I want to add some comments to the (recurrent) discussion about PvP on Ryzom. First about the opening post of Rikukatis.
To be honest, I am not sure whether PvP active players left to a higher extent than non (or casually) PvP active players. We had a large influx of players short after the merge from players who wanted to keep their levels and were curious about the new situation. Speaking about Leanon, I estimate about 5 times more players in the first 3 months after the fusion than
in average the year before (excluding the last weeks before the fusion). These numbers went down. For the former Leanon community, it seems to be more or less the same as before the merge (which was damn small), about the other communities, I do not know with sufficient exactness. But my impression is that they lost more players.
What you omitted or possibly did not recognize so much was a clash, bitter and violent at times, between the differing PvP and roleplay cultures. The french players desperately tried to convince everybody that being tagged were an indispensible feature in roleplay, and did in no way mean that players had to fear to be ganked at every corner. Some players from the other servers (from certain Leanon guilds in particular) enjoyed the opportunity of new ganking prey. As to Lands of Umbra, I can report that the Seves did not indiscriminately slay everybody. I once had a trek through ToT and was ambushed together with my trekkie by some of them and offered the alternative either to fight or to pay (we bargained a bit about the amount, was fun). So they did real PvP oriented roleplay as an outlaw clan, not just brainless ganking. And they participated in complex RP stories without killing every tagged newbie on their way.
The downside of such playstyle for some was e.g. the refusal of rezzing those from other factions, something which has upset especially former Ari players.
These clashes have never really been resolved or reconciled, rather left aside and forgotten, partially compromising here and there. This may have contributed to dwindling PvP participation, at least to some extent.
As to OP fights, several factors participated. The overwhelming superiority of one faction was one of them. OP wars are not for free, and clicking just to be clobbered down is not overly satisfactory. Next is indeed the low value of lower level OP mats. The Devs have severely worsened that situation by the introduction of q50..250 tools, one of the worst mistakes after the fusion. That resulted in rendering all picks below 250 widely useless for full grown diggers (and a digger is fully grown after a few months of playing) and making it costly to impossible for young diggers to harvest in high level areas.
In fact, all Greslin and half of the Egiros picks became more or less worthless that way, and as well all Armilo below 250. This devaluation of OP mats affected 9 OPs (all Greslin, 4/5 Armilo, 1/2 Rubbarn), where 2 of them (the 200) retained some value. This situation in an enlarged community very much forced the concentration to the 250 OPs mainly, and the 200s to some extent.
To be honest, I am not sure whether PvP active players left to a higher extent than non (or casually) PvP active players. We had a large influx of players short after the merge from players who wanted to keep their levels and were curious about the new situation. Speaking about Leanon, I estimate about 5 times more players in the first 3 months after the fusion than
in average the year before (excluding the last weeks before the fusion). These numbers went down. For the former Leanon community, it seems to be more or less the same as before the merge (which was damn small), about the other communities, I do not know with sufficient exactness. But my impression is that they lost more players.
What you omitted or possibly did not recognize so much was a clash, bitter and violent at times, between the differing PvP and roleplay cultures. The french players desperately tried to convince everybody that being tagged were an indispensible feature in roleplay, and did in no way mean that players had to fear to be ganked at every corner. Some players from the other servers (from certain Leanon guilds in particular) enjoyed the opportunity of new ganking prey. As to Lands of Umbra, I can report that the Seves did not indiscriminately slay everybody. I once had a trek through ToT and was ambushed together with my trekkie by some of them and offered the alternative either to fight or to pay (we bargained a bit about the amount, was fun). So they did real PvP oriented roleplay as an outlaw clan, not just brainless ganking. And they participated in complex RP stories without killing every tagged newbie on their way.
The downside of such playstyle for some was e.g. the refusal of rezzing those from other factions, something which has upset especially former Ari players.
These clashes have never really been resolved or reconciled, rather left aside and forgotten, partially compromising here and there. This may have contributed to dwindling PvP participation, at least to some extent.
As to OP fights, several factors participated. The overwhelming superiority of one faction was one of them. OP wars are not for free, and clicking just to be clobbered down is not overly satisfactory. Next is indeed the low value of lower level OP mats. The Devs have severely worsened that situation by the introduction of q50..250 tools, one of the worst mistakes after the fusion. That resulted in rendering all picks below 250 widely useless for full grown diggers (and a digger is fully grown after a few months of playing) and making it costly to impossible for young diggers to harvest in high level areas.
In fact, all Greslin and half of the Egiros picks became more or less worthless that way, and as well all Armilo below 250. This devaluation of OP mats affected 9 OPs (all Greslin, 4/5 Armilo, 1/2 Rubbarn), where 2 of them (the 200) retained some value. This situation in an enlarged community very much forced the concentration to the 250 OPs mainly, and the 200s to some extent.
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