I completely agree with you bro

I agree, they took away some really fun things.
Rage of elements - Too much hero rep i'd assume, want us to buy them, by spending.
Trader of rarities - Want us to buy from melvin.
They ruined ruthless fury - Want to make you spend to buff hard to have a chance to win.
The incident chests - Want you to pay for dragon phials and hero rep.
Double reals - Want you to pay for the reals instead of being rewarded with it.

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Game is slipping.

At the cost to repair gear and constant bleed for more cash it has turned from a game of challenge to a cash cow. No one hardly fight at my level unless they are willing to dedicate real money to staying ahead. The joy of playing against real (unlimited) characters is what drew me to the game. I have spent several hundred dollars and next time I know is I have to spend more to keep up. So, I play and have fun but find myself on that fine line between progress and just making it in the game.

There is no incentive to play hard as before because it is just too costly - unless you want to play slowlllllly and eventually save up to get gear etc. without the costly experience that comes along with it.

I completely agree with you bro.

I agree fully with your comments Saint. When I found out I had to pay 50s to open a hard earned undead chest, I was disgusted. Similarly, the Great Protector Quests call for the payment of 5 Reals to get Giant Might.

It is not because I have achieved level 70 with good total reputation that I am richer and able to pay more to spend my free time in the game. I will not spend double to play my usual time, and if I have to cut back my playing time, then I will switch to some other activity. The game seems to expect higher level players to pay increasingly more, but does not offer the possibility of earning more.

I have often said that the DE game programmers are not gamers and to date, not much has been done to prove me wrong.

I think the game is really polarizing to one side is the reason for less activity. DE has added things to make the game more fun.

1. Attack boats at sea is a great interacting, but only one clan gets to do it otherwise you make their clan unable to play.
2. SB's are fun but if one side loses then BC's the other.
3. DOT at higher levels. the number of 60+ players Red vs. Blue i think is pretty skewed.
4. Barbarians can be fun if they were consistent 7k or 21k depending on the mining level so littles can do more.
5. Medallions are great as long as you don't get bc'd constantly while doing them.

Changes i would make.
1. Block people from BC'ing 10 levels below them. Then more people would be willing to fight someone at their own level and not fear of a bunch jumping in and killing them. (Make it 10 levels from the lowest level in start of a fight. so if 60 attacks 50... highest that can join is a 60.)
2. Bracket SB's so no one cares about low levels. You would get a lot more littles active in sb's so when they get to the bigger bracket it will be part of the game not a rare occurrence.
3. Allow hops on aura's so players can get stronger without a clan being able to halt progress. And when they are strong enough to fight back then there will be more pvp.
4. Shutdown the ability to change sides. Think this speaks for itself.

If we had a Balance between Red and Blue all the things you want would be more likely to happen. Only things I don't have a idea for is arenas. The arrows and stars was a great idea. Maybe 2 days a week double the number of arrows. I don't think DE is doing a bad job at all with adding things and making more fun events.

Also like to say i'm a non-casher. You can do well without spending reals. But don't have a problem with people who do. Only really big difference is some reps and they move faster. We all end up at the same point.

I do agree - If people are having fun, they will stay and the game will make money. If not and people see that the admin. is only interested in making money and not in giving a good experience of giving good service, well, there are lots of other games out there, and people will leave. A great letter and a cogent, well reasoned argument. Hopefully, the admin is listening.

I agree - the archipelago for instance was a great change - however top clans are getting really proprietary when it comes to mining crystals; much to the detriment of other clans who would like to progress as well and become better. I have spent quite a bit of money in this game - because I enjoy playing it as well as interacting via pvp (although I am more of a pve guy). There are aspects for all kinds of players in this game - and I understand the need to make money (to pay wages to devs, improve game etc...) and that a good majority of people want to have everything for free. The dilemma is to find an acceptable middleground - not to overly advantage payers over non-payers while maintaining the attraction of the game. My 2 cents.

I agree, but if we don't all stand up, we will fall

Completely Agree

aye totally agree admins come on bring some events back like rage of elements

i agree big time

I agree totally
the game used to be fun, people were in arenas, you could get drops more often
and good gear didn't mean going into real life debt just to compete
all games need to make money, however, it has turned into a cash based game
back when i was playing DE (beta lol) it was so much fun
and gear could break completely then yet we had FUN
I have to agree with Suspira....if the programmers actually played DE, with no cash, things might be different
I have seen too many people leave game, good players too and I find that rather sad
there needs to be more game incentives and an easier way to play and get gear for non-cashers
and make gear that can be bought with in game coin be cheaper
it is exhausting to try and keep up with the Benjamins so to speak
again, in game coin needs to be easier to come up with so non cashers can enjoy playing
just a few changes would make this game so much more enjoyable

I agree
bring rage
bring reals
Add a new pvp event for the 1 week that doesn't have one

i agree with everything thats been said..bring them all back or DE is going to start losing people due to it becomming too expensive to effectively play

It's evident that lower level players just starting have more incentive, but at a price. I agree that higher levels have some new incentives but at an even greater cost. It does feel as a player that DE only care about profit from existing players, vs giving enough goodies for all to stay interested without everything costing so darn much. Frankly. I have found other games I am beginning to spend more time in than this one. I don't stay here because of DE and their incredible ability to make the game batter. I stay here because of frinds I have made, but even so Competition is a b*itch and there are other options out there attempting to get my hard earned monday. Some advise to DE. Listen to players, all of them, not just a few and make a plan of progression and LET US know what's coming and when, otherwise you will lose more of,us faster

I was not here at the start of the game, so I can only comment based upon my 6 months or so experience here and my comparative experience in a completely different game that I have played for nearly 5 years now.

With that preface, it is my *opinion* that this game isn't nearly as "money hungry" as perhaps people who have been playing somewhat longer perceive it to be. I say this because the game I've been playing for nearly 5 years has gone from 300 domains to 30, and it's absolutely because of their attitude that the more money people spend the better. In that particular game, spending money doesn't even guarantee that you have a chance to get ahead. Every day they have promotions, sometimes only 3 or 4, usually 8 or 10, and they are all "random chance" chests. You can't, for instance, buy the equivalent in that game of purple gear. You have to buy a bunch of boxes and open them and hope you're lucky. Then buy more and more--- You don't even get the option in that game to get the "special" game currency for free like you do here.

The only reason I am still in that game is for the friendships I've made over nearly 5 years time. This is just my perspective, coming from a *real* cash cow game mentality to this game, where at least I have the chance to eventually catch up with the big boys.

PS: Swey, I LOVE your tag line, it reminds me of the old D&D games ;-D

Excellent post Saint et al. - Agree 100% the requirement to spend more and more money the higher your level for the high level goods is simply getting out of hand. DE has made some great improvements over the course of the time I've played but it's quite obvious they've also gotten greedy. A lot of players, a lot of cashers have moved on, some are considering it. It's not a very good long term business model to require your most dedicated customers to spend more and more. It may work short term but it will never last. My $0.02.

Here's my thoughts - We wouldn't need to spend so much money to progress.... if it wasn't for other people spending a ton of money to progress. If more people thought about the value of the dollar spent instead of buying because it's shiny, we wouldn't be in the position of "buy or get slaughtered" in the first place. But since we are already there (me included, I cashed a LOT more than I ever expected to)....

Make clan immunities from war longer, we keep killing the little clans because we have to stay protected from the big clans. If you want people to last long term, they need to find a "family" unit that they can grow with. Ask around, many of us are here for the friendships, not the game play anymore. Fix this. If I thought for 1 minute that a level 1 clan could actually grow and survive (besides Blue Haven, that is very uniquely done), I would stop recruiting smaller toons and let them grow slower in smaller clans. Put level requirements on level 2 & 3 clans. Stop letting the "rerolls" join a level 3 clan, get full blue gear, and scare all new players out of the arena.

Change Curses so we can still join the arena. Let the bc rep players keep hitting and breaking gear, and let the curses have the disadvantage of less damage, more bleeding, whatever, but then let those players that were hit continue to join the arena. You could even still keep hexes from joining arena, but BCs cause gear damage already, that should be enough of a deterrent for those that cause trouble and deserve the bcs.

Change Torlings!! What a waste of time. Let me buy my way past them or make them level based, like garuug. Seriously - I have NEVER seen a game that wants me to NOT play for 20-60 mins at a time. This is ridiculous. Don't even need to change the frequency, just make every ship able to bribe them somehow. At Least give me the option of spending money for the times when other people are already waiting on an island for me (protector quests). You not only lock me out of playing for that amount of time, you are wasting 2, sometimes 3, other peoples time too.

Change Sydian distribution. I won't get into the debate over the islands here, we all know the imbalance there and the struggles that are going on. Only admins can fix this. Open maze at any time again, so we can farm for sydian there, start with that fix, and right away you'd see more people enjoying the game.

Oh, and give us the emotes me miss so much. Little things, like telling Mindless to (hike) make everything about the game more fun.

edit -
Reaghnf
Only things I don't have a idea for is arenas. The arrows and stars was a great idea. Maybe 2 days a week double the number of arrows. I don't think DE is doing a bad job at all with adding things and making more fun events.
My suggestion for Arena time - less gear damage, all the time. Guaranteed at least 2 people are going to die and get damaged. Teams are often unbalanced, stop basing them on level alone. There has to be a way to make it based on gear.