I am just curious why CF's playerbase has become such a rag tag collection of band wagoners. It seems like almost over a two week period half the playerbase quit playing their evils and rolled up goodies. Just because goodies now seem to be wining. Does no one enjoy playing the underdog any more? Its retarded playing habits like these that make me wish there was a 1 cabal per player rule in the game. So people couldnt just hop on to which ever side was wining. Enjoy your character, losing and getting your ass kicked can be rewarding as well, your victories are so much sweeter. To all the players that have a collection of charactes that they play back, with each character going absolutely nowhere. I challenge you to try playing on char at a time and see what comes of it. The RP rewards alone should convince you rejects to quit playing fair weather chars like a lot of you tend to do these days.

Bah

Considering how many evils were around two weeks ago.

The game has always had a pendulum swing to it, sometimes more obvious than others. Again RE Istendil, almost everyone *knew* he would kick their butts, so wouldn't log on their goodies when he was on.

It also depends on time of day, especially the time of day leaders are on for their cabals. IE if Empire and Scion leaders are on during the day, don't expect to see a lot of them at night, but don't be surprised if you're the only goodie in your range during the day, either.

- Tharena

Either its a 'crazy coincidence' that's been happening for years, or people prefer to be safe rather than be an underdog. The Istendil example is far better, people get their buddies to IM them if X, Y or Z is on, if so, they'll play one char, if not they'll either wait or play a char that is safer.

You can't force the playerbase to stop being wusses, you just gotta find a way that its equally fun to be either.

As I recall there were four or five certain hero evils, that did have the same playing times as all these goodies (maran and outlander) that would routinely log on and give them a fight (aka crush them)

But we're gone now. ;)

But I dont think you have the right reasoning. I came back from a 6 month break and asked my friends and checked the forums to see what cabal was in power. After learning and hearing from many that the Imperials were strong with quite a few hero level chars, I decided to roll a Fort, but as I'm getting into range, I notice tons of people joined fort too, so there was very few evils to kill. You can say everyone's jumping on the bandwagon but honestly in the few days it took me to roll a char and get to mid 30s the power had shifted, and I honestly didn't want to run around as a squire with nothing to kill 90% of the time. I think most people try to play the under dog, because they think everyone else doesn't, so A.) It'll be easier to get in with fewer there already or B.) Theres more stuff to fight!


And I think the reason everyone quit their evils to make goodies was that everyone was noticing fewer enemies, and wanted a more interesting play experience. Obviously the answer is make an Outlander.

nt

Ive never understood why the imms dont put a cap on cabals. Fortress is the worst, everyone and their mother is in the fortress. Most of them are there for the equipment gathering possibilities and giveaways. Maybe a cap of 15-20 people would be good enough and more stringent requirements for showing up/hoardin/login-out. This huge hoarde of goodies is the reason I kill/full loot em every chance i get (aside from being evil :P )

Some of the bandwagon chars only show up when their scout char sees a billion cabal members logged on.

With my last character I saw it more as time based. All of the Imperials would login for 3-5 hours around mid-afternoon. Marans would have morning and sometimes afternoon and the beginning of the evening. Scion would have the night hours. Tribunal would login randomly in groups and log out in groups. Outlander never really had any numbers other than the ####load of goodies, but I lump them in with the Maran.

- Ive never understood why the imms dont put a cap on cabals.

We pay very close attention to how many members each cabal has at a certain time. For the most part, they're all usually near where they should be. We'll make certain adjustments when one explodes in numbers, but putting a hard cap on it isn't a change I'd really like to make. I agree, Fortress has a good many members right now. I don't think it's as huge as you think, but yeah, they're a wee bit overpopulated for my taste. But we'll adjust.

As for bandwagon characters using scouts... we monitor that very closely, and will continue to.

As I saw it, the problem was that as soon as it looked like the pendulum might swing, instead of sticking around and fighting it, there were mass desertions. It was almost like everyone was determined to quit out whilst they still had their cabal item so as to avoid having a lost item on their record.

Yep, a lot of them did that and still do it.

I wish there was some way to only allow players to have one caballed character at a time and unlimited numbers of uncaballed. Maybe make something like this part of the CF rules? Shrug.

It's all about active players. I don't believe hard caps would accomplish as much as you think.

Empire and Fortress have EXACTLY the same numbers. Followed reasonably closely by Tribunal.

So perhaps the problem isn't the assumed overpopulation of cabals, but rather people just not logging in and playing? If that's the case, than even if we cap numbers...nothing changes. I'll say what I've always said to people. Play a single character, if you get bored with it...delete and play something different. However, holding on to a full gambit of characters as a 'just in case' scenario....well, it sucketh.

Yep. The problem is more of a cost versus reward thing. People have chosen that despite there being less pronounced rewards associated with being in the 'top dog' cabal and better rewards at least in terms of what gear you can have by being the underdog alignment, its still worth it for them to play 'cheap' rather than play fair.

If it comes down to "well, yeah I'll be bored as a goodie, or die as an evil" (or vice versa), people predominately choose the former. They'd rather be bored and safe than 'action-packed' between gank-fests. Not the easiest thing to fix. Number caps won't fix it, you have to adjust the cost vs gain.

I was just assuming they dont play 2 chars in opposite cabals. If they chose not to play the char because of top dog issues then yah, caps wont fix it. I dont really know how you could fix those kinds of things other than policing people who do those sorts of things. Isnt it possible to see the chars that log out when things get rough and log in when everyone else is on and punish those who have obviously developed a pattern of doing so?

I know its hard to prove such behavior but after they do it 10 times, its obvious they dont just "have to log off". Maybe put some kind of a warning on the rules or MOTD, or make it part of the rules.

>Maybe a cap of 15-20 people would
>be good enough and more stringent requirements for showing
>up/hoardin/login-out.

I don't like where a hard cap would take us.

Take a dude like Gelgso. That character was created around the start of the year and just deleted, and could have played a lot longer in terms of lifespan/con if he wanted to. That guy could pretty much only play Saturday/Sunday mornings. His logon times were regular. When Tribunal was up, he logged on those times. When Tribunal was down, he logged on those times and often was the only one on taking a beating. It was pretty obvious that he only had that one character (at least seriously) and that was just when he had time to play.

I don't want to tell a player like that he can't play CF with his five hours a week or whatever and be caballed.

This huge hoarde of goodies is the
>reason I kill/full loot em every chance i get (aside from
>being evil :P )

Side note: Almost everyone thinks they're the underdog, whether they actually are or not.