couple of times and I was only able to see other players when I was close to a city, fortress, or whatever you want to call it (and the sorrounding NPC camps). NPC spawns where also very rare in some areas. This allowed me to do a two hours trip twice without any surprises... which on one hand is great, but on the other hand looks a little bit too easy for a hard game like this (even in WoW a level 1 char would have serious trouble trying to cross an entire continent by foot, as he would aggro everything in some places from far away). I have to say that at the beginning of the trip I was very nervous, waiting for something to happen, enjoying the game like I was when I did my first trip in UO from Britain to Cove... but then, at the end, I felt a little bit dissapointed. Maybe I was very lucky but, again, there were no NPCs to stop me either.

Yesterday I joined one of the three biggest clans in EU-1. The biggest one in the server has got around 180 players, and the twentieth around 40. I doesn't look too bad. The problem is that in my clan, at any given time (at least during weekdays in the afternoon/evenings GMT) there are only about 10-15 players connected, which is about a 10% of the total. This, extrapolated to the rest of the server, means to me that normally, at any given time, there are around say 100-200 players connected (maybe a few more without a clan, but not many).

This seems to be a little bit of problem with such a big map (much less players that in UO, for example, which has smaller continents), or isn't it? I have just played Darkfall, as I said, for a few days... so I'm sure that there must be some things I'm not taking into account. How do you feel about the population in the game (not subscription numbers, but actual number or players playing the game at any given time)? Are those numbers enough to offer big wars between clans (and not only between the 2-3 biggest clans), sieges and so on... or is it difficult to find a little bit of action? I have seen plenty of videos showing ship battles and so on, but I wonder if it is a normal occurence or if those ocassions are a little bit unusual.

Thanks very much and sorry if there's something I'm missing. I'm just looking for help, just trying to decide which game to play, not trying to offend anyone

alderdale

You will hear people argue the population point a number of different ways. 

Its because the worlds to big

Its because they havent implemented my suggestions yet

Its because the game sucks and nobody plays

The reality is that at first you dont mind getting killed and looted because the items you get are very easy to replace and the mobs you need to kill are in close prox to a city.

As you progress further in the game you have to risk more, risk is the core issue here.  The world is mostly void of activity because most people wont venture forth unless the conditions to tip risk in their favor are just right and they rarely are.  Hence the popluation problem, hence the huge number of active accounts that arnt used.  People want to play, they want to explore but the risk prevents people from truely enjoying the gameworld.   You can argue these points all day but it is the core the problem.  If people could always keep what they loot and not lose what they have people would be out day and night farming away to earn the gold they need to buy the best items, harvesting and crafting non stop to the same end.  Building and sailing ships at all times, cruising around in warhulks "just for the hell of it".  The risk prevents allot of the this...............you see the true resutls, a dead world.  Naked's huddled around banks for hours on end.

in order to have a game world truely alive at all times you would have to have another server thats really PVE based no player looting and with different optional PVP senarios available for war decs, sieging etc.

Greymoor

Originally posted by alderdale

You will hear people argue the population point a number of different ways. 

Its because the worlds to big

Its because they havent implemented my suggestions yet

Its because the game sucks and nobody plays

You forget to mention that the population is highly concentrated at certain areas and cities meaning a lot of agon is effectly 'dead' space. Which leads to number one, the world is too large and many areas simply have no real interest to players.

The reality is that at first you dont mind getting killed and looted because the items you get are very easy to replace and the mobs you need to kill are in close prox to a city.

As you progress further in the game you have to risk more, risk is the core issue here. Let me stop you right there, this is exactly the same in any full loot MMO. In Eve you drive more expensive ships and use more expensive equipment. Adding more risk will increase your chances of surviving, most players will risk a moderate amount to strike a balance.

The world is mostly void of activity because most people wont venture forth unless the conditions to tip risk in their favor are just right and they rarely are.  I'll correct you again, people are always in and around the world, just in places of interest and not at the zombie spawn.

Hence the popluation problem, hence the huge number of active accounts that arnt used.  People want to play, they want to explore but the risk prevents people from truely enjoying the gameworld.   You can argue these points all day but it is the core the problem. Incorrect again...

  If people could always keep what they loot and not lose what they have people would be out day and night farming away to earn the gold they need to buy the best items, harvesting and crafting non stop to the same end.  Building and sailing ships at all times, cruising around in warhulks "just for the hell of it".  The risk prevents allot of the this...............you see the true resutls, a dead world.  Naked's huddled around banks for hours on end. What you've just suggested here is nothing like what Darkfall is all about, a 'dead world' just means you've been running in the wrong places expecting hordes of players. The world is huge, the population is decent, 90% of the population will inhabit a small portion of the world. Try Gulghat, Long March, Mar Shrall, Marithan, ect ect. You'll find 20+ actives in each of those places. 

in order to have a game world truely alive at all times you would have to have another server thats really PVE based no player looting and with different optional PVP senarios available for war decs, sieging etc.

Wrong again, to have a truely alive server AV would have to fix a few game mechanics such as the alignment system AND remove the dead space which currently gives no reason for people to visist. Also advertise the game and relaunch which is planned after the next exp. pack.

xpiher

EU population is concentrated in large zerg strong holds that is nearly impossible to raid. That makes the population seem lower than it is. There aren't very many dead zones in DFO, but mobs actively spawn which makes areas seem less populated than they actually are as well. This was done to save resources for player and sieges. 

NA has better population, but you'll run into the same problem of fights being far and in-between. This is caused more by how NA players play than just low population. Many of the top pvpers do not like PvE at all and they just sit in their city duling rather than out farming for gear because they never have to replace it. 

Which bring you to the core problem of DFO. The first person who replied to your post has it backwards. The reason the population is less active than it should be is because the game lacks scarcity. There isn't any real reason to farm one area over another because things aren't centralized and gold is plentyful. However, there are a few areas in the game where the only place a resource is gotten is from that particular area. This is seen by the fact that you'll always usually see people farming lenspar golems on Yssam and Carin, or people always farming Taint of Kamset on ruby. The rest of the game needs to have scarcity injected into it and have more localized resources. The next "expac" is supposedly addressing this issue. It has been theorized that AV is actually making the map a little smaller as well. 

asdar

Try going to a far place in the world and banging on someone elses mine for a while and see how populated the world gets.

Jupsto

I agree OP, alot of people try to deny it because they dont want the game to die but the population is awful (better on US1 I hear). closer to release there was no way you could cross the map without being killed. which used to anoy me as a new player (I died several times trying to get to dwarf lands the first time), now I miss it sooooo much. the game is boring without bumping into people. 

its stupid how much people whine about other things when population is easily darkfalls biggest problem. the game world was designed for many many more players. they need to shrink the map, or make proper hotspots where pvpers can always find action. Devils used to be a great hotspot before they were nerfed, now all there is only seatowers every few days. AV also tried to create hotspots and pvp with trade routes, which worked first few weeks when they were new but after completely FAILED, because people realised the rewards/idea/system was crap and stopped bothering completely.

Hopefully when AV vaguely talk about "streamlining/optimising" the map for thier next expansion it is with this goal in mind. Also hopefully the planned changes such as reduced grind and better UI and models/animations brings much more players. Because trust me darkfall is 10x more fun with decent population, and can't run much longer without it.

Manuito

I keep seeing the same numbers day after day, so for me it's obvious that Darkfall has a serious problem with population (which in turn creates many other subsequent problems for the game). There could be many reasons for this, as you guys say, and probably many ways to fix it... but something tells me that the game is not going to change no matter what it's discussed by the players in forums like this one or even in the official one.

While I really like some parts of the game, specially the way it reminds me of Ultima Online sometimes, I don't see myself developing my char for a few months just to be able to participate in ocassional fights, no matter how good they are (and I really enjoy PvP, full loot and so on). This game could have many other things to offer with very slight changes in the design, but right know I doubt that it could be called a "proper sandbox", as some aspects of the game are a little bit abandoned and you don't really have too many choices to make (even with your char, you just grind the same as all the other players and become a jack of all trades). Some "unofficial" UO servers have a greater number of players than Darkfall (or at least that's my impression right now), and reasons for it are very easy to spot.

Just wanted to give my opinion, not to offend anyone... I understand many people would disagree with me.