A few ideas / thoughts from a returning player

[friedpiggy]

Just a few things I have thought of since coming back.

1) make critical items easier to get - The levitation ring springs to mind. Once you enter the area there is a locked door that needs opening. I propose lowering the dc on the lock so that a chime of opening can unlock it for any characters that do not have the skill to get the door. Its a bit annoying having to try for 10 minutes plus to get the flipping door open.

2) A change in the shops in town - Lets be honest, nobody ever buys anything from the weapon shop. As it stands its a waste of space. I propose the following. Make it a pawnshop. Anything that is put into the mass sellers shows up in the inventory of the pawnshop and stays there for the rest of the reset. This will give newer players a chance at items that the vets consider garbage.

3) lower the ac / ab on those thieving buggers that are all over the show. Quicklings, cutpurses and rogues. Those things can seriously put a damper on things when you just starting out.

Like I said, just some thoughts I had. Use them / dont use them, its all good either way. The pawnshop idea though is something I think might be a nice feature. Can be server specific as well so anything put into seller on say 212 only shows up in the 212 pawnshop. It would mean newer players following on to servers after hells runs etc.

[Deleted]

1)The ring of awareness gives enough spot check for the entrance to the lev ring. I believe you get it from the quests. I haven't been to the Levi ring in years though because I just turn in a lvl 35 weapon. But yeah, harder for new players.

2) A sprucing up of town would be swell, but let's be more honest, I would rather the devs spent the time on finishing up the tantalizing new areas.

3) IMO, the thieves add flavor to the game. One can easily fix them at the priestly guy on docks. Annoying or maybe a way to make one more attentive

The market on 111 has trash from the mod for new players.

[rainbowdash]

dont chimes work on the door anyway, regardless of skill? Might take a while but I am pretty sure u ll be able to open them with chimes.

[KnightErrant]

2) A change in the shops in town - Lets be honest, nobody ever buys anything from the weapon shop. As it stands its a waste of space. I propose the following. Make it a pawnshop. Anything that is put into the mass sellers shows up in the inventory of the pawnshop and stays there for the rest of the reset. This will give newer players a chance at items that the vets consider garbage.


This could/would add serious lag to the mod...
That being said the shops could use a huge overhaul but the time involved to make items deemed worthy of buying could be considerable and moving useable items from the mod to the stores kind of defeats the purpose of exploring the mod.


KE.

[gladi8or]

I buy items from the shops in town on new toons all the time. At least for the first 15-20 levels. Especially when you first start out, you need to buy heal pots, weapons, lower gear... any of that crap is sold when I swap out rather than trying to categorize it all in the chests. It's cheap and quick to get when you start out. I honestly don't see much of an issue. The drop rate for lvl 29 weaps has increased drastically with new updates and if you have played long enough you always have a bank chest or chests with lvl 35 weaps which are good until immo and a bit beyond. There are areas that always drop set items that help you get to +9 to +12 gear along the way as you tag as well.

[woqued]

Many of the shops are useful. The weapon and armor shops don't get included in those, you don't buy from there. You might occasionally sell though.

But point stands for a new player: oh look many new shops! Then come the reactions:

Find shop.
... 1 minute later...
Hmm, junk only? Why? Ok, next one.
... 2 minutes later...
Hmm, junk again? Why? Ok, next one.
.... 15 minutes of examining later...
Ohhhh awesome stuffs! Looks high power! Hmm, only high level stuff. I'll make sure to come back later! Ok, next one.
.... 30 minutes of examining later...
Ohhhh potions, misc items, hmmm odd items I wonder if there's a purpose..
....
Ohhhh many vendors! They're even named according to what they sell! I'll come back if I need these types of items, well... The ones I remember - I started speedrunning the shop and likely forgot majority of it after two hours of examining.

... I assumed the thread was made with the idea that the "Hmm, junk only? Why?" -ones would be unnecessary clutter that slows the initial tour around town that is already long when you're going through all the stuff. And all the stuff is a LOT, especially to an untrained eye examining and even worse to one that is both untrained in examining and doesn't know the quirks of the server that lean from mandatory to somewhat relevant like the Spot/Hide/Animal Empathy/Open Lock/Search... Chimes of Opening, Lenses of Detection and so on. Could skim down some of the vendors in the other stores and have more specialized merchants - and plant those in place of the current weapon/armor smiths. Current vendors are really cluttered.

Perhaps a Kindly stranger [new quest npc] by the side of the road jesting with the town guard. Provides all the mandatory items required to complete achievements outside battle prowess - enough search, spot(vs quicklings and such), chimes, detection lens and some other stuff for some gnarly quest that is doable before you need any of these things. Preferably quests without the !search command targeting system.

TLDR: Weapon/armor smiths take the best spots in town and don't make use of their businesses properly! It's time to put the terms of the loan contract back on the drawing board.