Removed 23155/51557 accounts :/

[baedamichi]

1) "Too many accounts" is not itself a problem.
2) "Abandoned accounts" is not itself a problem.
3) "People who try the game and don't like it" is not itself a problem.
4) I'm not even sure "people register with no intention of playing" is a problem.

What makes this a high priority?

Added numbers to be able to reply better.

1) Agree totally.
2) Depends on why the accounts are abandoned...
3) That, imho, is the problem which should be discussed in this thread...
4) Agree totally. That's rather a problem of those people, as registering without the intention of playing seems to be a pointless exercise wasting their time, but not that of the devs.

Back to 3), which imho is the problem which should be adressed.

The Mana World (TMW) is a serious effort to create an innovative free and open source MMORPG.

(from the "About" page of themanaworld.org, accentuation by me).

So, if all the coding and designing is done to create a massively multiplayer online role playing game, then numbers matter, imho. What I don't like about the numbers Nard presents us here is that maybe "human resources" are wasted if among those who create an accout and then stop using it there are too many people who play a bit and then decide they don't like it.
In another thread (http://forums.themanaworld.org/viewtopi ... 12&t=15837) it was mentioned that maybe TMW fails to attract many new players because it is not well-known enough.
If a huge number of people among those (and we're talking of ten thousands here) who register but then never come back are NOT bots who got around the captcha, then missing publicity is not the problem. People found their way to TMW, but then they decided they don't like it. So, there must be, as Crush pointed out, something about the initial stages of the game they don't like.
If you could find out what it is and maybe change it, maybe more people would stay longer in game and make it more of a massively morpg.

Before we divert resources from other work to this

, of course it would have to be found out what exactly the reason is for people first finding TMW on the web, getting interested enough in it to create an account but then deciding to never log on ever again.

I'm a bit at loss here on how to do this, the only thing which comes to my mind would be a questionnaire...

I would be willing to create such a short questionnaire, but before I start putting any work in it, I'd like to hear the devs'/GHP's/players' opinion on it. To make such a questionnaire work, it would imho be necessary to send an automated email to all people who, say, haven't logged in to TMW for more than 6 months, just giving them a link to a questionnaire to fill in (maybe accompanied by words like "Dear TMW player, we sadly noticed you haven't played for more than 6 months. As it is in our best interest to make the game as interesting and as fun as possible to a large group of players, we would ask you to take two minutes and answer a few questions so we can improve the game.").

So, my question: Is it considered bad form here among the GHP to send people who registered automated emails those people never asked for (and please keep in mind, we're talking about ONE mail here, not more)?

[ZdlN]

The moment when a player has to consult external documentation, the game failed to be intuitive.

Yes, but as i said - npc talking much and only with a hidden hint is not good and brings the player to ignor npc's and such things:

How many game hours does it take to notice that this essential feature even exists?

And: Don't forget the players not can speak such a good english - for them is a updatet wiki necessary, cause they never found these hints.

Such a questlog seems good to me.

Why is the start to the magic career so well-hidden in a remote cave? It should be introduced to the player in the first few hours.

Maybe the players that helping the newbies can wrote down the most questions of them together an there is an npc with the answers? (also if you want to transport the cave/manaseed to the noobs )

[Jenalya]

As far as I understood Nard meant this topic about the issue of many accounts being created without that ever a character is created.

The numbers show clearly that there are a lot of empty accounts. As I often have a char sitting in Tulimshar with the intention to help new players I can certify that the number of real first time players has nothing to do with those I estimated (decrease of char/account) shows it anyway. I even tried, before making this post, to have a character in nothern Tulim, where the new players are now spawned.

But I agree that the question how many and why players stop to play early in the game is an interesting question as well.

Maybe the beginners quests in Tulimshar don't just have to provide items and nice stories, but also teach the player more essential information about the gameplay and how to advance most efficiently.

The quests introduced in North Tulimshar recently are almost all designed to serve this purpose. Most of them contain some short hints and information and try to lead the player to more quests and areas. Examples are the business man quest where the player has to fetch a suitcase from the harbor which is heavy enough to show the player what happens when you carry more than the half of the maximum weight, or the fertilizer quest giving the player the task to get Grass Seeds from the Woodland Area, to make the players aware how to get to the next area and give an actual reason to do that.
I'm not sure how many of the people complaining about how boring or confusing the start in Tulimshar is, actually played those new quests, since an experienced player creating a new character might just rush through Tulimshar to get Trade, Emote and Monster Point registration and head to Hurnscald after that. I'd be very happy about some more concrete thoughts about how the game start can be improved, since I already attempted this and if there's something that needs fixing, I need to know what.

In general I think having too much text in an NPC is tiring and many players doesn't read it or only with low attention. On the other hand there are players who enjoy storyline and dialogue presented with NPCs. I try to design NPCs to have optional dialogue, so players interested in this can choose to read, but who doesn't want to can skip.
I also think that a questlog would help a lot, since at the moment all the relevant informations need to be put into the NPCs dialogue and the player needs to read carefully enough to memorize them. With a quest log, you could just skim the dialogue and read up the parts important for the quest in the log.

Also, the full range of features should be introduced quite early. Like magic, for example. How many game hours does it take to notice that this essential feature even exists? Why is the start to the magic career so well-hidden in a remote cave? It should be introduced to the player in the first few hours.

Mh, with the current magic system, you can't really play as a mage with a low level. To make it reasonable to introduce it early, the whole system needed to be reworked.

[Whistler]

As a noob starting killing maggots and fire gobblins,
no pedagogical quest at this time, it's meeting other
higher level players that made me stay.
It's not a problem with the recent additions wich ease
the building of a char and the understanding of the game.
IMay be it's more related to the fact that nothing is happening here,
you just go there for the points or the terra set, rings.
What made us stay is more than the game itself, quality over quantity, melting new players with experienced players is a key to open thegame.
A "regular" quest in the style of Candor in Thulim in an open
arena with PvP could bring mid high players to show up more here
and by the way give the taste to new comers.
Thinking about more why we stayed and not why some left.

[o11c]

If we don't already, we should definitely have early NPCs saying "talk to everybody you meet, you never know who might be interesting" and "keep everything you find, you never know when you'll need 500 maggot slimes"

[baedamichi]

I'm not sure how many of the people complaining about how boring or confusing the start in Tulimshar is, actually played those new quests, since an experienced player creating a new character might just rush through Tulimshar to get Trade, Emote and Monster Point registration and head to Hurnscald after that. I'd be very happy about some more concrete thoughts about how the game start can be improved, since I already attempted this and if there's something that needs fixing, I need to know what.

I did, I try all the new content, no matter if it's made for my level or not.

And I'm not at all complaining about too boring a start in Tulimshar, actually you did a really good job there Jenalya!

And exactly this is why I'm wondering why people who start the game suddenly quit... Were they looking for something else, another sort of gameplay?!? Were they bothered by the fact (is it a fact?!?) that this game only really shows that it's an MMORPG after you'e played for a few days (weeks?) until you meet lots of people in Hurnscald and can socialize with them? What is it that makes people quit after not even having seen 20% of the game?

Thus, it would really be great imho to get at least some comments from people who really belong to that category of "Created an account, actually created and played a char for a few hours but then quit". Would it be possible (and would it make sense...) to add a few lines to the registration process like "This is a game in development, so we are curious on what people all around the world think about our game. So, please, even if you don't like the game, help us improving it by leaving a short comment on the forum in the section 'Feedback'."

we should definitely have early NPCs saying "talk to everybody you meet, you never know who might be interesting" and "keep everything you find, you never know when you'll need 500 maggot slimes"

Good point. But concerning the items, I see a small problem here... Noobs need to sell some of their items to make money, selling items, besides quests, is the only way of making money. A lengthy explanation by an NPC like "Sell only some items (boots, daggers...) but keep others (pink antennae, whisp powders, iron ore, coal...)" would imho be counterproductive, as people don't want to read lengthy lists... Maybe this problem could be solved by pricing the items accordingly? Shops pay just 1GP for items which will later on be needed for some quests, and more for items of which you basically just need to keep one (I'm talking about boots, cotton shirts, cotton shorts and such...).
Just one example, when I was a noob, I sold all my powders as they were bought by NPC shops at a good price, just to find out later on that for the Love Triangle quest I need 50 of each...
Same with iron ore, I found out too late that I needed it to create a strong armour...

[Nard]

When misinformation about the game is a problem, external documentation is the wrong way to approach it. Players of today expect games to be self-explaining. Any information which is required to fully enjoy a game should be taught to the player while playing. The moment when a player has to consult external documentation, the game failed to be intuitive.

Maybe the beginners quests in Tulimshar don't just have to provide items and nice stories, but also teach the player more essential information about the gameplay and how to advance most efficiently. Also, the full range of features should be introduced quite early. Like magic, for example. How many game hours does it take to notice that this essential feature even exists? Why is the start to the magic career so well-hidden in a remote cave? It should be introduced to the player in the first few hours.

I do agree with the first part: TMW is Role Playing isn't it?
I do not agree with the second:

• Jenalya's recent work improved a lot the information new players have about the game and introduced a few extra items to get. It could be possible to get information without even clicking on NPCs but it has some disadvantages when experienced players pass nearby.
• Magic: I do think Magic is the best quest in this game:
  • Every new player in game is soon aware about magic existence (Anwer now sends you to magic school as soon as you leave the first tutorial area). As a newbie I had no difficulty to get informed about it: Bard, Nina and Elanore speak about it. As a regular helper, I never had to explain that it existed, only how to get it efficiently.
  • It was conceived as a whole: each step is an accomplishment that requires not only item gathering, but also some exploration (we are adventurers, aren't we?) and seeking and other players helping (healing).
  • Hints and help are available from NPCs (even if some improvements are possible)
  • There is a magic training area in Magic school (perhaps the school area could be improved too, I was a bit deceived about it as a newbie)
  • The hardest, for me as a newbie was: find mana seed (there could be a clue about it's location), find sister sword (it is visible only from west river bank), and monster potion making (I had to refer wiki to understand)
  The major problem, in my opinion is that new players sometimes do not understand what NPCs say, or do not read carefully what they say. There is nothing developers can do about it. (except suppressing spoilers in wiki )

My walkthrough to get magic:

• Tulimshar
  • Speak to Bard (try each option and read carefully)
  • Speak to Nina until she speaks about a bad word (try each option)
  • Speak to Elanore after you get lvl10 (try each option and read carefully be cause she says things about healing only once). You will have to return and see her later.
  • go to magic school and peak to all NPCs (try each option and read carefully)
  • Do not speak to the Desert Well as the Dark Path of magic is actually unbalanced and unfinished. (If you did it do not listen to it).
• Hurnscald and environs:
  • Speak to Wyara (try each option and read carefully). You will have to return and see her later.
  • Seek, find and speak to Mana seed (try each option and read carefully). You will have to return and see her later.
  • Speak to Auldsbel (try each option and read very carefully). You will have to return and see him later.
  • Speak to Rauk (try each option and read carefully)
  • Speak to Wyara (try each option and read carefully)
  • Seek, find and speak to Sister sword (try each option and read carefully). You will have to return and see her later.
  • Seek, find and speak to Brother sword (try each option and read carefully). You will have to return and see him later.
  • It is time to go back to Elanore(try each option and read carefully)
  • Seek, find and speak to Old wizard (try each option and read carefully). You will have to return and see him later.
• After you get magic level 2
  • It is really time to go back to Elanore if you didn't get life magic yet. (try each option and read carefully)
  • It is time to go back to Auldsbel if you didn't do it before. (try each option and read carefully)
  • Seek, find and speak to sick Mouboo, choose wisely ; maybe there could be a better info about it and it's location because of the dark path unbalance
  • Speak to Wyara (try each option and read carefully)
  • Speak to Sagatha (try each option and read carefully). You may have to return and see her later. I had difficulties to figure what are the forest creature she likes (squirrels), she does not care about pinkies, butterflies, mushrooms, log heads, snails, flowers, silkworms. (!)

[Nard]

1) "Too many accounts" is not itself a problem.
2) "Abandoned accounts" is not itself a problem.
3) "People who try the game and don't like it" is not itself a problem.
4) I'm not even sure "people register with no intention of playing" is a problem.

What makes this a high priority?

Added numbers to be able to reply better.

1) Agree totally.
2) Depends on why the accounts are abandoned...
3) That, imho, is the problem which should be discussed in this thread...
4) Agree totally. That's rather a problem of those people, as registering without the intention of playing seems to be a pointless exercise wasting their time, but not that of the devs.

Back to 3), which imho is the problem which should be adressed.
[...]
What I don't like about the numbers Nard presents us here is that maybe "human resources" are wasted if among those who create an accout and then stop using it there are too many people who play a bit and then decide they don't like it.
[...]

It seems that you didn't understand what numbers I talked about, why I wondered about them, and why I made thread for them.
Thus I have to remind:

• TMW administrator, had to make account account purges, three times now. (look first post)
• It was said that account number inflation was a likely cause about the bad lags we could have ingame
• they had to face player database corruption
• We, players had to face service interruption
• The numbers are not mine but those mentioned in purge report (please read first post), I felt questioned by the HIGH difference between them and the number of players I can meet in game.

Nard

[Frost]

It seems that you didn't understand what numbers I talked about, why I wondered about them, and why I made thread for them.
Thus I have to remind:

• TMW administrator, had to make account account purges, three times now. (look first post)
• It was said that account number inflation was a likely cause about the bad lags we could have ingame
• they had to face player database corruption
• We, players had to face service interruption
• The numbers are not mine but those mentioned in purge report (please read first post), I felt questioned by the HIGH difference between them and the number of players I can meet in game.

Nard

I saw the numbers. I don't agree with the arguments.

• Every multiuser system purges inactive accounts. I know some other games and web sites and free email hosts that purge regularly and remove any accounts that have been inactive for more than a month or two. If anything, I'm surprised we purge so rarely and are so generous with the time period.
• I think every player knows there is sometimes lag. See below.
• account number inflation causes it to take longer for the game server to save information before exiting. At a certain point, the required time exceeds the time permitted before the process is forcibly killed. That's what causes data loss.
• I think minor service interruption is unavoidable and in fact normal for single-node services and for services which are updated to fix bugs and improve content. Major service interruption (data loss or extended downtime) I do not accept.

For what it's worth, my personal background is with mission-critical servers, and I believe it's important to provide the best service possible with the available resources. My goal is that server maintenance (including restarts) becomes so routine and safe that players no longer need to worry, and that even outages don't raise the spectre of data loss. In the best case, it will take time to earn that trust.

A word about lag: Whenever I see it in the game, which is not rare, I look at the health of the game server. I rarely find a reason for the lag on the server itself. After about a month of watching this and the health of my own computer, I believe that most lag is caused by either network delays or (in the case of particle effects or huge number of monsters on the screen) large demands placed on the client.

Please note that I do think it's important to understand why people leave the game, and certainly if we have a spam problem or security problem, it should be addressed by administrators. I'm still not convinced we have a problem that requires diversion of currently inadequate administrative time and energy to solve.


tl;dr: I read your post; I just disagree. Account purges are inevitable. Our policies for purging are more lenient than most sites. Service interruptions suck. Lag sucks, but might be unrelated.

[baedamichi]

It seems that you didn't understand what numbers I talked about

I did Nard, and I feel sorry if you feel like I misunderstood you or even ignored you, let me clear this up. The numbers you posted here, imho, show two different problems:

• 1) Because many people register and then never come back, there's too big a number of accounts which causes trouble on the server. This is rather a technical problem, and as far as I understood, this is the problem you were worrying about.

• 2) The numbers also show that there are actually quite some people who do register an account AND a char, and then never come back. This is also a problem involving gameplay / attracting new players.

Now, I didn't even say a word about aspect 1) (even though I'm fully aware of the problem), because I just don't have the expertise to say anything about it. I don't know how the server works, how spamming could be avoided, at which number of accounts the server starts to be unresponsive, slow etc. So, Nard, please don't feel ignored or misunderstood, I just didn't say anything about it because I can't due to a lack of knowledge.

I addressed aspect 2) because as a regular player it's in my best interest to have as big a number of "fellow" players as possible. Now, it's probably not what you had in mind when creating this post, but I think it's also something which is to be addressed in a post presenting such numbers as the ones you posted here.

In short, I didn't misunderstand you or your words, Nard, I just drew an additional conclusion from the numbers you posted here and wrote about that, I'm well aware of what you wanted to hint at.

[Nard]

I did Nard, and I feel sorry if you feel like I misunderstood you or even ignored you, let me clear this up. The numbers you posted here, imho, show two different problems:
[...]
because I just don't have the expertise to say anything about it. I don't know how the server works, how spamming could be avoided, at which number of accounts the server starts to be unresponsive, slow etc. So, Nard, please don't feel ignored or misunderstood, I just didn't say anything about it because I can't due to a lack of knowledge.

@Baedamichi: I do not feel you ignore me or anything like that, so do not worry and please do not be sorry about saying what you think.
Posting makes this server and it's forum lively, which is good for sure. My skills about this server are not much bigger than yours; if they are, you opinion is still welcome to me. When I said you didn't understand me, perhaps it s because I was not clear enough, then I have to be sorry about it.

Then let me try explain it better in a different way:
You will agree with me when I say that the char per account ratio should equal to 1 if every new account is operated by a player that has a trial of this game: he creates at least a char. if he doesn't like tmw, he leaves and the ratio does not change. I could understand that a few payers dont understand a thing in the client and leave their new account without creating a char, that a few surfers are registration maniacs and register to the site before even knowing what tmw is ( this was kind of suggested upper in the thread).
But there is a LARGE (>50,000, 25,000 purged!) number of registered accounts, and even at it's best i have just seen a little more than a hundred players in game.
Now suppose ( that is kind of true) I have 4 chars/account in my 8 accounts making a total of 32 chars. Thus 32-8=24 empty accounts are needed to 32 chars to keep a mean ratio about 1, along with the accounts which have only one char! I do not think that empty accounts are a big deal since they should not make the character data base heavier.
Accounts with 1 char make it heavier; the space they occupy depends on the way chars are managed. If a they are the same way as guilds are (according to Freeyorp, and if I understood well) a char occupies about the same space if it has no items than when it is full. Each player operation may need a complete rewrite of the data base (I surely exaggerate a bit!), the dead weights included, so they may have a big importance.

A regular player it's in my best interest to have as big a number of "fellow" players as possible. Now, it's probably not what you had in mind when creating this post, but I think it's also something which is to be addressed in a post presenting such numbers as the ones you posted here.

I have about the same interest as You, Baeda! That's the reason I created this thread.(have a look on my posts on other topics: TMW promotion for example) and also to avoid some things like:

I think my account has been purged now; because I haven't been on since about October?

My intention just to point out what seems a potential problem to me. NOT to ask it to be solved within the time I need to make a finger snap.


Nard

edit: typos

[Nard]

@Frost:

If you thought I was asking for something you are wrong. I just wanted to highlight a potential problem, because the information included in the purge log seemed weird to me, which leaded me to this analysis. It was surely not to start a new drama.

I never made any reproaches about the purge, though I regret it because my friends and me saw some of our companions be wiped. Thus I also wondered if there couldn't be a way to make the purge a little less blind.

The information I had at the moment of my post were those Freeyorp, Crush, o11c and Bjorn have given to us in the past. Thus my comments are based on it and on the numbers I have which is deeply insufficient to have a definitive opinion. I'd be glad to collaborate if you plan to have deeper investigations. The new information you give is welcome to have a better view of the problem, and I am in perfect synchronism with you on the last two points of your post. They were the targets of mine.

My experience about computer lagging is not an administrator one, but a real time data manager one: Audio/midi (music) and data acquisition (physics). I had to deal with large files management, and real time
editing,when computers were not as powerful as they are now. I experienced buffer overrun, time-outs, synchronization failures and so on. As an early computer user I had to deal with tricky memory management too (my university first computer had 64k RAM ).
Then, I understand that finding the problem's causes may not be that simple. If I made you believe the opposite, I am sorry about it.

Nard

[foobo]

Instead of million npcs, maybe you could try to implement interactive npc (bot?), sort of a guide (with player abilities and for example poltergeist sprite, able to move, attack, cast magic, which will guide through necessary steps in the game, teach almost all regarding game system, including magic and pvp and will leave us when will reach certain level to move forward). Hard task, but it'd be definitively more interesting and entertaining for a new player.

[Crush]

The problem with such guidance features is that they are hard to design in a way that they are accessible, but don't get into the players way or distract them. When they are too intrusive, they can quickly become very annoying:

[o11c]

Not to mention that there is currently no infrastructure for per-player NPCs, and moving NPCs have horrible problems.