Thoughts

All players want is a server where the GM's are dedicated and don't treat players like crap, create your own server with your own ideas and inspirations. That's what we need more of.

Players like uniqueness alongside the euro feel as its what their used to. But what i'd say is do whatever you feel is the best for your server, if you show dedication the players will show appreciation.

A decent low rate , with active gms and regular updates / events. then your onto a winner

something to aim for that isn't achievable before the server has had a chance to steady its user count.

6 months - 1 year for the top end kit and level 50-60 absolute max for me.

skills with no stupid high xp amounts to level them.

no cave teleports. also no teleporting to a province until it has been visited by foot first. guides on how to get there are much needed though.

dont have everything look the same as euro for the first 45 levels. new armours and weapons etc. from level 11 onwards.

As others have pointed out, a low rate server has best chances. The GMs need to be active and run small ingame events. The server owner and developers need to put a lot of effort into putting an extra spin on the game. Euro is a fine basis, but you need something unique and the only way in my opinion that you will truly get that is using professional developers. I'm not saying you need paid full time developers, but at least professional developers who don't mind investing some of their spare time. They can offer a well built server with minimal bugs and best possible customisations.

I've played a lot of servers and the high rate ones never keep players long. A lot of servers have poor GMs as well, in that they are only in it for the money, giving their friends too much special treatment etc.

Keep a minimal downtime on the server.

I think biggest value which pple look for in server (although many not consciously but it is still in their minds) is the security or feeling of security that the server is run professionally, which means you get a feeling that it will be around long enough time so the effort you put into the game won't be wasted tomorrow or day after tomorrow. We all bitched about euro but it had one virtue and that was staying power. The lower the rate, the more security reeking of longevity the server must exude. On server that pple get feeling it is run from somebody's bedroom and subject to server owner whim day to day, pple only play if it is high rate. High rates are like disposable napkins, lowrates like cloth handkerchief. Also as said just above here, have scheduled reboots, never reboot when something moves you, wait if you can for scheduled regular reboot unless it is emergency. You don't have to be some company behind it all but you should give impression that is the case and behave like one. Then it doesn't matter if your server is under your bed in your basement, on the other hand pro dedi location won't help if you reboot it whenever you get bowel movements :indecisiveness: and again, what matters is not the game interruption but the image of mir universe in players minds. I know that we are no kids anymore but to some extent we are becoming like them when playing.

If the server is not overly buggy, you don't need GMs milling among players on regular basis, that serves no good. Server owner should be somebody behind the scenes, should not interact with players directly - or he can but should do it incognito as a GM that nobody knows is the server owner. Problem with players talking directly to him who runs the server is that they can ask for and get requests fulfilled, but even if legitimate, it begs the question why the server owner didn't see the problem himself already or didn't get to know about it from chat logs, or reading server dedicated forum. Once pple have access to the 'ear' of the top power that be, it creates a feeling of insecurity, also the game looses its mystic charm, when you as player become in part somebody who runs the server - if he who runs the server listens to player wishes, they become to that extent server co-owners, and you as player don't want that. You don't want to have the feeling that if something will pose some difficulty, you will just put in request and it will be adjusted so its doable. Ideally server should have balanced content and if you just throw in a cave which proves 'impossible' by overall standard of the game, then tweaking it on player request is unfortunate thing which should not have happened in the first place. Server shouldn't be that 'raw' as to require such major tweaking once its out of beta testing.

To sum it up, think why God sent Jesus, who was analogous to a GM, why didn't he come down to speak to pple himself as the owner of the server on which the game of creation runs LOL simple to see - he would ruin his image if he made himself accessible. Or imagine reading a book and author of it would consult with you and agree to change the story plot development on the fly, per your request. I bet you as reader would lose big part of enjoyment reading the book.

On euro servers we never quite knew who was the top dog in Milan headquarters or he never interacted with us players, unless maybe on one or two occasions I recall but I could be wrong (one was when legal statement regarding wemade/euromir dispute was made public, second was when staff that interacted with us and did events were sacked and we were notified on forum that henceforth all will be to korean standard and that was the end of the Milan office communicating with us with personal tone). And we all put up with it all despite years of neglect because it proved to us again and again it would stay online no matter what (plus there was mir community but that again was the result of the server longevity), and it did (of course everything has to end sometimes...)

Mecha said:

I have always had this idea of running my own mir 2 server but I am a little worried of my expectations. I want to be able to run a server where it is appreciated for the detail put into it however I do not know my potential so I will start with the crystal files, very interesting files if I may add. I am a little curious about what the players expect and what they want in a server. This is just an idea and I understand the struggles of a server team and the players but I believe if there's strong connection between the team and the players then in theory the server could progress. It would be interesting to hear what you think about my idea?

Click to expand...

Advise from a developer prospective,

1. Try not to make false promises - stick to what you know and don't release details on things until it is set in concrete.

2. Keep your ground with your choices, although people may dislike your choice at first in the long run they will love your consistency and professionalism. People hate it when something changes mid game (unless it is necessary). Always make something too strong or too little exp/ too low drop rate because it's easy to bring them into line but not so easy when lots of people have leveled off high exp, got easy drops or easy kills - this should be avoided with testing but not many people will want to come away from a live server to do testing for nothing (unless there is nothing content wise for them left to do - if this is the case then there is something wrong in your server.

3. Try to make it a little unique, yes if you use default databases you have a lot of content already there for you. Maybe change names of monsters or add unique AI, changes maps, add new maps - there are so many maps to chose from!. I was having a brainstorm on unique boss encounters earlier this week after reading a post about bosses on somebodies server.

My idea was that in Oma King Spirit room there is a node at the back of the room called CursedNode - it starts a ritual when a player enters, once the ritual starts someone must hit the node to stop the ritual (if they don't then every player in the room will instantly die), if they do then the player in return is cursed. The curse reduces the players defense for say 30 seconds and makes them immune to the curse for 120 seconds. The ritual will start again after say 30 seconds (which requires there to be atleast 3 people in the group to repeatedly keep the curse from killing them all). There is also a phase where the node will randomly select one person and recall them to the node with a wave of monsters. There will be a small barricade that is put up along the wall to stop the player from leaving the back room until the wave of monsters are killed.

Feedback on an idea like this?

As to server content, if its low rate, than the caves for getting to 40 should be well developed as you expect pple to stay in them some time, not just a day or two, they should not be glossed over in the spirit that the game starts at 40+ (or 45 or whatever). I personally am traditionalist, I like to see the orig mir caves and mobs in place, like they used to be but you can up spawns to make those old place more lively, challenging, add some new elements like new subs in all low level caves, but don't make new mix of orig mobs like I've seen on arcadia (wolves in bichon province, that kind of thing). I decry even elimination of Natcave, spawns could have been made more lively, exp adjusted btw NC and OC, the latter traditionally has 1F pretty well empty, nobody cares about low level caves, there are so many... being traditionalist, I wouldn't mind moving some caves up the ladder of difficulty because mir has way too many caves for under 40 chars, those latter more modern additions (frogs, should be made for 40-45 levels, up mob strength and exp (and spawns if needed).

Speaking of challenging gameplay, every time I started new char lev1 on any server, official or private, I was disappointed that you pretty well can start off on deer, scarecrows, cats right at lev1, even yetis/omas, as they pretty well don't do much any damage to you. Only hens should be like that, all other mobs you should need to get and use some pots and or get a little higher level (make it some significant initial auto stat increase with level gain). I mean pretty well all pple are not new to mir, they would not get discouraged like five yr olds when they would get killed by a cat at lev1. That said if you listen, don't go overboard and make superman mir LOL

---------- Post Merged at 01:06 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 12:21 PM ----------

TheDayIDie said:

Advise from a developer prospective,

1. Try not to make false promises - stick to what you know and don't release details on things until it is set in concrete.

2. Keep your ground with your choices, although people may dislike your choice at first in the long run they will love your consistency and professionalism. People hate it when something changes mid game (unless it is necessary). Always make something too strong or too little exp/ too low drop rate because it's easy to bring them into line but not so easy when lots of people have leveled off high exp, got easy drops or easy kills ...

3. Try to make it a little unique, yes if you use default databases you have a lot of content already there for you. Maybe change names of monsters or add unique AI, changes maps, add new maps - ...

Click to expand...

I like point 1&2 they say in different way what I wrote above plus things I didn't (about starting things off on more difficult side first if you can help it). Point 3 yes but only as regards newer mir additions, or mir3 additions, I like to see traditional mir base, maybe tweaked and added some content but not renaming mir classic mobs or maps.

One change I'd like to see on map subject is to move the new/higher leve cave entrances to outlaying regions of mir, best make also new outdoor province map, not stick them all to WWoods or in the middle of traditional maps where lev5 mobs are outdoors and you step into lev50 cave. On the same note, never liked the area south of border village placement where you go from 'starting point' place to fairly high lev area. I know we don't care much for outlaying caves, places, nobody likes to do long travels to leveling cave when he comes home from work and wants to play mir for couple hours but that can be helped by granting some teleport ability at 40+ and increased at 45+ or whatever, just don't pile it up around bichon wall only (again, that's fine for high rate server but not low rate).

NPC - junk npc if at all, only in higher level maps, like 45+ at least (you don't run danger of bots selling there). Consolidate ring/brace/neck npcs into one with dialog where you click on the kind you want to buy or sell, with back button... that kind of innovation I am fine with as traditionalist. On low rate server don't put high consignment fees or too short period on TM. On chronicles for example, they eliminated the possibility of buying low level items (which are junk for high levels) for pple that joined the server months later or who level slowly. I like big storage too, else you chuck nice low level added stat items which you might have otherwise sold or given to new pple joining server later on - or you can keep your 'junk' on TM offered for sale for months on end and you can put even low level items for low cost there because the fees don't prohibit that. With today's item search working so well on TM I don't see the need for making it such exclusive place where items need turnover and high fees (which as gold sinks hardly help anyway). I'd like to see some way to sell from bag, say right click on item in bag would put the item straight into selling spot and if set to hold, you would sell just by right clicking item in your bag, if that is possible to script. I have tons of ideas like that, these are just off the top of my head.