AION Classic roadmap and the fast update schedule

While it is sad it is not so surprising, since originally 2.5 was the patch Gameforge wanted to start with and just customised some version of it due to player feedback. Atleast that is how I remember it vaguely from discord and the poll on this board.

I am going to stop playing the latest at patch 2.7 Revenant. Given they manage to fix their server issues before that. Ruining open world with random loot boxes and introducing new classes was exactly how retail started its downfall contentwise. For me it did not really matter whether Aion Classic was going to be 1.x (level 50) or 2.x (level 55), but appart from fixing bugs, offering broader content and adding quality of life features, I do not see the point of two different Aion retails steadily increasing levels, invalidating previous gear and reusing former broken content. Been there, done that.

Yet I also see it positively. Gameforge/NcSoft enabled me to play some kind of Aion Classic again in which I had fun and they both see to it that I am not going to stick with it for too long.

You have played Aion Classic for over one month, please take a break.

Hello everyone!

Today gameforge managers share one of the most important things for this year: the 2023 roadmap, and I really feel like I need to share my thoughts and ideas regarding it.

First of all, I want to say thank you Nyoka, for sharing the company's future plans and proposing to us (players) to discuss them!

Basically, what I want to discuss is rapid updates to 2.0-2.4-2.5 during this year.

Aion is a great game, and 1.9 patch is one of its best versions. Just take a look at two fully fulfilled servers with 200k characters created! This is amazing! I would call this a great result for such a tiny period of time.

So, my question is, do we need to deliver new patches as soon as possible?

Did we already enjoy and get bored from 1.9 content?

How many players have top gear?

Do we consider the fact that 2.* patches will kill Abyss gameplay and so called low-level players?

Maybe, we should postpone these updates, or open a separate server with free transfer for all, who wants to play on a different version?

Please, share your thoughts about it! It is really important to give feedback, that’s what Nyoka and Gameforge management need to make the right decisions!

Edit by Isobel: As a similar topic already exists, I fused both of them

Would be cool to have survey for that (as in to see if ppl like or dislike the roadmap)

i totally agree to level cap 55. since most of classes are not full powered without 55 stigmas ,skills and other stuff. air pvp in reshanta is garbage for melee classes. so pushing to lands is the greatest move.
But i disagree to do it so fast ,not because the patch is cool ,because of lags and non-stable server. if you will push patch with this state where is server now thaaaat will be a disaster for you and players.By the way you already lost 10-20% players base. and if you wont work harded on resolving this problem as fast as possible you will loose another 10-20%.

Quote from TellMeMore

i totally agree to level cap 55. since most of classes are not full powered without 55 stigmas ,skills and other stuff. air pvp in reshanta is garbage for melee classes. so pushing to lands is the greatest move.
But i disagree to do it so fast ,not because the patch is cool ,because of lags and non-stable server. if you will push patch with this state where is server now thaaaat will be a disaster for you and players.By the way you already lost 10-20% players base. and if you wont work harded on resolving this problem as fast as possible you will loose another 10-20%.

What makes Aion 'unique' is aerial combat and the whole concept of Abyss. The switch to ground pvp and making Abyss obsolete is what killed the game (and more ofc). It made it no different to other mmos, that do it better.

Ok, the lvl 55 balaurea patch is not THAT BAD but still it should be delayed. This roadmap will kill the classic servers so fast.

Quote from WizNick

Quote from TellMeMore

i totally agree to level cap 55. since most of classes are not full powered without 55 stigmas ,skills and other stuff. air pvp in reshanta is garbage for melee classes. so pushing to lands is the greatest move.
But i disagree to do it so fast ,not because the patch is cool ,because of lags and non-stable server. if you will push patch with this state where is server now thaaaat will be a disaster for you and players.By the way you already lost 10-20% players base. and if you wont work harded on resolving this problem as fast as possible you will loose another 10-20%.

What makes Aion 'unique' is aerial combat and the whole concept of Abyss. The switch to ground pvp and making Abyss obsolete is what killed the game (and more ofc). It made it no different to other mmos, that do it better.

Ok, the lvl 55 balaurea patch is not THAT BAD but still it should be delayed. This roadmap will kill the classic servers so fast.

again disagree.not ground pvp killed the game. OP classes killed the game and PvP gear for PvE killed game. you are so wrong in your mindset

Quote from WizNick

What makes Aion 'unique' is aerial combat and the whole concept of Abyss. The switch to ground pvp and making Abyss obsolete is what killed the game (and more ofc). It made it no different to other mmos, that do it better.

Ok, the lvl 55 balaurea patch is not THAT BAD but still it should be delayed. This roadmap will kill the classic servers so fast.

I'm sorry but nobody who is into PvP likes abyss or flight PvP. Its buggy, requires stupid flight pots and EXTREMELY unfair. You cannot say what killed the game as a fact, thats just your opinion. Adding new bs infinite gearing (+accs, +25 gear, plumes, stigmas+ etc.) and p2w in order to compete is what killed the game imo.

I for one think 2.0 can't come fast enough. It is the vastly superior patch to 1.9 for PvP.. Starting with 1.9 was just for nostalgia reasons. Gelk, Inggi and SC are much better than the stupid flight pvp in abyss or camping DC entrance in Heiron with 100 people alliance and then calling that "pvp".

Someone mentioned he knows a lot of people who play just because its 1.9 and level cap is 50.. well I know a lot who hate this cap and want 55.. We are all talking out of our behinds here on forums.

Best thing to do is give us an INGAME poll/survey whether people want fast updates or not.

Flying and the wings in general always been a marketing features in fact most of people prefer fight on the ground because its definitly more fair and intresting. Even if I like 2.0, reading the roadmap really decrease my motivation to play specially for endgame PVE, the interest of farming DP specially on asmo side where blue balaur scale are really expensive when you know Beshmundir Temple will be release in few weeks make praticly no sense for me...

Do you people forget that 2.0 was just a zergfest outside Gelkmaros/Ingisson forts?

I think the road map describes how Gameforge after years still don't understand Aion and the community of it. People want to have endgear (and I don't even think about 50 AP gear) and with this roadmap only a few will have it before level 55.

They should push a lot of drop and AP events the next not even two months so that people can at least go in the next patch with the anuhart gear and the extends.

Also nice distraction from the DDoS attacks...

Quote from Protecc

I for one think 2.0 can't come fast enough. It is the vastly superior patch to 1.9 for PvP.. Starting with 1.9 was just for nostalgia reasons. Gelk, Inggi and SC are much better than the stupid flight pvp in abyss or camping DC entrance in Heiron with 100 people alliance and then calling that "pvp".

Hey Protecc or people that share such opinion

I was wondering why it is, that you require Inggison/Gelkmaros to enjoy ground PvP. Maybe you can elaborate on that?

My thoughts are, if one likes ground PvP one is already able to do so in Heiron/Beluslan at the end game level right now. Apart from the rifts usage limit, which can be increased, I fail to see any difference. Especially since sieges are just a PvE event now. Where is the difference from slaying questing players in Heiron to zering questing players in Inggison? Instead of camping the entrance of Draupnir Cave, players just camp entrances to each others Udas Temple or Silentera Canyon.

It's too fast for my taste the passage to level 50, knowing that with these lags we lose time and we can not play serenely, already they hold the server 1 month without any lag and we will see for an update future day, it is clear to me and my friends that if this update arrives too soon, we will leave the game, we are here to take advantage of lvl 50

Hello,

I added a poll in the first post as requested and changed the title of the thread.

~ Sparx ~

Waaaay too fast. Good grief.

Please don't kill the servers like NA Classic. Literally a ghost town.

Quote from WizNick

Do you people forget that 2.0 was just a zergfest outside Gelkmaros/Ingisson forts?

Because it's not already a zerg at Indratu caves etc in 1.9?

Update is too fast. Started playing 2-3 weeks ago and was about to buy my first PvP gear item, now considering to just wait untill 2.0 cause else all the gear is just obsolete. You are rendering the motivation to play to 0 with this fast release schedule. 2.0 should come around september or october. People are playing for nostalgia and not for going through all the content at a fast pace..

I did not read every post here so I dont know what was actually mentioned and what not. But here is my point of view:

1. This huge update just 3 months after game is released (where literally every previous content aka. Gear - is totally irelevant) is just demotivating me to play it anymore. Like what is the point for the next two months? So I am missing motivation for WHY should i farm Dark Poeta, Fenris/Miragent or any other endgame gear. When it gets useless and worthless in July.

2. Who was lucky enough to farm endgame gear already. Now he is not rewarded by actually enjoying it, playing PvP content with hard-earned gear for only two months during vacation-time summer. Asking question: Whats the point of working hard and farming this gear???

3. Most people on Tahabata server are casuals or newbies. Most of them is happy to finish Dark Poeta on rank A. I see people 48-49 lvl running Adma. Now you tell them that everything they do from this day on will be USELESS and WORTHLESS in just 2 months. Most lose motivation to even play it. Bigger half of playerbase will not be even able to kill Tahabata, which i see "a must" in 1.9

4. Giving everyone a free steel rake set and basically turning off Fenris/Miragent quest line (only contacting support can solve this) makes me think you planned it since the beginning. Question is, why you telling it now? In retrospect.

5. Personally I was grinding like mad past month , like mad. To get gear. What is left now? I am told its totally useless in 2 months. What I do now, well, demotivated, reduce my time playing this game, possibly quit.

Most of these points shared one logical thing - people wanna ENJOY their FARMED gear as a reward for their grind (wether it be pvp or pve)

I mean at this point both, geared and non geared players are mostly unhappy - both lack motivation to play.

Instead, delay it by 4 to 6 months at least. And I (and others) may consider farming Dark Poeta rank S, crafting endgame things and doing AP gear.

As I see it - the only motivation now is to totally ignore Dark Poeta - instead keep and farm kinahs for 2.0. And also totally ignore AP gear - just play with steel rake and keep AP. Demotivating

Quote from B3NK5

sorry if it seems I'm getting a bit upset right now, but how stupid is it please to upgrade the "Classic" server to the next level after only 3 months ?

It was stupid to launch it in this state to begin with.

Quote from B3NK5

We don't need new content

Speak for yourself.

Quote from B3NK5

there are only a handful of tribe groups that already have endcontent clear and on top of that there are the MASSIVE server problems that YOU can't get a handle on.... ... ... So the idea of you (Gameforge), how best to get the players to continue to play Aion CLASSIC... you push the content after only 3 (!!!) months to the next level... that's just ... .sorry but really ... stupid ...

The barrier of entry for DP-S is very low. You will need to farm DP-A and TL for a bit and then you can already search for a group on LFG and tackle it, and both DP-A and TL are reliably doable in random groups. You don't even have to enchant your DP-A gear for good Tahabata kills.

I don't know what kind of gear you want to try the highest content with, but aside from "a handful of groups" being plain wrong, everyone can do it in a matter of a few weeks if they actually try for once.

How long are we supposed to wait for the "slow" crowd? A year? Two years?

The game has already been figured out, and to many tourists' rough awakening, early Aion had next to no endgame content.

Quote from B3NK5

90% of the people where I know, play Classic, BECAUSE it is lvl 50 Cap ... but YOU know how to scare players away... I'm telling you, with the patch and lvl cap on 55 you will run away a lot of players... and yes I will be one of them... regret it already my Siels energy to have renewed... .

They will lift the level 50 cap someday. They have to. If your buddies only play because of the level 50 cap then they are dead men walking anyway, so why bother keeping this Frankenpatch for people who will leave anyway?

Better have an update rhythm for the players who stay for what's to come.

Quote from B3NK5

Too bad Gameforge ... Classic "could" have been really good, but you have once again set it in the sand... but since this thread expresses criticism, he will soon disappear anyway...

Classic could have been really good if GF didn't listen to people who always want to complain about something, no matter what it is, at least they have something to be upset with.

Because of this vocal minority we ended up with an unbalanced, and most importantly, unfun, Patch where the PvE side of progression is cleared in weeks while the PvP side is legitimately impossible due to bad balancing and heavy nerfing of pretty much everything.

Leaving this mess behind is the only good option in my opinion, to hopefully get back to how it's supposed to be ASAP, while ignoring nagging unsatisfyable individuals this time around who will whine and (hopefully) leave anyway.

This way they can at least preserve a decent enough experience without giving these individuals the chance to ruin the game for literally everyone in a desperate attempt of pleasing a small crowd of people who act like they're representing anyone other themselves.

Sooner or later we will catch up to Korea, and that's when updates will slow down eventually, and this can only happen if we don't linger on updates that are obviously tailored to people who don't bother thinking about the future of the game for a second, just as always.