System, right now, works like this:
--> Miss a payment, house gets instantly deleted.
I propose to make it work like this (which is how towns work):
--> Miss a payment, you now owe that money and have until the next upkeep to repay or your house gets deleted.
Most games with open housing tend to have at least a one week delay before full deletion if you miss a payment or, at the very least, a warning system to let you know you are X days from deletion.
My advice would be to stop adding features until you can fix what you have. Sincerely, there is a lot of bugs and issues and they shouldn't linger (or have been lingering) for months and months on end while you add more features which will most definitely bring extra bugs and issues.
This is just common sense.
@Ablabla If you lose your horse three times in PvP, it's likely your fault? I fail to see why you'd need to go around with more than one spare horse for PvP and even then, that's likely pushing it.
We don't fight on horseback in this game.
Currently, the only challenge with getting a horse lies in the first ten minutes of creating a character.
I propose that we move to have your horse dying be a tad more meaningful with the following changes. It goes within the same spirit of the other changes related to the economy (as horses are firmly part of said economy).
Changes:
-Every horse should have three lives. If it dies three times, it's dead forever. Consider that "horse durability", in a sense. This will create a market for horses.
-When your horse is shot from under you, you shouldn't be able to mount back for at least one minute. The current timer is way, way too short and makes it too easy to escape.
-In an effort to make the horse market more interesting, horses should have the following attributes impact (again, slightly) different qualities:
A)Strength should impact horses' speed while pulling a wagon.
B)Dexterity should impact horses' speed without a wagon.
C)Constitution should impact horses' health pool (if it doesn't already).
Pretty straightforward, just a way to create another profession and market, while making things more interesting in the open-world.
@grofire I want a game that works. You weren't promised a game. Get over yourself. The game evolves.
What you bought into, if you backed the Kickstarter, was the possibility of a game the way they envisioned it back in 2018. There was no guarantee it'd actually be made, nor were there any guarantee the game would be set in stone. No games are actually set in stone. Do you think WoW in 2022 is the same as 2005? Should a player who bought the game in 2005 because it was a certain way sue them now that it's different?
Get real.
Also, I'm not looking for an Albion lookalike and have no idea why "removing respecs from wilderness campfires" would equal "THIS IS NOW ALBION OMG". You're entering delusional territory.
Then clearly you do not agree with the siege system.
Moreover, while there is no shortage of empty towns right now, there might be on launch. How, then, are upcoming guilds supposed to take a new place? Just forever be out of a town?
Not to mention, the "end game" dynamics of this game sort of gravitate around cities trading hands. I think reducing the destruction is a lot more interesting than outright removing city capture.
One could remove city capture on the PvE planet, though.
@grofire No, I did follow this game's development for about a year and a half and been following the forums. I don't think I'm the first person to suggest this; I just make suggestions and feedback based on the game that is in front of my eyes, rather than live in the past.
Moreover, enough with the argumentum ad populum. You represent yourself, a guy whose opinions are no more important than anyone else, not some muted crowd of older players who are conveniently sided with you.
Devs are asking for feedback. Which includes feedback on every element of the game. There is no "well, me and my bois consider that this matter has been solved because we happened not to like it when they touched it five months ago 
". There's only the game as it is and the feedback we give on it.
@spoletta Palisades are a rank 5 tech, though, not stone walls. Last I checked, stone walls were behind the Town level.
--
I proposed some quick fixes for the time being but it is obvious the entire siege system needs a full revamp, not only to make it more enjoyable for both parties but to limit what a conquest can do. As it is currently the main end-game vector, they need to be given a lot more love. They should definitely be a multi-stage event, with more involvement required.
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Some food for thought:
A good, arguably very niche game, who had a great "siege" system was Pirates of the Burning Sea. As few people probably played the game, I'll just describe it in short. It was also aimed at smaller (24vs24) battles so I think it could be apt to take inspiration.
There were three ways to put "contention points" on a port belonging to another faction. First, attackers of a given faction could kill enemy NPCs belonging to the port's faction within its vicinity. Second, a fully PvP flagged enemy group (groups were composed of six players) could patrol the waters near the port. Third, once per hour, the enemy could get into the port and seek out a "Saboteur NPC" and give it money and materials (you had to physically bring the mats as packages, which meant possible losses at sea if somebody intercepted you).
Adversely, the defenders could reduce points in three ways. First, defenders of the port's faction could kill enemy NPCs belonging to the attacking faction within the port's vicinity. Second, they could flag up and patrol the waters near the port. Third, once per hour, the governor (a player) of the port could give it money to "reinforce security" and remove a certain amount of contention points.
Obviously, both factions could kill each other's players to either add or reduce contention points. At 3000 points, a small red bubble popped around the port. That was the Pirate PvP bubble; any player could now be attacked by members of the Pirate faction (which the Pirates absolutely loved) but unflagged players from both factions couldn't attack each other. At 6000 points, the bubble doubled in size. Now, the entire port area was a full PvP zone. At 10,000 points, the port was considered "under attack" and a port battle was scheduled for three days later (there was an 8 hour window for PBs so if say we "flipped a port" at 3 am, the PB would be set 3 days later at the first "primetime window" hour, not at 3 am).
It was a good system which allowed PvErs and PvPers to contribute. PvErs often stuck around until a port got to 6k contention points, killing NPCs and delivering supplies. As the game had ship destruction, they also often sold replacement ships at low prices to defenders or attackers of their faction. PvPers, meanwhile, had a blast and faced off with the best other crews. Lastly, random pirates were often either paid to harass the enemy or came to wreck things.
On the day of the Port Battle itself, the faction organized and people were mandated to be in specific ships. Now, of course, this last part doesn't apply as here sieges are guild based. Ports were important because not only did you need a certain amount of "points" (taking a port gave your faction points) to win the "season" but also because ports had specific resources/facilities and one could deliver a tough blow to an enemy faction by seizing their key facilities, for example.
In general, the whole PB system from that game had the benefit of turning PBs into large, multi-day events, which involved not only PvPers but also PvErs and random reds (pirates) in a meaningful, fun way. Everybody got to do their part and feel like they had contributed (or ruined people's plans) in some way or another. If we are to revamp the siege system (and we should), we would do well to make sure all types of players are important.
@StormBug I do like that idea ("crafting for a recipe" ) for recipe acquisition and agree it makes a lot more sense. We could keep a few "rare" (future set items, 'unique' items, etc.) recipes for rare chests (master and legendary locks?) at a low drop rate, making those truly rare and exotic.
I apologize if I misinterpreted your previous post. It wasn't done out of malice.
@Tuoni The issue with that "watch out for Autumn patch" is that it's also supposed to be when the game goes full launch; meaning we'll be given an untested system right prior to launch or on launch. Unless launch date has moved?
First, I do not care how long you have backed this project. You could be Jacopo's towel boy for all I care. The fact of the matter is that I have paid to play this game and I am playing this game. Devs want feedback from players.
How the game was a year ago has no impact whatsoever. What matters is how the game is right now and our feedback to it. Having played some pre-pre-alpha version of this game does not make you word sacred. Your opinion is worth exactly the same as mine is; with the caveat that mine is at least backed by general thoughts on how to improve game design while yours is mostly "we had that before, me likie, you no agree, you no smart".
You'll have to deal with the fact that the game will continue to change from when you first experienced it in pre-alpha. Seriously.
Second, exploring can be just as easily done by hitting a city along the way to regenerate health lost and respec. There is no good argument for a full ability + skill respec in the middle of the wilderness; hell, virtually no MMOs allow for unlimited skill+ability respecs, much less for nothing and in the middle of nowhere. The reason for that is that it massively cheapens choices, dumbs down the game and makes it a lot more casual and easy.
See an ice elemental? Instantly make a campfire and two seconds later, poof, fire spells. Fire elemental? Pull that in reverse. This mob happens to resist a spell or two? No problem, disengage and just adjust your ability list.
The campfire, as it stands, replenishes your energy - which is important if you got abilities making use of that - and allows you to cook in the wild. As they expand cooking, I do expect this latter element will become more important as well. That's plenty for a "craft it on the spot with 10 rocks and 5 branches" type of craft.
@spoletta A compromise might be to allow preset changes every hour? That way, the powerful campfire lovers would still get to keep their powerful campfire and it'd alleviate the most egregious "I respec every 30 seconds" cases?
@Tuoni The economy is already extremely problematic because we're having way too much gear and resources coming in and you think we should just... make it worse?
To fix your marketplace-->durability issue, we could simply add the sale of items missing durability to the marketplace and show the durability of the item as you try to buy it.
Fairly straightforward.
Campfires are extremely easy to make and make preparations entirely pointless; one does not need to prepare oneself for an expedition in the wild or to kill certain mobs, one simply needs 10 stone and 5 branches and voilà !, you can respec to your heart's desire. Face a mob with fire resistance? No problem, instantly swap to cold damage.
It especially makes a mockery of chests when you can simply spec for combat, get to a chest, make a campfire, respec and lockpick away. What's the point of even having lockpicking in the game if people can just respec to it in five seconds and then take it out ten seconds later?
Campfires should be limited to bringing your energy back and cooking food. For everything else, you should seek permanent fireplaces.
@GamerSeuss Everyone being able to do everything doesn't everyone necessarily needs to be able to unlock every recipe and be able to be a master of everything. There are limitations in abilities and talents, for example, and you're not asking for them to be removed. Or maybe you are, who knows.
I have not read this broad mission statement of which you seem to be the chief priest, judging by your other posts, but would love to. In any case, poor game design is still poor game design and people being allowed to master everything (with crafting in its current state) is just a recipe for disaster and makes crafting entirely irrelevant within a few months as there'll be thousands of people with maxed out crafting in everything. It also makes crafting particularly uninspired and merely a mats grind (and this game has an easy one).
@spoletta Is it, though? You need citizens to make towns. This, in itself, has been promoting alts. People move things safely with alts. Alts can be in other towns and make use of better facilities than your main. Alts can also be in other towns to steal their stuff or sabotage their crops while your main is safe with his friends. One can use PvP alts to terrorize a specific region without having to go around and cross an entire map back and forth. Hell, people will most definitely have alts on other planets if other planets ever come. There's plenty, in the game design, that favors alting.
Moreover, the idea behind expanding crafting wouldn't be to favor alts but to favor specializations and cooperation. Yes, some of you will instantly think "well, I'll make an alt and do two or more professions" but that's still more time spent, more resources collected and mobs farmed. Most people cannot do that solo and shouldn't do that solo. If no one specializes, then every town and character is just the same and, while that may seem enticing, it just leads to boredom and every town living in full autarky as no one needs anything. It's the opposite of a living and vibrant game world.
I have a feeling, however, that I'm about to be told that asking people to cooperate or group up, in a MMO, goes against some credo of Fractured.
@Tuoni Comparing this current economy with Albion's economy is laughable. First, Albion's crafting system has a multi-tier system of specialization where one not only becomes a master blacksmith but a master plate armor and then a master "chestplate" maker. Our system does not have that. Moreover, Albion's economy benefits from gear destruction. We don't. At most, we have an extremely forgiving durability system.
If you want an economy that works, you need to have at least an equal amount of resources spent vs. resources coming in. We are far, far, far away from that. Not only are we tremendously far away from that point but most of you are arguing for even easier mechanics. No gear break! More durability! We should all be masters of everything!
The current crafting system is a barebones system that you seem to want to defend at all costs. Are "dropped recipes" a good idea? It's a bandaid, an easy-to-implement idea to supplement a very basic system. The fact of the matter is that the current system, outside of enchanting, is really easy to master. You want to talk Albion? Getting to Master in Fractured takes about one hundredth of the resources (comparatively speaking) it takes to go 100/100 for a given weapon/piece of gear on Albion, if not less.
Sieges are currently broken; I think pretty much everyone is aware of it. From being allowed to log in, as an attacker, inside the enemy's town, to being able to teleport through walls to the flag having virtually no health, the issues plaguing this core mechanic of the game are numerous.
Obvious fixes:
-Any attacker who logs in the besieged town, during a siege, should be automatically teleported to the attacker's siege camp or simply spawn there.
-Any and all teleport spells should be blocked by walls and palisades.
-Defenders should have to manually open a gate to go through it (like we open doors in buildings) and gates should automatically close within 15-20 seconds of being opened.
-Flags should have magical and physical armor and tremendously more health.
-The Attackers' Siege Camp should have a bubble around it so defenders cannot pull a reverse "log in catch" and log back in right on top of it. If they try logging in within that bubble, they should be teleported back to their flag.
-Until fixes are implemented, the Conquest mode should be temporarily disabled. I know we are in beta but the goal is to retain players, not see them driven away because they can lose, in a matter of seconds, what they have worked on and accumulated over weeks.
Conquest Mode Revamp:
The Conquest mode should be revamped. My proposal is to make it more interesting by introducing time constraints for the Conquerors on what they can do.
Instantly allowed:
-Changing taxes.
-Emptying coffers.
-Destroying/harvesting fields.
-Constructing new buildings.
Delayed:
-Destruction.
I propose a three-day moratorium on any and all destruction (besides fields). First, this will prevent the near-instant deletion of the town's bank and its housing. Second, it'll actually give time to the conquered to plan a counter-attack, rally their friends or, perhaps, abandon the city after taking back their belongings. Taking back their belongings force them to enter a now-hostile town and escape with a lot of stuff on them. It creates opportunities for the conqueror and the conquered by rewarding patience for the former and guile for the latter. It creates OW-PvP scenarios where one might kill an enemy who has A LOT of stuff on them.
It also delays Stone Aging and gives a chance to the Conquered to fight another day, if not immediately. It brings more layers to a rather simple, blunt system.
Lastly, I believe that when the destruction of a recently captured town is enabled, it should be within time constraints. In my opinion, it makes no sense whatsoever that massive buildings can be destroyed in one click and a whole town be razed to the ground in 10 minutes. It's not only nonsensical but it is sincerely detrimental to the longevity of the game. I believe that once destruction is enabled and the Conqueror decides to start destroying buildings, they should be put on "destruction timers": the more complex/important the building, the longer it'd take. A 2x2 house, for example, could take only 12 hours whereas a townhall would most assuredly take a full week. The Conqueror could initiate destruction of all buildings at once, but they'd be set to different timers and thus prolong the window of opportunity for the conquered people to recapture their old hometown.
This, in turn, would also make it so if they do manage to recapture it, the town wouldn't be a wasteland but would likely retain most of its important buildings.
What you are suggesting would only perpetuate a problem that is prevalent in this economy: everyone can do everything.
I know this is the kind of thinking across a lot of modern MMOs and especially themeparks but if everyone is able to craft everything, no one is a specialist. No matter how grindy you make things - and it can get ridiculously grindy - every non-terrible town will have tons of specialists of every profession. At the very least, the current recipe system does bring some competition and forces people to invest in their crafts (buy recipes or farm them) to get full sets.
What we need are things that force us to make choices, that make our characters unique.
I, personally, like the recipe system and believe they should expand upon it. Add more unique recipes for more unique sets. Add them to weapon crafting. Add them to socketing and imbuing. Add them to cooking and animal handling (different nets?). Moreover, make it so we can only master one profession and add more professions; artisans for decor/furniture making, lockpicks (which should seriously be moved out of the talent respec nonsense at every campfire), siege engineers, blacksmiths, imbuers, jewelers, tailors, leatherworkers, fishermen, cooks, etc.
It should be difficult and a money/time investment to be the best master craftsman of your chosen profession. You could also add another layer of mastery by having to master not only your general profession but the crafting of specific items: for example, a Master Blacksmith (t4) could be only an Apprentice (t2) Battlemage Armor crafter, giving different bonuses.
Towns could further specialize by having to make more choices. No more of this nonsense where every town unlocks every tech. No. Towns should have to either be medium jack-of-all-trades or heavy in one or two specializations. Make them work for it too; a town library or laboratory could ask for specific mats to level/unlock specific research, which boosts general market demand for certain goods.
We certainly don't need to simplify the current system. We need to expand it.
I have read your entire post and, while I disagree with a few of its conclusions and premises, must compliment you on its quality. It is refreshing to see articulate opinions.
First, what I agree with:
-Reds are way too severely punished at the moment.
-Good and neutral are having it too easy.
-Crafting t3+ enchantments is indeed a "group" effort.
-Crafting primitive weaponry and gear is trivial.
-Crafting set gear can be, sometimes, ridiculously difficult.
-A durability loss on "knocked out (fake death)".
-Masteries and your proposals to fix them.
What I disagree with:
-Crafted gear is not difficult to make.
-Rebalancing based on Karma and, especially giving good characters a free pass.
I believe that you have done a fine job explaining where we stand, where the economy is and what the fear is for the future. It seems to be something players from both sides don't always register: a game needs to have both casual PvErs and hard PvPers to have a decent economy. Its corollary: easy isn't better.
I agree with several of your propositions but, while I agree with almost all of them, feel like they sometimes do not go far enough.
To be specific:
On the issue of Karma:
Karma comes easy to those who are good characters but is hard to those who go red; recovering it, while red, exposes you for a long while: it isn't "one murder = you may die once and lose two pieces of gear" but more along the lines of "one murder and you are going to stay red for several hours at least, where you may lose multiple sets of gear". On the other hand, a good character is likely to stay good forever and would thus be never exposed to any gear loss.
In my opinion, a red character should be forced to stay red for at least two hours (of ingame time, being offline doesn't count) following his crime (which allows for revenge killings). After the hour has past, he should have two options: stay red and farm mobs to gain Karma OR go to the shrine and pay the "Temple" to absolve his sins, which brings him back to zero karma (thus neutral). The price could then be set based on his crimes; the more severe the sins, the more expensive the penance.
Moreover, I'd make it so we get more Karma from killing higher tier mobs. Not massively so but a little nudge to bring repentant Red players to higher-end areas would bring interesting potential open-world PvP scenarios.
On the issue of gear drop:
I do not believe Good characters should be entirely exempted from this. However, I do think we have the potential to make this better. Hear me out.
First, I think you are 100% correct with the "one gear drop" for Neutral characters and "1 to 2 gear drops" for Red characters. With that said, I think that we could introduce a 30% chance for Good players to drop gear. It'd reward their dedication to the "Good" play style while still presenting a certain danger and a potential reward for their enemies.
Second, I think that one good way to tackle all of the problems you mentioned (from gear drop to balancing the economy) is to introduce gear destruction. The problem with "gear drop" is that it is a nullsum when it comes to the economy; sure the dropped gear is likely to have lost some of its durability but no more so than if it had continued to be used by the same player. In my opinion, each piece of gear that drops should have a 30% chance to destroy instead: after all, a fight just occurred. It likely was brutal. It'd make it so gear doesn't always drop and successful red players just don't collect entire wardrobes. Or at least, it'd help alleviate that concern a wee bit.
General thoughts:
I believe that this "three-tiered" system is a fine one but it needs to be streamlined and equalized; there should be set weapons as well and the difference between primitive and non-primitive gear (T1 to T2) should be important The idea is that we should discourage red players, as much as possible, from going out there and do "naked kills".
I feel, personally, that T2 plate gear is in a perfect spot but this should be equalized to all types of gear; with the proper infrastructure, a solo player can relatively easily get himself two full sets of plate+weapons a day. Enchanting that gear to level 1 should possibly be made slightly easier (as you, yourself, pointed out). At this point, if the reforms proposed here were to be implemented, I could easily see a world where T2 gear becomes the norm and the bread and butter of players around. Losing it wouldn't hurt terribly and one could reasonably expect to replace lost pieces.
Everything beyond that should be difficult to get and reserved for big outings with your guild or sieges. Speaking of the latter, I will conclude my post by saying three things on sieges.
On sieges:
First, everyone should be dropping one piece of gear on death during sieges, good and red characters alike. This is a special occasion where people should feel like they can and must bring their best.
Second, until some of the most egregious issues with sieges (tp'ing through walls, flags having legit 10 HPs, etc.) are fixed, the conquest mode should be disabled as to not drive more people away from the game.
Third, a city conquest should not allow the conqueror to just outright destroy every building in five seconds flat. This absolutely destroys any and all chances for revenge or come back for the conquered, which deprives the game from precious and interesting gameplay. Instead, I believe that the newly conquered city should benefit from a three-day "no destruction of buildings" peace window after which the governor can start initiating destruction of buildings. The time required to destroy the buildings would vary based on their size and importance; a 2x2 house or a crop can easily get removed overnight but a bank, townhall or workshop should take a few days. What this would accomplish is give a chance to people to move their stuff out (and then be attacked if they don't sneak in properly) or take revenge and recapture their town before it gets razed to the ground. It also forces the conquerors to try to defend a town they likely just ravaged.
Alright. I'm done. I had not planned on adding this bit on sieges in this post but I feel it ties in with the gear drops and general balance of the economy.
The overall goal should always be to have a lively, healthy open-world economy and it is clear there are a lot of great ideas here.