Canceled my Sub and Deleted all Chars

Good evening,

I wanted to say that I have canceled my subscription and deleted all of my characters after a month of playing.  I was a returning player from original beta, having played on and off over the years.  I lost countless hours of my own time to PKers with no real way forward on Champion Spawns, Bosses, and the content I enjoy.

The roadmap for the game doesn't look very exciting either.

Good luck all!  I gave away the few million gold I had and all my belongings before deleting.  Maybe someone else can find some joy in masochistically being ****** each time you want to enjoy yourself after work. 

A Cat,

Signing out Forever

We understand a player might find fault with things as they are, The game has changed so to do players. I find 1 month not long enough to get back into the swing of the hard gaming he lists as his forte in game.  I have no doubt he is mad.. but to come and dump all on the players of the forum is not right.  May I ask this be locked up. To save the others the hurt filled message meant to drag up feeling that might change others minds erroroniously 

*shrug* UO isn't for the timid.

Last time there was only Fel and all activities are there.

Now there is a Trammel with all expansions in the same rule set. The only thing left for Fel is either Champ Spawn or pvp, and you quit just because of Pker... *slaps forehead*

There are ways to deal with them, and it's only a super small part of the huge UO content.

A PK will get ya fired up though lol I think those are my best memories though of being tormented by PKs. But ya they can get to ya sometimes.

Captain_Lucky said:

A PK will get ya fired up though lol I think those are my best memories though of being tormented by PKs. But ya they can get to ya sometimes.

Yeah, but there is no solution to this. This is what a mmo game is all about in the first place... 

If the only thing any of us have is time, then a PK is truly stealing that from you.  If I want to fight them, it will take a LOT of time to prepare.  Then, even if I prepare, I will be out numbered, so more time finding people to help.  Then there's gear. They have better gear because they've spent more time than me collecting it.  So, the only question left is what is PvPs purpose in UO (For a player like me)?  I just don't see a purpose given the current content I'm interested in.

Back in the day, when you died and lost loot it was no big deal as there was nothing really special about gear.  Just go get the same standard stuff.  Now, it's built off farming for high end drops.  However, the cliques of PK players are too powerful for a returning player to deal with.

After a long day at work, I want to enjoy myself.  So, the easy solution would be to make PvP shards and PvM shards.  Problem solved.  However, it's too late (for me).

For the lady that said my 1 month is not long enough, well I've spent years on this game, have several accounts.  I still have a Beta disk.  My experience is very important to a returning power player that doesn't want to deal with PvP.

I would login, work a spawn, get PKd after 45mins to an hour as they stole everything.  This happened numerous times.  Why would I invest more time in that, with odds lower than being struck by lightening, that I would succeed in gaining control over the content I want to play?

Tis such a shame too.  The other side of things is that I only ever ran into a handful of people, just a few returning players and a core group (who were also secretly the PKs).  I mean what's the point?  Lol, this post stands as a testament to why this gaming studio will go out of business.  Want to save it?  Create something for all types of players. 

Risk/Reward and Balance aren't as important to an experience as developers think.  My basic needs were inadequately met.  Kind of like having a child and then never feeding it (Dev - But we have perfectly balanced the amount of food it was given!!!!), or risking the family cat or dog coming along and eating it before the child gets a bite (Balance - We'll move the food a little closer!!) .The child "might" eat sometimes, but is highly likely to die.  Why risk that?  This is UO's PvP system as it stands.  It's just not good by design, and no amount of balance will change the underlying issue.

Simple as that.  I died because I couldn't eat.  I'm not interested anymore.  But after years of investment, I wanted to share my experience.  My experience is valid and happens all too often. 

Edit:  This is not my first time having this experience after returning and playing for a few months.  I was hoping it had been solved.  I was also told to spend real life money to transfer my characters to lower populated shards, or to start new characters on different shards.  Are you kidding me? 

This game has nothing to do with being timid.  If you are intelligent you see the pattern, calculate what it'll cost you, and decide it's just not going to give you the experience you want.   

When angry, don't talk (or action?)
When happy, don't promise.
When sad, don't decide.

Easier said than done, but I find it quite true.

Whatever the reason, we understand how you feel but since you have already permanently deleted your characters, it does not matter.

Seth said:

When angry, don't talk (or action?)
When happy, don't promise.
When sad, don't decide.

Easier said than done, but I find it quite true.

Whatever the reason, we understand how you feel but since you have already permanently deleted your characters, it does not matter.

Correct.  I deleted because I wanted to break the cycle.  You call it "Emotions" with your poem-esque analogy, but it's actually purely a calculation of my investment of time not being worth the trouble.  

Also, I have proof that my analogy is better than yours.  UO subscriber base continues to decline, year after year.  There are several shards that are literally ghost shards (as an example).  You can provide all the silly metaphors, poems, and classy garbage you want.  Fact is, after several weeks of dealing with the same issue, I had to stop myself and say "This just isn't worth it."  I will admit to having a few good encounters, but there were FAR more bad ones.  Am I spending money and time to be abused? (Money is also just another way of saying "Time" too)  Come on, why would I waste my life in that cycle?  I enjoyed the game more when it was first released than in it's current iteration.  Nuff said.  This was my shortest resub.

Sorry to hear you are having problems with the game design. I am not a pvper and so i spend most of my time in tram and I always find lots to do, From time to time I will go to fel and do the champ spawns to get scrolls and such. I do understand your frustration as I have had the same issue. N one likes doing all the work and have a group of pvpers swoop in and steal all the rewards. I would like to pose an idea here. Why not make the champ spawn rewards based on points and deposit the reward to the player even after they are pked. In other words make it so the scrolls stay with the ghost. That would mean making them blessed instead of cursed. 

Not everyone quit because they were pked in Fel, at least that is not why I stopped a few times before, so does the friends I knew. I don't think the population dropped because of this simple reason alone. 

WOW I haven't had this much belly laughs in a long time.  What is the point to this what ever you want to call it.  I call it a child throwing a temper tantrum because something didn't go their way.

Lady_Storm said:

We understand a player might find fault with things as they are, The game has changed so to do players. I find 1 month not long enough to get back into the swing of the hard gaming he lists as his forte in game.  I have no doubt he is mad.. but to come and dump all on the players of the forum is not right.  May I ask this be locked up. To save the others the hurt filled message meant to drag up feeling that might change others minds erroroniously 

Canceled_Sub said:

If the only thing any of us have is time, then a PK is truly stealing that from you.  If I want to fight them, it will take a LOT of time to prepare.  Then, even if I prepare, I will be out numbered, so more time finding people to help.  Then there's gear. They have better gear because they've spent more time than me collecting it.  So, the only question left is what is PvPs purpose in UO (For a player like me)?  I just don't see a purpose given the current content I'm interested in.

Back in the day, when you died and lost loot it was no big deal as there was nothing really special about gear.  Just go get the same standard stuff.  Now, it's built off farming for high end drops.  However, the cliques of PK players are too powerful for a returning player to deal with.

After a long day at work, I want to enjoy myself.  So, the easy solution would be to make PvP shards and PvM shards.  Problem solved.  However, it's too late (for me).

For the lady that said my 1 month is not long enough, well I've spent years on this game, have several accounts.  I still have a Beta disk.  My experience is very important to a returning power player that doesn't want to deal with PvP.

I would login, work a spawn, get PKd after 45mins to an hour as they stole everything.  This happened numerous times.  Why would I invest more time in that, with odds lower than being struck by lightening, that I would succeed in gaining control over the content I want to play?

Tis such a shame too.  The other side of things is that I only ever ran into a handful of people, just a few returning players and a core group (who were also secretly the PKs).  I mean what's the point?  Lol, this post stands as a testament to why this gaming studio will go out of business.  Want to save it?  Create something for all types of players. 

Risk/Reward and Balance aren't as important to an experience as developers think.  My basic needs were inadequately met.  Kind of like having a child and then never feeding it (Dev - But we have perfectly balanced the amount of food it was given!!!!), or risking the family cat or dog coming along and eating it before the child gets a bite (Balance - We'll move the food a little closer!!) .The child "might" eat sometimes, but is highly likely to die.  Why risk that?  This is UO's PvP system as it stands.  It's just not good by design, and no amount of balance will change the underlying issue.

Simple as that.  I died because I couldn't eat.  I'm not interested anymore.  But after years of investment, I wanted to share my experience.  My experience is valid and happens all too often. 

Edit:  This is not my first time having this experience after returning and playing for a few months.  I was hoping it had been solved.  I was also told to spend real life money to transfer my characters to lower populated shards, or to start new characters on different shards.  Are you kidding me? 

This game has nothing to do with being timid.  If you are intelligent you see the pattern, calculate what it'll cost you, and decide it's just not going to give you the experience you want.   

Arron said:

Sorry to hear you are having problems with the game design. I am not a pvper and so i spend most of my time in tram and I always find lots to do, From time to time I will go to fel and do the champ spawns to get scrolls and such. I do understand your frustration as I have had the same issue. N one likes doing all the work and have a group of pvpers swoop in and steal all the rewards. I would like to pose an idea here. Why not make the champ spawn rewards based on points and deposit the reward to the player even after they are pked. In other words make it so the scrolls stay with the ghost. That would mean making them blessed instead of cursed. 

Seth said:

Not everyone quit because they were pked in Fel, at least that is not why I stopped a few times before, so does the friends I knew. I don't think the population dropped because of this simple reason alone. 

At least, that is the way I see it.

To the opener.

Champ Spawns are not really solo content, bring a few friends, and you can cut that 1 hour time down to 10 minutes = your risk goes down massively.

There are 20 odd spawns, and 24 hours in a day, chose your time and place.

I know friends who solo all day long, and never get seen, just because they know the right time and places to be.

There are lots of quite large guilds, that take in new players, for exactly the purpose of doing champ spawns as a team, and gearing players up, join one of them. Join the war on PK's, take control of your own life and destiny - this is actually very exciting, and the entire point of UO. Teamwork, a Sandbox world, with politics, intrigue, drama, highs and lows. It was never here to roll over to easy-mode desires.

@popps, the downfall of UO, was Trammel itself, giving it all the game content, none of the free content you enjoy in Trammel should be possible. Trammel should be a place to have a safe house, chat around a bit, gossip, train your crafter, meander - not hunt for overpowered game items. 

Bilbo said:

WOW I haven't had this much belly laughs in a long time.  What is the point to this what ever you want to call it.  I call it a child throwing a temper tantrum because something didn't go their way.

I have actually been toying with the idea of creating a corporation or group of guilds that will help Blue players who wish to  work the fel champ spawns. I actually know a couple of great pvp'ers that are not red and do not grief other players. I will have to give it some more thought. Sort of like protectors of Tram. 

Cookie said:

To the opener.

Champ Spawns are not really solo content, bring a few friends, and you can cut that 1 hour time down to 10 minutes = your risk goes down massively.

There are 20 odd spawns, and 24 hours in a day, chose your time and place.

I know friends who solo all day long, and never get seen, just because they know the right time and places to be.

There are lots of quite large guilds, that take in new players, for exactly the purpose of doing champ spawns as a team, and gearing players up, join one of them. Join the war on PK's, take control of your own life and destiny - this is actually very exciting, and the entire point of UO. Teamwork, a Sandbox world, with politics, intrigue, drama, highs and lows. It was never here to roll over to easy-mode desires.

@ popps, the downfall of UO, was Trammel itself, giving it all the game content, none of the free content you enjoy in Trammel should be possible. Trammel should be a place to have a safe house, chat around a bit, gossip, train your crafter, meander - not hunt for overpowered game items. 

To be noted where it says... "....Garriott noted that they had the metrics to back it up...."
To be noted where it says : "....The population went up – a lot – after Trammel, in spite of EQ’s growing presence...."

Personally, I have no doutbs, ZERO. Trammel SAVED Ultima Online and pemitted it to keep existing....

Nice video.  According to the video, at around 31 minutes, they state that more than "HALF" the user base was lost due to the current PvP system in place (And that was in the beginning).   After 20 years, the problem is at its worst, and the developers have chosen to essentially go out of business at this point.  I mean, come on!  The solution is so easy!  Make a PvP shard.   Felucca Shard, Trammel shard.  Problem solved!

Thanks for the video.  It provides the data that supports my point of view.  The game is in a death spiral.  Throw out the 2019 roadmap, and reconfigure the servers and PvP.  You will boost the population 100 times within a few months.

Then continue designing content for the largest player base (That's 90% of players) and not the 10% of griefers who are stealing my time each night when I get off work.

Mervyn said:

http://sendvid.com/fh28txso

It wasn't me this time

That's what happened to me, over and over and over.   It was SO much fun.  And yet I'm timid and silly because I don't enjoy losing all that time I spent spawning the champ each night.  I was using a Tamer I had made (This was REALLY enjoyable btw) and building up the pets skills.  I was a couple of weeks out from speeding up the farming process.  BUT NO I needed to stop, start a new character to defeat spawns faster to avoid being PKd.  Are you kidding me!?  

Lol - The solution is so damned simple it's hilarious!

In the real world, the countries where Murderers have all the power, are the places no one wants to live.  There's LOTs of these places around the globe.  They are horrible places to exist (I'm sure).  Yet, PvP in UO simulates these places.

Some Warlord came along, killed your entire family and friends, stole all the food you were growing in the field, and you are giving up on life?!  Bah you are timid!  You need to go prepare to fight the Warlord and all his psychopathic friends so you can take back your desire to grow food in your field, so you can eat to survive.

Look.... the real life person committed suicide instead.  What a loser... How timid of them... guess living in a warlords territory is not for the feint of heart.  Any noob knows you just buy weapons, build up a community of friends, and fight back.

My god.  Fire the head designer.  They are the deathknell in this games history.  They NEED to be removed if they cannot understand these simple analogies.

I expect this post to be locked or deleted anyway.  That will be the final grief UO plays upon me.  They will delete the time it took me to explain the reason I am leaving, as if to say "**** you!  Timid Noob!"  LOL  I will laugh when the final server closes, and say "I told you so" even though I really don't want them to go out of business in the first place.

You let this go for 20 years!  HAHA, time to hire a new lead designer (And I'm sure this isn't the first one).  You can have a resume that is filled with your glorious deeds, that is a mile long, and still be an utter failure at your job.  Also, there's still time to fix it.  You could change the course you are taking (that is a slow closing of the business doors for the last time).  There's still a LOT to like about UO, it's just that you've let the murderers control everything.  You let the people who have low moral judgement ruin it all.

One has to wonder why you only chose to create a log in for this forum to come tell us all you have quit?
Starting a champion spawn at peak playing time and expecting to not be raided is somewhat foolish, to say the least. Even on quiet shards that's not likely to happen, it's been that way since champion spawns were introduced!  

Quitting because you can't do something that was always impossible doesn't make any sense to me, neither does ignoring the vast amount of content that isn't a champion spawn.

They created Trammel for people who don't like to be pk'd, also Malas, Tokuno, Ter Mur and Eodon. 

Since you have quit, and deleted your characters, I don't think there's much more to be said than Goodbye.

My brief comment about UO not being for the timid seems to had an effect on you. You mentioned it several times. One simply can't be overly sensitive in UO. Everyone dies and when we do we have insurance. All you've lost is some time. The whole point of the game is killing time lol. Power scrolls are about all the PvPers have. You gotta give them something. UO isn't a single player game.

Just thinking about it I've seen a lot of new names on Legends. That's been going on for awhile. I don't think the game is gonna close cause some newb gets PKed lol.

They didn't start in Fel so they get the chance to enjoy the game at their own pace.

@popps is right on with the state of UO

Trammel saved UO, everyone knows that expect those in denial.  Sure we hated it but the fact remains.

IMO power scrolls needs to be removed for more balance and PvP changed to be more like factions was and not limited to just Fel. Pk's limited to just killing faction players unless in Fel.   

Also limit the amount of stats items can have also remove the ability to use some skills with others, Like you wouldn't be able to use Chiv and Necro... 

Oh and remove Shard Shields or Make a portal room to any shard (aside from siege) and allow any paying sub to use them.   There's some other items that should be changed as well.

Petra_Fyde said:

One has to wonder why you only chose to create a log in for this forum to come tell us all you have quit?
Starting a champion spawn at peak playing time and expecting to not be raided is somewhat foolish, to say the least. Even on quiet shards that's not likely to happen, it's been that way since champion spawns were introduced!  

Quitting because you can't do something that was always impossible doesn't make any sense to me, neither does ignoring the vast amount of content that isn't a champion spawn.

They created Trammel for people who don't like to be pk'd, also Malas, Tokuno, Ter Mur and Eodon. 

Since you have quit, and deleted your characters, I don't think there's much more to be said than Goodbye.

"They created Trammel for people who don't like to be pk'd, also Malas, Tokuno, Ter Mur and Eodon. "

The issue, at least to my viewing, is NOT that Trammel is for players who do not want to be player killed BUT, rather, that an item quite fundamental for gameplay, ALSO in PvM, has been exclusively limited to Felucca as a Spawn.

And what has this caused ?

A Monopoly....

And what do Monopolies create, to my understanding ?

The SKYROCKETING of prices --> Inflation and, therefore, the need for all of the Trammel players who do not want to deal with PvP, to have to GRIND an outrageous amount of time in order to put together enough Gold to then be able to afford the absurd asking price for those Scrolls of Power....

And, to my opinion, what does all of that repetitive grinding cause in several players ?

It can "deter" them from wanting to play the game as a whole.... they get "burned out" from having to grind way too much in order to afford those absurdedly high prices....

Which it would mean, as I see it, as a consequence, a game losing its players' base which is not good for the necessary upkeep and gathering of resources needed to maintain it.....

The only way out, to my opinion, from such a deadlock situation is to "break" that Monopoly by either making pkillers life way, but WAY more difficult in Felucca (which is kinda out of question considering their enormous wealth coming from the benefit of holding such a Monopoly and the superior gear which they can afford with that in-game large wealth), or more simply by making Scrolls of Power available also elsewhere, where a few PvPers cannot control them and their pricing....

That is at least the way I see it.

Captain_Lucky said:

My brief comment about UO not being for the timid seems to had an effect on you. You mentioned it several times. One simply can't be overly sensitive in UO. Everyone dies and when we do we have insurance. All you've lost is some time. The whole point of the game is killing time lol. Power scrolls are about all the PvPers have. You gotta give them something. UO isn't a single player game.

Thing is, that to many it is PRECISELY time the MOST VALUABLE commodity....

A whole lot of people have a life pretty much leaving short free time and they therefore want their free, LIMITED time to be well spent towards their entertainment, not towards increasing their stress already coming from real life...

At least, to my understanding....

popps said:

Captain_Lucky said:

My brief comment about UO not being for the timid seems to had an effect on you. You mentioned it several times. One simply can't be overly sensitive in UO. Everyone dies and when we do we have insurance. All you've lost is some time. The whole point of the game is killing time lol. Power scrolls are about all the PvPers have. You gotta give them something. UO isn't a single player game.

Thing is, that to many it is PRECISELY time the MOST VALUABLE commodity....

A whole lot of people have a life pretty much leaving short free time and they therefore want their free, LIMITED time to be well spent towards their entertainment, not towards increasing their stress already coming from real life...

At least, to my understanding....

If your playing the game like an office I couldn't deal with that. 8:15 do champ spawn. 9:15 to 9:25 meet with guild mates. 9:25 to 10:30 mining. What kinda game is that lol? Just go with the flow and enjoy it. If your life is that packed up on time I don't think video games are for you lol. Making the game super easy cause people just want to play an hour a day is called Facebook Gameroom. Making the game work around people that can only play 2 hours every other day would be a really big mistake. Not to mention impossible to revamp the whole system. I have 24/7 to play if I wish. That would give me a huge advantage. It's not the finish line, it's the journey. What is it in the last 20 YEARS have you not been able to fit in? lol The game over all is fine. Your not going to make 100% of the people happy regardless. There's things I really hate about the game (castle customization *cough*) but you deal with it. I don't ignore the 1000s of things I love about UO to focus on the couple I don't agree with.

Food is essential to life... yet I wonder how many people in this discussion grow all of their own food.

Most people are very accustomed to finding an area of work which makes a profit for them and using that profit to purchase other items.  This applies to us in our real life and is quite applicable to the discussion about power scrolls only being available in Fel.  There is nothing wrong with certain content and drops being limited to certain play styles or risk areas. 

Champ spawns are fun and several of them exist in the Tram ruleset for those that wish to enjoy them for the fun of defeating them.  No one can prevent you from having fun doing those spawns.  If you wish to do spawns for fun and have the added reward of power scrolls you need to be willing to accept the risk associated with them.  As others have pointed out in this thread there are several successful strategies to mitigate the risk.

Merus said:

Food is essential to life... yet I wonder how many people in this discussion grow all of their own food.

Most people are very accustomed to finding an area of work which makes a profit for them and using that profit to purchase other items.  This applies to us in our real life and is quite applicable to the discussion about power scrolls only being available in Fel.  There is nothing wrong with certain content and drops being limited to certain play styles or risk areas. 

Champ spawns are fun and several of them exist in the Tram ruleset for those that wish to enjoy them for the fun of defeating them.  No one can prevent you from having fun doing those spawns.  If you wish to do spawns for fun and have the added reward of power scrolls you need to be willing to accept the risk associated with them.  As others have pointed out in this thread there are several successful strategies to mitigate the risk.

" There is nothing wrong with certain content and drops being limited to certain play styles or risk areas. "

Oh yes that there is a whole LOT of wrong in that, at least to my viewing....

The wrong starts, as I see it, when that "certain" content is made available in a way that promoted Monopolies which are controlled only by a few players which, therefore, can pretty much ask whatever they want for that content....

And that causes the rest of the players to then have to engage into boring, repetitive and ENORMOUSLY time consuming "grinding" in order to put together the in-game gold necessary to afford that content which those few players holding that Monopoly can, instead, make in minutes, thanking to their Monopoly....

So, players get split into a few who get an enormous in-game wealth in very little time and a very large number of other players who, instead, struggle spending countless of their time in boring, repetive gameplay in order to only afford a few of those absurdedly uber priced items...

Frankly, at least personally, I cannot see how such a recipe might not be leading to the demise of whatever game based on it considering how it might be eventually deterring to many players to want to keep play that given game....

Monopolies, to  my viewing, are bad, in real life as well as in games and all efforts from the Developers should, to my opinion, be intended at BREAKING them Monopolies so as to ensure healthy and beneficial competition to REDUCE prices, not to get them artificially inflated....

Lady_Storm said:

We understand a player might find fault with things as they are, The game has changed so to do players. I find 1 month not long enough to get back into the swing of the hard gaming he lists as his forte in game.  I have no doubt he is mad.. but to come and dump all on the players of the forum is not right.  May I ask this be locked up. To save the others the hurt filled message meant to drag up feeling that might change others minds erroroniously 

I second this, +1.

Arron said:

I have actually been toying with the idea of creating a corporation or group of guilds that will help Blue players who wish to  work the fel champ spawns. I actually know a couple of great pvp'ers that are not red and do not grief other players. I will have to give it some more thought. Sort of like protectors of Tram.

I thought this is already available, i.e. justice + protection, etc, but maybe not for someone who wants to play solo and asking for power scrolls in Trammel ruleset. They are not asking how to do this now, but to modify the server rules to meet their own needs.

I think it's time to end this before it becomes anymore toxic.