Another Retention Rant (in General)

I noticed that MessBrutal quit playing, and it made me realize what motivated me through the early game (aside from OB buying my supportership out of the blue, which guilted me into staying).

It was competition ﾖ not the generic type, but specific competition. I remember making Excel spreadsheets with AdmiralKiller, Rrowland, and Messbrutal listed, as we all started characters at the same time. I tracked the changes and focused on besting those specific guys, because, as a new (to CB2, anyway) player, reaching the top was not a realistic goal or even a concern. Of course, itﾒs a concern for vets running NCBs, but when the focus is on NUBs, reaching the top isnﾒt expected.

Increasing the low-level MPR competition would add to it, but that brings us full circle to the lack of retention in a lovely catch-22. But what if we add NPCs? These were mentioned previously as benchmarks for players (ﾓCongrats, you beat XXX three times in a row! Hereﾒs some money!ﾔ). Ideally, these bots could be auto-generated (from a list of generic strats) when players hit the one-week mark, and they can auto-delete when the players fail to log in for a month (unless they become supporters). This ties in with the benchmarks that players can be instructed to beat them. Iﾒm sure itﾒs a coding hell hole, but then again, Iﾒm not a dev. It would provide a specific achievable target for the first month or two of the game, and bots could also be used to fill in any ﾓvoidﾔ areas where few decent targets exist.

Iﾒd rather see some form of (non-animated) graphics to help retention ﾖ obviously an attractive GUI is more appealing ﾖ but Iﾒm sure thatﾒs a point of contention for some. Both of these are large changes that will require a lot of time, but we are talking about the gameﾒs survival. Lastly, Iﾒll repeat what Iﾒve said a few times before: Kill Shire. It was a good attempt at providing competition when we had more starting players who burn more than 50 BA, but now people can reach 1st place in one day ﾖ and thatﾒs no exaggeration. It misleads players to think that the game is dead, and it actually removes the urge to play. You can split the timeframes with Rivendell and Lorien, but Shire is useless.

I still think Achievments would help a lot. Some people see past this obvious trick but alot become dedicated to accomplishing these goals.

There can obviously be a lot, and you can gain small rewards for the easy ones and larger rewards for tougher ones.

Examples would be reaching 1,2,3,4,5 million mpr and 6 eventually.

Also I agree and non animated graphics would be pretty cool. Each team would look slightly different depending on their weapons and armor strength and hps and etc..

One more thing....Changing the tutorial, once changed include a feedback section to continue playing.

One more thing. In most games even really good ones. People come and go for various reason. I think having a larger base would help. Advertising somewhere popular with a fancy interface and some hot chick could do the trick.

I'm afraid there's just no fight left in Jon, and anything the rest of the people with some actual admin power can do is merely slowing down the steady slide into oblivion.

If you want to breathe life back into the game, it will take far more than just a few cosmetic changes... it will require a massive shift of what we already accept as annoying but unavoidable, things like "pruning the deadwood" (inactive characters), allowing people to fully reset and start with a NUB (not a NCB) if certain conditions are met, a prohibition of CB$/item sales for RL cash, rolling bonuses, total revamp of items to remove useless ones (let's face it, 80% of the items in the game are pointless to own/equip, and that is rubbish), more significant advantages for item namings and so on and so forth.
That's a shift which we all know will never really happen, not even parts of it. And without it, the game will just keep declining until one day Jon will stop paying the bills and take it all down.

It might last another couple of years, maybe even longer, but it's only a matter of time, and you all know it.
Pessimistic ? Maybe.
But also almost certainly the truth.

Nice to know you've got all the answers Sick...

Here's what we do know...

The game is actually quite playable and enjoyable once you're playing. New players aren't sticking around in my mind because of unmet expectations (the stupid, but very pretty pictures on the front page?) and confusion early on.

Seriously though, could you be more negative and fatalistic?

While fatalistic, he's right in many parts. The game needs enough cosmetic changes to be viewed as an overhaul (even though the gameplay mechanics are fine).

We do need some way of allowing resets for NUBs without opening to the door to profiteering... or just eliminate the NUB for a new system that doesn't make people feel like they screwed up their one shot at being able to really play.

And, yes, we need to trim hundreds of dead characters, delete crappy items, and monetize new items on a regular basis. The gameplay is fine, but everything else needs to be brought back to modern age. Overhaul.

But I do expect Jon to hand over the game to NS before ever letting it really die.

Why do so many people think that they will do so much better with free nub handouts along with a complete reset?

More cash for gear/upgrades. BA without having to buy it, so more XP.

I would do *so* much better (as long as the crappy low game is fixed as well), and earn so many more CP with a NUB...

horsepucky... you'd be just as flighty and likely to completely redo everything as you are now...

We need to work within the borders of possibility at this point. We've got one person (and some very quality helpers) attempting to make the game better for everyone. Making broad suggestions of complete revisions to the core functionality of the game (the bonus system) without coughing up time and money is just silly. If the issue is NEW user retention then it's highly unlikely that most of stuff brought up here is even relevant. Figuring out why only a handful out of every thousand signups keeps fighting is far far more important than the perceived unfairness of the N*B system.

With the exception of those at the very top, we'd all do better with another NUB, but that's not the point. The complaint is that it gives a feeling of "you have one shot, don't screw it up" and that one shot comes when players have no clue what's going on or how demanding the NUB really is. If they shank it, new players can feel like the game's shot for them, even if they do fine with it, they get hit hard by the slowdown once the NUB is over, and the real vets feel jaded about it being a handout in the first place. It's just not pretty from any angle.

But I don't want to focus on that. Revamping the NUB system is just one of many changes.

Novice, re-read the first post. The NUB system is a lesser point.

lol! I'll let you know this NCB is half way thorugh, I'm at 1.5M MPR, something I've never reached before, and I've no intention to stop.

Probably becuase there's not been a chanemonth to intice me.

But with a NUB, this run would have been *far* better.

1.5M MPR, would put you at like 2M MPR with a NUB, that's nothing special...

"1.5M MPR, would put you at like 2M MPR with a NUB, that's nothing special... "


Exactly what I was thinking..


And for a revamp why not bring themes back?

Also I love the achievements idea.

Themes would go along with the graphics. But I don't know enough about coding to understand why themes broke and can't be fixed in a week.

I wouldn't be in negative CPs for my Clan. My gear would be larger. 500K MPR would also by a full 1/4 of my size. That's something quite special...

Actually chances are you only wouldn't be in the negatives for CP. Your MPR and NW wouldn't likely be higher.

Okay, yeah. I typically avoid saying much on the forums lately, but I think I'll comment on this with a few points.

Firstly, are we really going to do this again? Can we not have one thread where we honestly discuss -new player retention-. Inevitably, these threads become a point for everyone to their problems with the game. Things like rolling bonuses, upper level dead zones, what to do after the NUB... None of these things matter to someone on their first day. Which is when a huge portion of our potential players are quitting.

So let's just talk about what will help NEW player retention. If you want to talk about something else, make a new thread for that.

As for my thoughts on this, it's not a super easy thing, honestly. I feel that too many players are asking for CB to be something it's not. For instance, adding graphics would be (possibly) worthless. I mean, why bother? CB will not be competitive on that level. Period. Adding artwork for some of the things would be great. I like letting my imagination define things, but some people don't. And I can always redefine how something looks in my mind's eye, but someone who wants to see things needs that.

I'm a big fan of "flavor" in things. Flavor text and small visuals for items. And, in my opinion, that's one thing CB lacks. The small things keep a player interested. To this end, I think that simply turning every Item in the game into a hyperlink to the wiki would be great. And then have player made artwork put there for eye candy.

Yes, some may consider this a lazy button. But it's the good kind. Get a new player naturally going into the wiki and then both inform and entertain them.

I had more ideas. But I like this one so I'll let people just look at this one first!

I like it...

./support for GW

+ over 9000!

How so mate?

I haven't bought any BA, due to the cost, so I'll have 3 months of full extra free daily BA for extra MPR, plus I'll have the 400% increase to my cash rewards, so my NW would also be higher.

Am I missing something?

Considering I was trying to stay as objective and realistic as possible, yes, yes I can be far more negative and hugely more fatalistic... since I wasn't before... but I'm not even trying to be.

Obviously, whenever people say something BAD about something you like, even if it's true, you tend to call them pessimists, negativists, fatalists or whatnot.
Don't worry, I have plenty of experience with that sort of reaction, I get that constantly from my girlfriend whenever she gets yet another crazy idea. And then she keeps grumbling "don't dare say <I told you so>, dammit" after it almost always goes exactly as I had described it would.

How about this...

When I first joined, I remember there being over 300 people playing.
But now, less than 150 users active in the past 7 days, and we've been hovering around that number for a while, occasionally dipping quite a bit below that for short periods of time while people have connection problems or whatnot.
The total actively playing population is steadily diminishing. There might be some short-term recoveries, but they don't last long. Older players get eventually disillusioned enough, or they just have to move of for RL reasons, and new players are NOT taking up enough of the empty spots.

8 new users in the past 24 hours - and that number is nothing special, I've seen it higher.
That means in LESS THAN THREE WEEKS, we are getting AND LOSING a number of players equal to the TOTAL AMOUNT OF ACTIVE PLAYERS.
Extremely few players stick around more than their first day, and quite a few don't even go past their first login.

If any of you believes the currently predominant theory of "it's the graphics", while you might be right in general (a majority of new players leaving because of that), you are mistaken : their reasons for leaving are irrelevant.
With pretty graphics, they MIGHT have stuck around for a week or a month, then they would have gotten bored and left in spite of pretty graphics anyway.

The internet is full of people, and you can bet you and me are not THAT special at all - the game COULD be saved, there IS enough of a playerbase that would actually be at least potentially interested in a game like this... because, let's face it, it IS a niche game.
Indiscriminate advertising will only get people that are not likely to stay in the first place, and the dead weight they add at the bottom can turn off even a proper potential player... not that we have a shortage of things that turn off potential players.

In fact, I can bet most of you guys can't even put a finger on WHAT EXACTLY MADE YOU stick around longer than a few days, and then longer than your N*B... without at least partially telling a lie to yourself.
And more importantly, you can't remember what exactly ALMOST made you quit, and WHY exactly you didn't quit yet.

It's not what you WANT to see out of the game, it's what you already see in it... and making it more visible to new players.

I can. And I did. It's in the first post. But if you want me to repeat why I stayed in CB1, I can repeat that as well. And I can also explain why a game like MineThings -- which is of similar nature as CB -- had a much easier time attracting me during that first critical log-in. GUIs are very, very important; that shouldn't be news to anyone. Before a player can even find out if this niche game is his or her style, the player has to want to stay around long enough to find out. I love this game, but I've never once thought, "gee, I'd really like to play an Excel spreadsheet."

Now, seriously, I challenge each one of you to answer this simple request... NAME SOME REASONS WHY YOU HAVE NOT QUIT PLAYING THE GAME YET.

I can almost bet the first two that come to most of your minds are "because I have already invested so much effort in it it would be a shame to lose it" (irrelevant for new players), and "because I made friends I like and would be a shame to leave them" or something more general like "because of the community" which basically means the same thing (again irrelevant to new players).

And afterwards, if you do find some reason that's actually related to the game as opposed to your resistance to change... ask yourself this... assuming you joined the game TODAY... do you honestly think you would have stuck around ? WHY ? Feel free to explain in great detail.

Demi, I wasn't talking about you, but the mass of "oh, you're so negative" kind of guys :P

This game attracted me due to it's, well, niche design. A game that revolves around 6-month runs, each one a chance to take a spot among the game's elite. A PVP game with no twitch-based aspect. A game that involves the careful optimization of strategy to see gradual advantage and eventual success. A highly competitive game that at the same time did not require, or even significantly benefit from, absurd amounts of playtime per day.
I'm a very competitive player, in any game, and one that allows me to compete fully while not sucking up every moment of free time is perfect. CB is such a game.

Yeah... that part wasn't intended.

I play CB because it's a blast to play, and at the same time can be a daily distraction. If I found it today I would likely be fascinated and spend the next six years trying to win it.

Habit.

The awesome community is the main reason I still play. Other than that it's the daily grind of the clickies.

Certainly the community is why so many of us (non-lurkers) stay, but a new player walking through the virtual door for the first time isn't a part of the community yet and likely didn't drift over to join a random one. First appearances matter, so let's slap a coat of paint on the drab walls, put the beer on tap, and trick people into staying long enough to make sense of the massive amount of cluttered data that the rest of us don't even notice anymore.

Yeah, the only reason I keep on coming back is its habit to log in once in a while and burn BA now for me.

Also, I love the fact that its now common idea that CB is basically all around a 6 Month Run and thats it...

Seconded. ;)

The community is a bonus.

I think alot of the reason I'm still here is because I got involved in the community early.

Like day 2 I was making posts and talking to people.

I don't know how to stress this or encourage it to the newer types.

Maybe we could have part of the tutorial be something like a light side vs dark side decision, but instead of having the force involved we just have a link to the most recent nov/ranger rant war and they have to pick a side and post.

Well, Silva, it should hardly be surprising. The N*B bonus is so big that once it's over, any ground gained in relation to higher-up players is gained incredibly slowly. The 6 month run, for the most part, determines where you stand on the MPR rankings and dictates how much of a MPR advantage or disadvantage you'll have for as long as you keep that character active.

If you want new players to join, advertise more.

If you want new players to stay, fix the stupid tutorial and delete unnecessary steps. Give rewards for certain accomplishments after the tutorial.

Personally I don't see the big deal in early NUB resets, rewards suck early on anyways. After say two months remove the ability for reset. That should give the new player some time to figure out the game.
I mean honestly, it makes the game seem fruitless if you figure out the game when its too late.

I know this rant is a waste though, because I've stated it in the past and nothing has been done about it. Just thought I'd reawaken old dusty ideas...

When I joined CB1, I spent the first month or so without making any real posts. After I got around to joining the threads, I certainly felt more involved in the real community.

And since I assume that those involved in the community are more likely to stick around (plus, it makes the community feel larger), one of the achievements I'd like to see is a nominal award for, say, ten posts. I'm sure we'd get an occassional spammer, but I say the benefit exceeds the minor annoyance.

I have to say I agree that this game need some major overhauls - I am only here because of habit. I am playing other games a lot more now. Those 'other' games lack a lot of the playability of cb but do have some nice features that we will probably never get here (non-animated icons for weapons/armor, fight displays, guild/individual quests, guild buildings to enhance stats etc.

I realise that to enable any of these would need a drastic increase in RAM/storage and even maybe a change of database but I would be very suprised if we are still here in 3 years (someone make a note of this and remind me in 3 years time :) ).

I just gave you clan rituals!

NS : what people claim to want (or even honestly believe they want) and what people actually need (or better said would be happier to have) are two very different things most of the time for most people.

A couple of us have mentioned MineThings a few times. It's another game without any animated graphics, but they've done a good job of making it feel "modern."

Notice that the only real difference is the colorful theme and tiny item icons. It may just be me, but I'd like to see CB get a similar face lift.

Hmm. Seems I broke-ified the html.

To be honest, it was you guys playing mine things that gave me the idea to have user created images for stuff in CB. ;)

So here's my $0.02:

I think the game mechanics are fine. It's fun to think up strategies and toy with stuff. Game-play is, to some degree, complex. There's a pretty steep learning curve. This is somewhat lessened at the lower levels, I guess, but chances are you'll be reading the wiki a lot to make progress. Well, that's my case. I'm a bit of an overachiver. Not sure how it can be changed or if you might even want to, but that's my view on it.

That aside, I think aesthetics can be improved a little bit and that would go a long way. No need for flashy graphic battles and so on, but a spiffier interface would help. Also, navigation could be improved I think. Finding stuff can take a bit of digging around.

Also, more of a question rather than me attempting to upset the established order: Why was it deemed that 6-8 hours (time for BA to cap) was the ideal time period? Wouldn't it make more sense to, say, double this time and place the focus on strategy and customization to achieve success rather than making sure you can log on every 6 hours?

I say none of this to offend anyone nor to upset the world older. This is just my newbie pov, which you can kindly disregard. :)

Oh, you are good at hitting the nail right on the head for a heated debate Rod.

There are definately two schools of thought here.

First school believes that managing your schedule around CB and being able to use your BA to your full potential is part of the competitive edge. That's why there is still the 6-8 hour refresh. In the olden days of CB in fact it used to refresh even faster. Part of the show of dedication at the lower levels was that you could keep up with your BA regen rate.

The other school of thought is along the lines of what you were alluding to, and kind of why the BA/regen slows as you go up in MPR. Yes the game is ultimately about how good you are at building a team rather than just making time to get online and click fight.

It has been gone over many times before, and once you get used to it a little, it's really not that bad at all. It can be quite frustrating though for the new people since you have to go from being a novice with no knowledge of the game to a die hard addict overnight or risk losing out on 30% of your only lifetime NUB. So there are some suggestions being thrown around to help pull some stress off the new guys.

I like this guy.

To make this seem less like a gripe session of things we want NS to do instead of having a life (psst, new supporter items), I'll take a moment to thank him for the best change in recent memory: the clan wall.

That falls into the category of changes I wouldn't have thought to make, but it's a very nice addition. Thanks again to both NS and whoever came up with the idea.

My two cents:
So I recently decided to teach myself Photoshop. I have CS5 and was looking for a project to learn with. Then I was reminded by this thread that the UI, that gray with red wording stripe to the left... well... sucks. It works as intended but looks old, uneventful and very primitive. So as part of my learning experience, I'm making a new one. As I started, I had no intention of going anywhere with it. A fun project for sure, but with no potential.

As I progressed, I began to wonder if it would be possible to have the UI, the log in screen and other aspects of the game spiced up with user submitted art and digital design. I think it would be awesome. It could also divert some of the work of NS and anyone else who is on the coding side of things to the general community by having The player base design stuff.

In order for this to work at all, at least two things would need to be considered:

How easy it would be to code in? I don't know what it would take to go from a .jpg to fan art backgrounds, more colorful everything or a pretty UI. Could be as simple as pasting the pic, it could be a coding hell hole.

Community reception and acceptance. What if I make something that I think is really cool and works great and no one else likes it (very possible)? What if that same thing gets put on the site and it adds to new player retention but all the old players hate it?

Is it possible to decide of big changes that will add to new player retention w/o changing the game too much for the existing player base? Is it possible to do so with a realistic amount of time and effort from everyone involved?

I'm willing to break out my beloved CS5 to make designs. What I like about the MineThings image above is how subtle the design is. There's a pickaxe and gear in the left frame and the color in the main window isn't distracting.

That being said, NS or Jon's ghost would have to be willing to entertain the idea at the very least. Otherwise, we're just wasting time.

I entertain all ideas, and I welcome new contributions.

I did some searching and found that minethings only has about 10 people online at a time on average. Not exactly what we want to push towards, in my opinion.

We certainly don't want to become the game, but no one's talking about changing gameplay at all.

Well, that was a complete frickin' waste of time. All I created was an ugly theme, but I made it from scratch so it took far longer than it should. Regardless, I'm still posting it here just because I spent time on it. It turns out I'm no decorator.

Click to big-ify the ugliness.

official sanctioned achievements would certainly help :)

That is not half bad demi, lol.

I especially love the "john's back forum with 9000 replies lol". ;)

Actually, the wood + old-style Carnage Blender logo is kind of cool.

It's over 9000!

I'm saddened that no one likes "Demigod fondled Azthral" in the fight feed.

FTW! :P

So... we're advertising for Coca-Cola now?

that was the same thing i thought, demi should have designed original coke ads back when they came out with new coke! ; )

I thought it looked more like a baseball bat, which also wasn't intended.

I really like the whip reference.

So after talking to a few of the friends I referred, I have confirmed that one issue is certainly the interface. Not even the aesthetics, just navigational issues. Peeps don't know where to find out how much cash they have (frankly "equip" could be renamed to "character info" or something), one mentioned surprised at a lack of need to heal (maybe add for new characters a "your character has been/is always healed automatically" on the battle screen and so on. I'm sure old players know the navigation blindfolded and don't notice these things, but invite some friend, listen to their confusion and you'll see what I mean.

I think before re-hauling any major game mechanics or even the looks of the game, some work could be put into simple usability/navigation issues. I don't know how someone can go about deciding how to improve a navigation they find perfect 'cause they're used to it, but I think some effort might be required.

Note: I understand the argument of "if they're too dumb not to be able to find (insert whatever here) (that's what she said!) then they shouldn't be playing this". While, yes, this game does indeed cater to the "my IQ is above room temperature" population, this is no excuse not to "dumbproof" stuff. I don't want to start a fanboy fight here, but I like some of the stuff Apple makes because the UI is real straightforward. People who have never seen a computer before could probably pick the stuff up and use it. Worked for Nintendo with the Wii pretty well too. But I digress.

If only she said that....


Healing is a dumb part of CB for many reasons, not the least of which is how transparent the whole thing is.

I thought the tutorial said something about healing...

How do you like the healing display now?

It's nice, good job.

Wait, did I just suggest a change and it happened?

Oh my god. I think I love this game.

So this thread has taught us that Messbrutal quitting caused Heal costs to be displayed :)

I'd have preferred the "Can I drop f-bombs in chat" thread to be made by me, but all in all, good post.

Whoops. Awkward moment... he didn't quit after all.

Cheers!

what a brutal mess you made of that demi! ; )

Sorry for causing all this rumble :)
For those wondering, I moved in a new apartment 2 month ago and had some financial issue that I came trough recently and only managed to get internet back last week-end and been blending almost all my ba since.


A new esthetic revamp for the site sure wouldn't hurt to try and retain more players, unfortunately I have no skills to help with that.
Demigod attempt ain't bad at all even tho it sure made me think of getting a cola.

Personally I enjoy the game the way it is but I can see how other people need more.

I just hope CB sticks around for many more years.

I still see a Louisville slugger bat instead of Coke... which is weird since I was going for rustic wood.

i think viagra helps with that!

I guilted you into playing?


Haha, suckerrrr

Well, whatever works to keep people around... Part of me wants to start telling new players that once they hit 1 mil MPR, the interface changes to a colorful HTML5 layout with all sorts of sleek gadgets.

We'll have a game packed out with dumbasses, but at least it'll be packed.

Boobies.

CB needs more boobies. ;)

I'm working on it GL. ^_^

now that is one of the best exchanges i have seen on cb! ; )