Smolderforge. The present and the future.

[pinklal]

Hello there. I think about this server and gonna share it with you.

As everyone remember few weeks ago our server reach more then 500 players online, and i even remember few days when it was 700. This online provide really nice challenge on arenas for some reasons:

1) The number of playing teams. Obviously when 10 or even 15 teams playing 2x2 at same time, its hard to snipe or dodge somebody. Also it makes ladder balanced for most of teams cause literally every comp got counter. Finally it provide ~same skilled players and teams playing with each other which makes everyone learning faster(obviously 1.6 rated team cant learning something if some 2k "gladiators" kill them in 30 sec).

2) 3x3. I mean normal rated games with popular comps. The fact is 3x3 more balanced then 2s, its takes more skill and thats why its more interesting. I belive modern community(players who started to play tbc's pvp after 2011 or something) didnt saw really challenged 3x3(which was on retail or old AT) so its gonna be interesting for everyone. How to make population of 3s higher and make more ppl play it? Simply! Theres few ways(and you could use both of them in same time):

A) Add extra points for 3s. I mean non blizzlike more %, i mean custom scripted 50(or 100) arena points for playing 10(or any other number of games) in "3x3 hour" which could star at prime time. People gonna unit in groups before and playing 3s, it gonna be popular at least for 1 hour everyday. I belive its enough to make ppl understand how funny it is.

And other way B) host some tournament. It could be tournament with money prize, Or just with fun items, anyway it gonna be popular, cause you know, most decent players got EGO which gonna provide them fight for being tournament winner, doest matter which prise it give. So people wanna practise before tournament, they gonna make teams and traiting in ladder. Which makes this bracket more popular. Actually non-big tournaments every month is a good tradition which make community learn to play 3s(not only 2s as it was last few years since 2011).

3) solo que 3x3. When its only 1 match goes we met same players. Its also possible to cheat(que with second window and dont join/wintrade for main). But if its 3-4 matches in same time, you gonna met other players, and it takes more fun.

To be honest, most of decent players on smoderforge dont playing solo 3s. They call it cancer. And i cant be disagree with them. Even if ure paying good, some bad players could simple ruin your game and make you lose. How to change it? Pretty simple. Divide players to few groups which cant cross. Like 1500(or less)-1700, 1700-1900 and 1900+. Players from other layers cant meat each other and i belive it gonna helps alot. Cause newbie guys gonna stuck at first group, if they learnded something they gonna get more raiting and 1.7 and join next lvl etc. Do you scare it makes people dont get que at all? Not really cause i belive the whole server gonna play it after this change. For first time you gonna divide players for 2 groups, and later for more.



But now we could see that online back to default ~350 players. Which means no 3x3 at all(only solo que), which means only few teams playing 2s etc. I belive everyone understand thats not a good way, thats not a progress.

So yea, im agree this online changes was based on close of nost, fail of playtbc and some ppl lf a blizzlike realm. But not all. I belive a huge part players who join smolder few weeks ago left for other reasons.

I gonna try to explain those reasons and suggest to change server. Who knows, maybe those changes gonna invite more people there.

The biggest reason is gear difference. You know when you start with s2 gear, its pretty hard to win s4+swp geared teams even if ure outplayed them. Also price for the s4 and guard off piece is insane. 2k arena points for 1 piece is a joke.

So what we could change? Start with s3. You said go bg and farm s3? Well, most of ppl dont like to do that. And most of ppl who playing bgs on SF rightnow - alredy got s4, tons of bufs and games more like a farm, like a vanilla premade vs randoms farm.

I see 2 ways there. First way make s4 gear only for arenas, and s4 offpart(guardians) only for bgs. So everyone have to play bgs and arenas anyway. Or second way - make s4 for honor points or for arena points(but everyone start with s3 anyway). So people who like bgs gonna do bgs, and people who like arenas gonna do arenas. I cant find any reasons to start with s2 and have pretty big gear difference with players who came there bit early.

The second thing is PvE gear. The point is you have removed swp rings for healers. But, you still get swp last boss staff, bow and frist wep. What's the point? It makes even more disbalance, like s2 vs s4 it hard but possible, and s2 vs s4+swp is impossible. If you want to make balanced gear, you need to do next:

Boost classes which weak on tbc(2.4.3) for way which give them good pve gear. Which classes is it?

Well, i belive Paladins(any spec) druids(only feral/balance spec) warlocks(destro) shamans(ele ane enh) and hunters desirve to get any t6 gear(include swp pieces like legs waist and wrist). They're not so strong in this patch so that gear helps them alot. But you have to remove any t6(or non set same as t6 stats) gear for other classes. For rogues, heal druids, priests and warriors. You could give them few t4-t5 pve items with same attack power or bh or spd numbers but with other stats indead of res(like haste for mage, arp for war/rog or spirit/mp5 for priest/druid). But not t6 lvl gear at all for them. Those classes are alredy dominate, and pve gear make them much more stronger.

I belive all SWP WEAPONS should be removed. They're really imbanace and improove stats so much. Its not good for pvp actaully. I talking about sindorey staff, thoridal bow, 1h mace with 2 gems from kjd, kdj dagger with spd, appolon 2h sword and swp staff for ferals. And sure warglavies for rogues shouldnt be avalible to use in pvp( i belive now its possible to drop it from BT with normal raiding).

For some reason, i feel fair to add high end jewelery to everyone. Actaully its alredy on server instead of swp spirit/bh rings. So just add few swp/t6 jewelery and it gonna be balanced fine.

And one more thing - the skull of guldan is also pretty imbalanced trinket. Theres no place to this trinket in any aspect of pvp.

If you remember, on most popular pvp server arena tournament gear was literally same as i said. Because for years players test it and understand that gear mix is best for decent pvp balance.


Also, most important bugs of this server alredy on tracker. Seems like you're working on it and its great. But you also need to managment realm in right way to make it more populate. I guess before you was fine with low online and big % of donors which buying codes. But what if you gonna get 5x time more online? Don't you think you gonna get more money even if less % of players gonna donor money?

So you really got a chance to be biggest pvp based 2.4.3 realm even after "some server which never release" finally release. People who like blizzlike gonna join it, but pvp players gonna stay. You have a advantage because fix only pvp mechanics is much less scope of work then fix the whole game.

So i hope you gonna read it, think about it and take these tips to make server better. I hope we gonna see 700 and even more players online soon!

Thanks.

[Agarwen]

Add extra points for 3s. I mean non blizzlike more %, i mean custom scripted 50(or 100) arena points for playing 10(or any other number of games) in "3x3 hour" which could star at prime time. People gonna unit in groups before and playing 3s, it gonna be popular at least for 1 hour everyday. I belive its enough to make ppl understand how funny it is.

I belive all SWP WEAPONS should be removed. They're really imbanace and improove stats so much. Its not good for pvp actaully.

For some reason, i feel fair to add high end jewelery to everyone. Actaully its alredy on server instead of swp spirit/bh rings.

And one more thing - the skull of guldan is also pretty imbalanced trinket. Theres no place to this trinket in any aspect of pvp.

Its amazing!

[Kez]

@pinklal Swp weapon should get deleted and shaman/druid and paladins are able to get swp/full t6? I think its very unfair to any other class, Its not like shaman cant equip the Golden staff, and for paladins, isnt there hammer of sanctification ? :) About your S3 starter, Aint a Bad Idea therefore I agree with you. I cant even disagree your 3s hour because on AT It were great to play in that time to achieve your extra points.
Let me add a point for PvE if you dont mind.

PvE got "easy" on SF since you've t5 as starter gear and its not a challenge to do the heroics with t5 and upwards equip, what about using T4 as starterequip? I guess it would be a challenge to do dailies and these other heroics, and you would have to buy T5 with badges, It would ruin your system from Tier6 since you give them out for badges too, but what If you make something what let you buy Tier 6 with the same amount of badges as it is right now but you're just able to buy T6 when you already have T5, therefore you would have to reset T5. Iam not sure If you would like to do such thing, and not sure if the community has a positive or negative opinion about it :)

Greetings kez

[Hartun]

PvE got "easy" on SF since you've t5 as starter gear and its not a challenge to do the heroics with t5 and upwards equip, what about using T4 as starterequip? I guess it would be a challenge to do dailies and these other heroics, and you would have to buy T5 with badges, It would ruin your system from Tier6 since you give them out for badges too, but what If you make something what let you buy Tier 6 with the same amount of badges as it is right now but you're just able to buy T6 when you already have T5, therefore you would have to reset T5. Iam not sure If you would like to do such thing, and not sure if the community has a positive or negative opinion about it :)

Greetings kez

You can thank the staff for fucking up the little PvE that existed here. They know what happened

[Xios]

You can thank the staff for fucking up the little PvE that existed here. They know what happened

If I remember correctly we changed everything because the majority of the community begged for it, and we didnt have developers to continue with scripting the raids.

[Bucovsky]

IIRC PvE players were playing bgs only :P if you know what I mean Hartun.

[Akeno]

If I remember correctly we changed everything because the majority of the community begged for it, and we didnt have developers to continue with scripting the raids.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFnFr-DOPf8

[Outskilled]

Just an edit, looking back through another thread seeing henry slate blizz for the nostralius shut down drama, how they wont listen to the community etcetc, even though hes done the same exact thing for years and ignored 90% of the core players thoughts *cringe*

What even is this, nice to see some effort going into the structure of your post and ideas bro +rep for that...

Shit thing is it all falls on deaf ears, we've tried these threads before.. Fuck all changes mate.

There clearly is lack of ambition within devs and staff its been this way for years, just look how long we have asked for xfaction battlegrounds the code already exists in the solo queue why not roll out a trial peroid? No one wants to even take points like this seriously and ontop of that the lack if resources within the team to do so.

The best thing that could ever happen to this server would be to wipe it back to s2/s1 with progression slowly brought out for new seasons gear ( previously donated chars get s2 ) within each season the best shit for example s4 obtainable through arena the way its meant to be done with last seasons obtainable through honor, with an exclusion to the current head&shoulder & weps that u can get from 2's/3's

Theres a reason new players leave the server, there is no scope for progression within the server. Hunters who autoshoot for 1500 and warriors that white hit for 1800, thats on a s4 mail/clothie, you demolish s2 players of any class because of the massive gear difference.

"Reading this back makes me wonder why the fuck do i even play here jesus christ"

This would balance the server 100% for the plebs joining the server these days, in my honest opinion this population wont stay like this if changes arent made, if i was s2 fighting s4 people id be getting the fuck out to another server, ontop of that there is peak imes where one faction can simply not win a battleground or enter due to horde/alliance online.

If you wanna donate, u can donate for s3 weapons only for a bullshit amount fuck this full s4 for 4 dollars bollocs, the usd is that weak these days that its the kind of money people find in the back of their couch, and it fucks up the server, since when did u find so many BIS players in bgs on retail? They arent meant to be this optimised brauh, hence why SF battlegrounds are so shit.

The SWP wipe helped the community so much, as mentioned above to keep a steady growth this is one of the few things that could help hold and deive a player base.

But who am i kidding no ones going to give a fuck about this post or this thread anyways 1/100 of the player base only checks these anyhew

[Wamboye]

There clearly is lack of ambition within devs and staff its been this way for years, just look how long we have asked for xfaction battlegrounds the code already exists in the solo queue why not roll out a trial peroid? No one wants to even take points like this seriously and ontop of that the lack if resources within the team to do so.

It's not just about ambition. It's impossible or really hard to find staff members for tbc servers these days. I remember back when I was into working on servers there were at least 10 new projects every week and you could find 10 GMs at an instant, we also had lots of developers who wanted to improve servers and make them perfect. The site where all this went down, went down. I can't find a similar site now. And you see a lot of people who want to become staff members just for the sake of having power now.
We only need 1-2 decent devs. They could make SF great. But good luck finding them unless you want to give them lots of money.

[Wamboye]

If you wanna donate, u can donate for s3 weapons only for a bullshit amount fuck this full s4 for 4 dollars bollocs, the usd is that weak these days that its the kind of money people find in the back of their couch, and it fucks up the server, since when did u find so many BIS players in bgs on retail? They arent meant to be this optimised brauh, hence why SF battlegrounds are so shit.

I'm always a supporter of the noob-donor arguement but this time I have to disagree. If you start playing on SF you're already full s2/t5. On retail you had lots of 7-8k hp rare gear noobs in bgs, here you only find 400 resilence players or full t5 pve players. That's just SF. Wether it's BiS or S2, I don't care really. Some know that I've been playing with hats like http://www.wowhead.com/item=18308/clever-hat before there were transmogs, which reduced my stats to S2 level, and it didn't really change things.