Survey - FL Interest

[Pollux]

Jobs such as merchant roles require player interaction, and are some of the least played roles due to how boring it is without many players online.

It's a misconception to believe that increasing the number of players online will inherently make roles like the merchant more enjoyable. The way of improving such roles is not in the increase of the player base, but in refining and improving the mechanics of the job itself. An example would be introducing physical shipments.

Listen Pollux, you need to get people who understand the gamemode to help you make the changes that will actually work. You need people who come with a well rounded understanding of the gamemode and aren´t scared to tell you to fuck off and that your ideas are dog shit. But if I know you well you aren´t the person to surround yourself with such healthy company.

You mention yourself you can't be making decisions based on random ideas and speculation - but I have a feeling that is exactly what you still are doing.

I never said any of that? What I mentioned was the problem, not a solution. You are correct that increasing the number of players online doesn't solve the issue with merchants, but are incorrect in thinking that is what I said. The solution to merchant roles is to increase the scope of their jobs so they can do things that isn't just "sit in a shop and maybe press F1 -> Market to sell something once in a while". These things cruically need to not entirely rely on very occasional player interaction in order to be sustainable. Exactly how it works depends on each job, but as an example chefs could sell food to NPCs and players via a food deliveries with the new cooking system when there isn't anyone in their restaurant. The cooking system also then adds a lot more depth to an otherwise boring role, as it's much more fun than just buying stuff from the market and giving it to someone else. While in the past players enjoyed roleplaying that part, that isn't the case anymore and hasn't been for some time. This applies to a lot of the gamemode, we can't rely on players making things "fun" themselves as they once used to, we have to make the actual gamemode fun and make it flexible so people can still be more creative if they want to.

The issue has never been that we're not capable of thinking of solutions. It's extremely easy to come up with some good ideas, literally anyone with just a few hours on the server can do that. The hard part is actually implementing these solutions and having to make the right compromises to do so. That's the part FL has always struggled with and one that unfortunately not many can help with unless you're either also a developer with free time or are willing to spend thousands (not an exaggeration if you want something good) on paying external developers to do everything for you.