Ember Online

First of all I want to caveat that this is not a Silo-bashing thread. As far as I can tell, they are a well-run guild who work hard and get results from that hard work. And so they should. However I raise this controversial topic in interests of improving game dynamics – i.e. increasing competitiveness between the existing active player-base in order to make the game more newbie-friendly and increase overall active player-base.

The most important commodity in the game is active players (ie non idlers). In recent weeks (perhaps even months) i am noticing a decline in active players overall... and a quick scan of /gtop often shows that the majority of active players online belong to one guild (sometimes even 60-80% online are Silo). Meanwhile some of the other guilds that do show up in /gtop are actually idling rather than actively playing. Unfortunately it isn't very good for the health of the game when the majority of active players online at any time are likely from the same guild. For example I recently chatted to some older players who are largely inactive because they are wearied from always opposing the dominant guild. Likewise i talked to new players who I hadn’t seen on for weeks and they admitted that when they see majority Silo online they just do other things instead of play EO because it’s too easy to get PKed etc.

Right now there is no incentive for a strong active player to leave the strong active dominant guild. So basically im asking NiteHawk and the other game developers to consider stepping in with a game mechanic that offers an incentive for strong active players to branch out and start their own guilds (which would ultimately improve in-game competition and make it also friendlier for newbies to join/contribute).

Yes i do understand that there are OADs that require 6ppl parties that are hard enough to put together as it is even for the most dominant guilds... but i suppose there is nothing stopping an alliance of 2-3 smaller active guilds from doing the OAD together (if it suits them) rather than just having 1 dominant guild do it... The only thing stopping 2-3 smaller guilds allying to do it is there is no current incentive for the active players to organize themselves into 2-3 different guilds rather than 1 dominant one. But I honestly think the game needs the guild diversity to survive and this is why I ask NH etc to consider incentivizing such a thing.

One such mechanic that might work to incentivize guild diversity is to introduce a guild prestige point system where each instance of successfully completed game activity (eg killing mobs, completing quests, running OADs etc) earns the guild a certain amount of guild points. Each week the accumulated guild points are ranked and converted into hero coin rewards to be distributed among guild members. However the scale of rewards is designed to naturally reward active players and promote guild diversity... for example (numbers below can be scaled/tweaked depending on how many guilds we think is healthy for size of player base):

Guild A with 30 active members accumulates 5000 guild prestige and takes 1st place = 25 hero coins = <1 each per week
Guild B has 10 active members accumulates 1500 guild prestige and takes 2nd place = 22 hero coins = 2.2 each per week
Guild C has 5 active members (10 inactive) accumulates 600 guild prestige and takes 3rd place = 20 hero coins = 4 each per week
Guild D has 2 active members accumulates 100 guild prestige takes 4th place = 18 hero coins = 9 each per week
5th Place = 15 hero coins etc.
6th Place = 12 hero coins etc

In this scenario, some players from Guild A may actually have incentive to leave Guild A and start Guild E or join Guild D etc... and maybe the 10 idling players in Guild C would actually stop idling and do something (or the 5 active ones would leave).. plus newbies and players in different timezones who miss alot of events have a way to accumulate PP via making contributions to guilds etc. Something like this would act as a natural incentive to promote guild diversity and benefit the game as a whole because it actually encourages active playing and balances the competitiveness between active players. This makes it easier to keep existing players motivated and new players to find the game more empowering/less discouraging.

I am happy to invest more time to thinking through how such ideas would work etc but am not sure the rest of the player-base/staff really supports my assessment of how critical promoting guild diversity is to growing/retaining active player-base... And frankly I can’t be bothered investing time thinking of suggestions if no-one else actually thinks change would be beneficial.

So what do other players think? I'd be interested to hear the perspective of players from different guilds and even different game experiences etc as to how this might or might not achieve the aim of helping to grow/retain active players.

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Edit - I'm not really fussed if the reward is HeroCoins/PP or something else... basically just whether the system works to do what is intended

Guild diversity is 100% needed, there's no doubt about that. I wish other guilds would step up more tbh. Pandemonium did for a little bit recently, but then the hype of a new guild died down and reality set in - it takes a good amount of consistent work and effort to keep a guild going strong.

I kinda like the idea of a guild point system, but it needs to be a bit simpler. Something to consider - we have had 2 schisms in our guild history where a "strong" leader left and formed their own guild to contest us. Both times it died down quickly. I'm not sure you can change that with guild incentives, because as I already said it takes some dedication to make a guild work well. Incentives only go so far if the leadership is ultimately not willing to put in the time and effort.

I'm not saying a guild incentive system can't help, because I think it can. But I don't think it necessarily fixes things long term. For our part we are not, and have not been, inviting anyone for some time now. Any and all new players are either clanless or going to other clans, but those other clans do need to step up and invite them and help them get going.

To clarify I, and and all my lovely guildies, are 100% for more diversity and competition. You won't find any of us complaining or resisting this, BUT I will also say that I don't expect many of them will want to run off and make their own guild in the name of power. Mostly going forward I think the simplest answer is other clans scooping up newbies and guiding them, or even guilds consolidating in some form.

I get where you are coming from on this. I can perfectly understand why people would be getting frustrated. I don't really have an answer though. I wouldn't leave mainly because I like the people. I consider them friends. It really isn't about being in the more dominate guild that holds most us in Silh I'd imagine, so I don't think offering incentives would help.

Whether particular people would or wouldn't be enticed to leave Silo by incentives isn't the point... that's a personal choice. I have some EO friends in Pand, Def, other guilds and even Silo - despite not being able to belong to all of these guilds. Some may decide that playing with friends is more important than chasing rewards. Others may think they can chase rewards and still be friends in a different guild. But without any incentive then of course you would just play with friends and 100% certainty nothing would change

And i just want to clarify that the incentive system isn't designed to only target/entice Silo players (since Folder's response seemed to think it was only targeted at his guild)... it may also re-incentivize existing guilds into activity/competition or empower active players to come out of a dying guild and make their own etc (because 'stepping up to compete' is not as easy as Folder claims it is when there are high barriers to entry etc... an incentive system helps them at least get a leg up to compete so they can put in the hard work you suggest is needed to run a good guild... otherwise you will likely crush them before they can find their footing).

Basically the bottom line is i'm suggesting it would help promote active players and active play.... and the game needs more of that to grow imho. I don't really mind what the incentive system is... or whether there is some other way of doing it etc - so long as it achieves this aim. Short of suggesting to Folder and Silo that you break up the band 'for the good of the game', an incentive system is all i can think of to provide more motivation for competitiveness and activity right now.

Happy for you to suggest other viable things to promote competition if you dont believe an incentive system works... (because i don't think closing recruitment and telling others to 'step up' is really working to motivate others at this stage - sorry)

I get what you are saying, I really do. When Silh started the guild was just me for a couple weeks. Then Daedroth joined. Then Lightning joined. Then Garou (who never even got a 25er). It was just us 4 for quite some time. We worked hard, we took the time to learn the game, worked with other guilds for loot scraps. Undermanned OaDs. Other guilds eventually broke and some people flocked to us, we gained numbers yay! We're still here now and currently have the most active guild, but it wasn't always like this and it won't always be like this either.

An incentive system translates to what at the end of the day? Items? Will that make you want to play more? We've tried experiments in the past where we, for example, did not run OaDs and let other guilds have all the fun for a while. It didn't change anything though, and in fact I would argue it hurt the game because there was no conflict and people got bored. Sure they got some more items, but then what? I kinda worry this does the same thing.

Let's say we have a 2man guild and under this system they get more coins/pp/whatever. This translates to event items. Then what? They are still a 2man guild and will still get smooshed by numbers. Will they enjoy the game more and stay longer because they have some items? I'm not really sure. Maybe. I think unless that 2man guild needs to party up with other guilds to get numbers, or consolidate into 1 bigger guild.

What I'm saying is...prepare for unpopular opinion...!

The problem is leadership in other guilds. It's not strong. It's not there for their members. You can throw all the items or incentives you want, but if those guilds aren't being run well with active leadership it's not going to change a thing. We work very hard to foster a team environment where everyone feels like this is a home for them. We talk outside the game, sometimes we play other games together, I'd consider these people in my guild to be real friends. I don't see this being solved by ingame incentives, but I concede it may help the short term. So I'm not really against it at all, but I'll say it a million times even if people don't like it - someone HAS to step up and take charge.

An interesting idea, but flawed. Splintering a guild because they work together and get stuff done in the name of incentives isn't the answer. I don't have the answer and asking Staff and Builders in general to create a system that will force this will only hurt the game. End game stuff is on it's way then we can open the advertising lanes to hopefully attract more daily players. It all just takes time.

Adramelk wrote:An interesting idea, but flawed. Splintering a guild because they work together and get stuff done in the name of incentives isn't the answer. I don't have the answer and asking Staff and Builders in general to create a system that will force this will only hurt the game. End game stuff is on it's way then we can open the advertising lanes to hopefully attract more daily players. It all just takes time.

Shrug I disagree the concept is as flawed as you think it is. Most markets in the free world are regulated by governments that step in to promote competition because monopolies are generally shite for the end consumer. That's all I'm suggesting here. Not so much different from how most marketplaces work in the free world. Yes Folder is right that leadership does matter (incentives won't promote competition if the competition is mismanaged)... But it at least provides ways for competition that might be managed well to get an opening and compete. I'd hazard a guess that the landscape when silhouette started out was not as singularly dominated by active players all in one guild as it is now. That's why what may not have been necessary then might be necessary now.

Edit - to clarify, the system I'm suggesting is not forcing anyone to split up etc. Silo can all still play together in the same guild if they choose to.... But the new players u advertise to join etc will at least have some means to compete (by accessing the guild incentives) and not get dominated from day 1... Which ultimately helps/motivates/encourages them to keep playing and become active players in the community....and thus playerbase grows

Eh... If I am happy in a clan no amount of incentive will make me leave, if I am unhappy in a clan no amount of incentive will make me stay.
Right now, incentive or not, I can't see myself leaving a clan where I pretty much like all the people there.
Anyone who leaves a clan for an incentive... well seems kinda mercenary to me. The reasons I will leave or stay in a clan is based on the people in the clan, not power or incentives.

I do agree clan imbalance can cause issues, however the balance does change regularly and it's difficult to artificially manage it.
About a month ago Silhouette were regularly getting out numbered by Defiance and Pandemonium, and regularly having losing fights.

There are ebbs and flows with clan sizes, but when we get more players this should balance out a bit more evenly.

I'm gonna take a different angle on this and look at situations where having a big clan currently helps:

1. Some events
2. Top end OADs
3. clan fights
4. General chatting to people
5. Finding people to level/farm/piss around with.


Each of these items could be addressed separately to lessen the impact of clan imbalance on general player game enjoyment

i. e.

#1 The events staff have been looking to run more events where having a bigger clan isn't an advantage.
If you check the #announcements channel on Discord it's very rare an event is run where pure clan numbers gives you an advantage


#2 Build is aware of the need to make OADs competitive for all, this has led to interesting changes to Dreads and is leading to the planning of some interesting OADs in future.

#3 clan fights aren't always about how big a clan is, it's about how organised people are.
Perhaps we could introduce ways of training people to be better at PVP

#4 This is potentially a poisonous idea, but perhaps we could look to introduce a global chat channel, maybe you wouldn't chat to everyone, but you'd randomly be placed into a global chat with 1/4 or 1/3rd of the people online.
(Think clash of clans)

Alternatively we could look at introducing friend chat, where you could chat to friends in different clans

Both of these ideas would need a lot of work to make them feasible.

#5 There's been various versions of this posted before but some form of publicly viewable toggle could be good indicating if you were looking for a party, perhaps /LFexp, /LFoad, /LFfarm


Any thoughts?

Maybe implement an upkeep charge to maintain guilds of x number of members (x = a number of members deemed as excessive) which gradually taps away at the guild's coffers. If the guild can't make the payment, to be made at an interval of time deemed appropriate, then it gets audited (or punished in some form or another.) Ideas for punishments:

A hefty fine - The guildies must aggregate their personal gold to pay off a sizable fine in order to keep the guild alive
Relinquish assets - cut guild members so that the total guild members are less than the value of x
Bankruptcy - The guild is dissolved