Why I believe Era fails
 

Since the beginning, one of the great things about Graal is that much of it is about skill, not how much you play. Someone who logs on for the first time can kill someone who has been playing for years because of skill.

This is harder to accomplish on modern servers, and servers where there are items that you can gather, as opposed to Unholy Nation, Classic, and other classic-themed servers, where the main goal is, for the most part, questing and PKing.

Era used to be better than it is now. Remember when sparring was about skill, not your gun? I remember when there were people who had the most expensive guns in the game that I could defeat with an Uzi. It used to be based on skill. Now, after several years, I get on and the only thing I can do is grind and grind to make money. Once I've made money, I can buy a gun. But why should I even bother buying a gun? Why don't I just keep making money until I get enough money to get a gun that is good enough to actually defeat someone?

A while back, the highest difference in gun damage was somewhere around 4 or 5. Now it's up to 10 or so (yes, there were guns that did significantly more, but they shot slow). Somehow, in the transition from 100 HP to 10 HP, guns started taking less hits to kill people. Then, in the transition back to 100 HP, it took even less hits to kill. The term "lossy compression" comes to mind.

No matter your skill level, there is almost no way you can defeat someone who has a gun that does 20+ damage, shoots as fast as an AK47 or faster, and reloads in very little time.

And, while I'm describing how Era fails, I'll bring up quests. If you've done any of the quests on Era, you'll know where I'm coming from. First; what kind of prize is one extra HP out of one hundred? That would be absolutely fine if there was only 10 HP, but not out of one hundred. Why should I do more than one quest? 101 HP is generally enough to give me one extra hit, so what good do the extra 3 HP do for me?

I'm sure there are many other ways that Era fails, but these are the ones that really hit me after logging on for less than ten minutes.

Please don't turn this in to a spam thread about Era, Utopia, or any other "Era clones"

In before flame war.

Hopefully people can manage to keep this sane. I doubt it.

Why did they go from 100 to 10 to 100 hp?

I have no idea. But, guns used to do 10/100 damage. Now they do 20/104.

I can own with one handgun, :D No lie,

When did it become 100hp?

You obviously haven't been on for a while. You can no longer own with one handgun. Guaranteed.

The secret is you calculate where they are going to be, and then shoot that way, they run into it, never waste a bullet, never spam to keep them down, every bullet should hit.


But if what you say is true thats probably not gonna work anymore now is it :(

We went from 10 to 100 again to have more variety with gun damage. The problem with this idea is that we introduced it before we changed the damage of all guns to fit nicely with this system, I guess the plan still is to do this after the reset. We also plan to get rid of the "gun > skill" problem.
About the quests -> there will be more.

Edit: Oya, you can actually own with a single handgun, it still works.

Why do you reset era monthly anyways? Insane... I bet everytime you do that, you loose players.

We dont reset monthly, and this time it's because of the duping issue which has been around for several months.

If you can own with a handgun how come when I go on Era I see 25 people with these bigass guns?

I think a market, which introduces controlled supply and demand of items, adds a different level of interest to the age old "skill" game. I personally enjoy games with markets - I've always been good at selling and buying, and I love the challenge of making connections in your own favour.

If the problem is people who have a higher "market skill" which allows them better guns then seperate them - not forcibly - give them a reason to seperate. Make a new area which is harder, either because of tougher players or another factor (NPCs) but also has better lewts than the previous place.

This gives the new players room to grow and the old players a continual challenge.

Yes, you can, if the other person is not moving and is not shooting. Or is shooting the wrong way. But basically, any ***** who knows how to walk and shoot could defeat someone with a hand gun if they have a better gun.
Not really monthly, but a lot. This is the problem with a lot of classic servers; they reset a lot. The first time they reset (a year ago?) it was needed, but now they're going to reset again .... not needed.
Era doesn't have a market. You work, and buy a gun. That's really all there is. If you want to be good, grind and grind.

You wish -_-