I haven't been at this topic before, but I was told that there's a big discussion going on here about a restart, so I read last 10-20 pages and started writing.
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People are talking about restarts and having 100 people playing at the same time. Only one person has pointed out that that won't be possible due to the map, but this very strong argument was ignored. I will explain you why this is a very strong and valid argument. There will be a short version at the end.
The hypothetical case of a restart
Day one:
Seventy-five people are running around in rook. The quests are extremely easy and nobody needs help from others to do the steel enchanted wood quest for example, since everywhere are people running, so there aren't full spawns of monsters killing you. The experienced people see that they can't do the caravan leader quest, the quests of Scott the sewer manager and the guy who wants 10 cockroach legs within reasonable time since people are hunting and camping at all those places again.
Within two hours the first wave of people arrive in main, it are the experienced people who decided to complete Lea's quests as soon as possible, get 5 small sapphires and skip the rest.
A smart person takes the initiative and decides to make one big party or the quests takes a long time if everybody would be running around randomly, blocking the spawns and much more monsters have to be killed. Not everyone arrived in main at the same time, so there's some frustration since people leave the area to go for a new missions and others are joining the area. This is kinda annoying since parties has to be remade all the time and it doesn't always happen so some people are running behind the people that are making the kills.
Some more hours passed and a group of 10 people, who are at least to say slightly annoyed by all the kill stealing and slow progress, finished all missions of Commander Zen and start hunting. When they are all level 55 two persons run to magmic island and claim the spawns, an other person claims gladiators and a fourth and fifth person decide to team up and go for mercenaries. A sixth person somehow managed to make a pretty penny and goes hunting under mount mossfloor with big waste. The other four person end up having no good hunting spot.
Meanwhile in 'rook'
New persons see a lot of kill stealing on their monsters and are not getting any help from people about how to solve certain quests. Why would they help the newbies after all? When you help a lot of players like you did before the restart you know that it means that a group of people is be able to reach main faster and will compete with you for the hunting places.
The next few days
More and more people are reaching for main and there are so many people competing for the hunting areas that they ignore the fact that others are hunting there. The experience people are getting now is just a fraction of what it used to be. When a single person enters your spawn your exp/h is already more than twice so low. People are extremely annoyed and some form groups that kills everyone who enters their spawn. The peaceful players see how the others can level much faster by hunting people out of their hunting area and some of them start doing the same. Everyone is extremely annoyed by crowded spawns, others entering their spawn, pking and having only a few nice people who still help out others. Many people decide to leave the server and never return.
Short version and sum up
The map is too small to sustain a server population that is much higher than now. Quite some people I know are bored of hunting at pirates for 40 levels already, having scouted the entire map and having nothing to do.
A restart won't change this unless the rifts are getting opened. As the owner stated the first rift is for a group of level 80+ and the second rift for a group of level 120+ or 140+. This means that only the first rift could become a hunting place soon.
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Is it impossible to level up as fast as a warrior/ranger when you are a mage?
Someone said that some vocations are much slower in leveling. The vocations he mentioned were mages. I started at this server with a Saint quite some hours after the server started. As most people know Saints deal the least damage of everyone. Despite that I hadn't played the beta, wasted like an entire day camping rawler and the spider boss in rook I was the third highest level of the server for most of the time during the first week. I even had taken the second spot a few times. Only Angel Celes managed to stay in front of me all the time and she already played theb eta and knew how to do everything. I may be known for the huge amount of time I'm spending on my shadowstriker now, but at my saint I didn't played as much as I did now by far.
The key to manage to level that fast with a mage is very simple: always hunt in parties. Till level 80 I never hunted solo with maybe one or two exceptions. I wasn't even focussed on leveling. All I did was completing quests.
I think that it is very possible to get enough levels for the rifts within a week by playing maximum 4 hours a day no matter the vocation you are as long as you do it correctly. Most people do play four hours or more average, but as I said it's maximum 4 hours. It can probably be done with less. As stated the first rift will also include many puzzles, so even if you join the rift teams half a week or a week after they entered it you still have a good chance of being in the first team to complete it. This is stated on the fact that nobody, but me and four others, managed to do everything needed for de deeper prison quest with exception of obtaining itch powder and nobody knows to solve the witch quest in Amazon camp. Coming to this the drop rate of the sickle should increase with at least a factor 50 and that of the itch powder at least with a factor few hundred. The cure against itch powder could be renamed so it's less obvious.
Also a week ago there were 9 different vocations in the top 10 of the highscores, which is an amazing achievement and shows that it's possible to get high level with almost all the vocations. Before everybody start screaming I will say that quite some vocations aren't balanced. Today I will probably think about the vocations and post a suggestions of how they should be and maybe also how to make the vocation more balanced and/or more enjoyable.
The economic advantages of others
Some people managed to make a lot of money at this server yes. I myself barely got any advantage of it and for a non-mage it doesn't matter either you start with just the money you have when leaving rook or having an unlimited amount of money. With the possibility to make a good penny for everyone at most of the level 55+ hunting places the economy became more an economy based on trading goods. Most items have no value other than the value npcs give to it. Better items, like relics, artefacts and items dropped by monsters such as those dropped by toxics dragons, dark torturers, black knights, but also some other rare items that are dropped by monsters which aren't hunted a lot do have a value. With many items by limited in usage to only a few people a lot of these items are traded for other items once looted. Either you have an unlimited amount of money or not, this doesn't change your chance on looted these better items.
The money has not resulted in big level advantages since you are rarely limited by money once you can enter the prison, which is at quite a low level. By reset the money of everyone and giving them in return 1k for every level they have, this benefits all the low-medium level players, future advantages of having a lot of money could be taken away.
Last note
Am I a char lover? Probably, since playing saint is boring to me, but somehow I managed to make a level 100 saint which will probably be extremely useful in the rifts and I do enjoy my shadowstriker now and want to know the high level spells and the possibilities a shadowstriker has. Would I quit the server with a restart? I don't know. Good chance that I would give spellcaster a try, but I would probably retire or quit in the anarchy there would be at all the spawns, despite I bet that I would be in the top 10 after the first day, but probably even the top 5, no matter the vocation I pick.
. The tank hit more than the wildheart because the wildheart cannot hit high on the defender due to the higher resisitance on the tank. (therefore the tank receives less damage) and the tank hits his normal hits. This means the wildhearts attacks are decreased and ultimately lower than the tanks.
