Not enough Raiders in Trion Rift - Raids nerfed 50% ???

[justinhalfout]

I really, really wish people would just stop with saying this. In TBC Blizzard added improved gear you could buy from farming heroics as they added later tiers of raiding, and they allowed those same currencies to drop from raids too. Barriers to entry were progressively removed as TBC went on, by the time Sunwell was live you could get from fresh 60 to being ready for the Sunwell in under a month, even without having to work at it 24/7. You didn't even have to do much work rep grinding, my guild had tens of thousands of Aldor and Scryers rep tokens stashed away for new guys who needed the shoulder enchants.

Save for the first 6 or so months, TBC used the exact same raid and gearing models that WotLK, Cata and so on did.

I was referring more to the fact that many people had to guild hop their way up the ladder if they wanted to get anywhere,there were guilds perpetually stuck in T4 which is not unlike Rift now where some guilds are perpetually stuck in T1/2,maybe I should have worded it better.

You could argue Blizzard perhaps made it far too easy these days by nullifying past tiers and providing quick catchup options,but at the very least the grind required these days to catch up is minimal,they realized times have moved on and generally speaking people can't be arsed to grind their nuts off and let an mmo become akin to a second job,this "second job" in Rift is apparent and can be greatly nullified by reaching for your credit card.

As someone pointed out the main problem is the shrinking playerbase upon which the raiders can be drawn from,you don't win over new/returning players by underhandedly making Patron a requirement,by nickel/diming them to death,throwing up paywalls and rubbing their face into the store each time they login.

[thurizas]

So there are no catchup mechanics in Rift at all other than buying gear off the store? If you buy the game and all the expansions, you have to clear all previous raids to gear up for the current content raids? Forgive me, Ive never played Rift.

There are catch-up mechanism, although they are a bit of a grind. I'll use my main in Rift, Golyr, as an example. I haven't raiding with him in either Storm Legion or Nightmare Tides. Yet he is probably raid ready, and not a penny was spend on the cash store. I am currently setting between tier two and tier three geared; yes I had to do weeks on end of weekly quests as well as lots of PvP. All in all, it took me 3-4 months of going from quest blues and greens to where I am now.

BTW, this is with no guild helping....well, I am in a guild with my wife and we are the only two members in the guild; so I have the guild perks for bonus currency etc, but no group of people that I can use to help run stuff with.

Now, is 3-4 months too long, probably, but then the day or two in WoW to go from fresh 100 to (heroic?) Hell Fire Citadel is probably way to short.

Probably the biggest problem with Rift, and it marketing scheme, is best summarized by the following quote I say in general a few months back "I've been playing for three years and have not bought anything from the store". Technically, here is someone who has gotten three years of enjoyment from the game but has done nothing to support the developer over those three years. With attitudes like this, I am not surprised that more things are getting moved behind 'pay-walls' or becoming patron only.

N.B. For full disclosure, I am a patron, and have been since before Rift was launched (actually back then, we were called 'founders').

[Lathais]

As someone pointed out the main problem is the shrinking playerbase upon which the raiders can be drawn from,you don't win over new/returning players by underhandedly making Patron a requirement,by nickel/diming them to death,throwing up paywalls and rubbing their face into the store each time they login.

I was considering returning to Rift, I had not played at all in NT. I've been playing a bit and got some items either as drops or quest rewards i can not even equip. Earrings and items that require Planeswalker:Water. I go to look and see that I must buy these things. I can not simply sub and have access to them I do not think, I have to pay additional on top of a sub for them it appears. Please correct me if i am wrong, but this is a huge turn-off for me and has me considering uninstalling it again.

[thurizas]

I was considering returning to Rift, I had not played at all in NT. I've been playing a bit and got some items either as drops or quest rewards i can not even equip. Earrings and items that require Planeswalker:Water. I go to look and see that I must buy these things. I can not simply sub and have access to them I do not think, I have to pay additional on top of a sub for them it appears. Please correct me if i am wrong, but this is a huge turn-off for me and has me considering uninstalling it again.

Yep, you are correct. Earrings and Pt:W items require an unlock.

Now, as a patron I don't recall having to pay to unlock them (I might have had to do an achievement or something of Pt:W; not sure. I can't speak for someone who is just playing for free, although from the discussions on the forums you may have to pay to unlock them.

That being said, I think throughout my entire leveling process I saw one two item requiring Pt:W. I don't think anything from dungeon, expert dungeon or raids require Pt:W; and all of those items are available through in-game means (i.e. no need to spend cash at the store).

With the ear-rings, you don't need them for any content except raids, really. If you aren't raiding you really don't need ear-rings to be competive in open-world events. yes they are helpful, but lacking them will not stop you from completing events etc.

[Lathais]

Yep, you are correct. Earrings and Pt:W items require an unlock.

Now, as a patron I don't recall having to pay to unlock them (I might have had to do an achievement or something of Pt:W; not sure. I can't speak for someone who is just playing for free, although from the discussions on the forums you may have to pay to unlock them.

That being said, I think throughout my entire leveling process I saw one two item requiring Pt:W. I don't think anything from dungeon, expert dungeon or raids require Pt:W; and all of those items are available through in-game means (i.e. no need to spend cash at the store).

With the ear-rings, you don't need them for any content except raids, really. If you aren't raiding you really don't need ear-rings to be competive in open-world events. yes they are helpful, but lacking them will not stop you from completing events etc.

I've only done Goboro Reef so far and I've already seen 3 items requiring Pt:W. As for earrings, well yeah, I'd kinda need those as I play pretty much exclusively to raid. If I were to keep playing, that would be the reason, so that I could raid. I used to be a Class Leader and Raid Leader in my old guild. Speaking of my old guild, and pretty much everyone on my friends list, I have not seen any of them on at all the past couple days while I have been questing in Goboro.

[Edge-]

Yep, you are correct. Earrings and Pt:W items require an unlock.

Now, as a patron I don't recall having to pay to unlock them (I might have had to do an achievement or something of Pt:W; not sure. I can't speak for someone who is just playing for free, although from the discussions on the forums you may have to pay to unlock them.

You have to buy them, even as a patron. If you bought any one of the NT bundles they came as part of it, so that may be where it came from.

That being said, I think throughout my entire leveling process I saw one two item requiring Pt:W. I don't think anything from dungeon, expert dungeon or raids require Pt:W; and all of those items are available through in-game means (i.e. no need to spend cash at the store).

There are more than a few quest rewards in the first few zones alone that require PW:W, one of which being one of the first few rewards you receive from a quest. There are plenty of drops that require PW:W from dungeons/experts (can't speak to raids), it's a relatively small number of pieces compared to the total number of drops, but some of them are pretty important pieces of gear depending on what your current gear is.

With the ear-rings, you don't need them for any content except raids, really. If you aren't raiding you really don't need ear-rings to be competive in open-world events. yes they are helpful, but lacking them will not stop you from completing events etc.

Not having them makes it a big pain in the ass to get into experts, as the stats they provide are pretty significant. I know I had to spend far more time/money tweaking gear/enchants to get enough int to get into experts on my mage than I would have had to if I'd had access to earring slots when I hit level cap and was farming dungeons (of which there was really only one max level dungeon that provided decent gear and there weren't the drops from the raid IA to help fill in slots yet).

[theWocky]

There are catch-up mechanism, although they are a bit of a grind.

A "bit" ? Yeah, that's a bit of a friggin' understatement. There is no realistic, non-grindy catch-up mechanism.

All in all, it took me 3-4 months of going from quest blues and greens to where I am now.

That time is irrevelant. Is it "played" time or every night? Either way, that is excessive. You sound like someone who plays every night. That would make you a hardcore player. Yes, believe it or not, people who log on every day and do dimensions or world events and never set foot in a raid are actually "hardcore" players.
The fact that you're a patron and never subbed re-inforces this assumption.

Also, you're in T2 and T3 without a guild? Unless you had help, were carried, I call bullshit. You were talking 3~4 months actual in-game-time then? There are level caps on gear marks, so you can't get more than one piece every three to four weeks or so - unless you're a "whale" and opened your wallet.

If the grind is beyond a casual raider's time schedule - ie 2~3 times per week for a few hours, raid guilds will fold, people will leave. This is exactly what's happening.

Now, is 3-4 months too long, probably, but then the day or two in WoW to go from fresh 100 to (heroic?) Hell Fire Citadel is probably way to short.

That is nonsense and shows you've never set foot in Warcraft. All except the most dedicated are going to power-grind in a hardcore, no-sleep session.

I just started WoW again, taking it casual, leveling up and I'm doing a level or two a night at level 90~92
Leveling from 1-90 was a breeze because they gave me a free boost to 90. This is what companies do to entice players to catch up quickly when their game is slowing down. They also upgraded ALL my accounts to Warlords of Draenor.

With this generous gesture, I immediately subbed for a month - and I'm still subbed to Wildstar.

N.B. For full disclosure, I am a patron, and have been since before Rift was launched (actually back then, we were called 'founders').

The sole issue with Trion is they are so blinded by their friggin' cash shop that they fail to follow WoW's (and many other MMO's) example of making the latest content readily accessible. They also don't encourage playing together - opting for people to rather "buy" what they need.

Trions games are B2P, P2P, and F2P with microtransactions. Spending over US$200 for a new player to have "everything" for a game with sub-par PvE (used to be better) content is ridiculous. Yes, you don't "need" everything, but other games give more for far, far less. Eg. Secret World was recently on promo for only US$25 dollars to catchup all episodes - most of this is voice-acted cinematic quests. GW2 is only a once-off US$50.

[thurizas]

A "bit" ? Yeah, that's a bit of a friggin' understatement. There is no realistic, non-grindy catch-up mechanism.


That time is irrevelant. Is it "played" time or every night? Either way, that is excessive. You sound like someone who plays every night. That would make you a hardcore player. Yes, believe it or not, people who log on every day and do dimensions or world events and never set foot in a raid are actually "hardcore" players.
The fact that you're a patron and never subbed re-inforces this assumption.

Yes, I do play a few hours on most nights. I probably average 2 hours or so a night, excepting weekends when my play time does go up. That time is
spend the various weekly quests and PvP. Also, I'm not quite sure how you are differentiating a 'patron' and someone who has 'subbed"

Also, you're in T2 and T3 without a guild? Unless you had help, were carried, I call bullshit. You were talking 3~4 months actual in-game-time then? There are level caps on gear marks, so you can't get more than one piece every three to four weeks or so - unless you're a "whale" and opened your wallet.

If the grind is beyond a casual raider's time schedule - ie 2~3 times per week for a few hours, raid guilds will fold, people will leave. This is exactly what's happening.

It is possible, though it does take some planning and dedication. For example, I would insure that I did a random chronicle everyday that I logged on (granted that I would solo queue, I constantly got "Shadow from Beyond"....gods I am so sick of that chronicle, could run it in my sleep).

I also insure that on the days that I log that I win at least one random war-front. Most times, I try to keep my random war-front charges as low as I can. So for example, I was not able to play Sunday or Monday (preping for a final in Number Theory), will not be able to play tonight (the final is tonight) and will not be able to play on Wednesday (day my WoW raid runs), so on Thursday I will be chain queueing for war-fronts till I am able to win 4 or 5 random war-fronts.

Also, I had a stash of token-tables left over form various sources (I bought none), so I would hold all the weekly quests till I had them all done, used a token table and then turn in the quests. That way I have been able to hit the weekly cap on void stones, abyssal crusaders marks and fragements of madness (I think that is the correct T2 currency) several weeks in a row.

By doing that I was able to get a piece of the main pieces of T2 gear -- Head, chest, etc -- about every other week (the go for roughly 23000 FoM) At the same time I was grinding fragments of darkness (I think that is the correct T3 currency), hitting around half of the weekly cap (i.e. 2200-2700), which in three weeks time would get me one of the cheaper items -- hands, belt, boots -- each of which is 7K.

Also, remember that I was hitting PvP fairly hard, so I was getting the various PvP rewards which give items for slots that you can't get through the store (i.e. back, neck, earrings, rings and trinket -- though I am still waiting for a DPS trinket to drop, got a healer one). Upgrading the PvP items to 'warmonger' will give you T2 equivalent stuff. For example according to (http://db.riftscene.com/database/wei...tor/rogue_dps/) this cape (http://db.riftscene.com/database/ite...ongers-shroud/) is still fourth best.

So, it is possible, it just takes a bit of planning and dedication to what you are attempting to do.

While I do keep a stash of credits, I have not purchased gear for my main spec from the store. I use the credits mainly for
(a) clearing the soul-walk cool-down when I screw up and pull to much at one time
(b) buying crafting items (i.e. elastic thread) from the store to slowly build loyalty
(c) convince items -- like larger bank vaults, extra bag slots, extra bank vaults.

That is nonsense and shows you've never set foot in Warcraft. All except the most dedicated are going to power-grind in a hardcore, no-sleep session.

I just started WoW again, taking it casual, leveling up and I'm doing a level or two a night at level 90~92
Leveling from 1-90 was a breeze because they gave me a free boost to 90. This is what companies do to entice players to catch up quickly when their game is slowing down. They also upgraded ALL my accounts to Warlords of Draenor.

With this generous gesture, I immediately subbed for a month - and I'm still subbed to Wildstar.

That is your opinion and you are welcome to it. However, for the record, I have had an active subscription to WoW since 31Mar2005 (probably way to long...but that is another story). I have been a raid leader, main tank for a progression guild (which I don't do any more), and a guild leader since 2008.
If you are interested, you can look at my main WoW toon here - http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...olgarax/simple. N.B. I know many here will comment that I haven't cleared heroic HFC yet...still have plenty of time to do so prior to the patch, and dropping down to a very causal raiding schedule (3 hours a week, outside of the core 5-7 people, rarely the same group from one week to the next, rarely more then 15 in any raid, so mythic is not on our horizon due to be a fixed size of 20).

My comment on a day or two, was how long it seems to take these days going from fresh 100, in roughly 590-600 item level gear to having 695+ gear. Once you hit 100, head to Tanaan jungle and grind on mobs there, you will get tokens like: http://www.wowhead.com/item=124552/baleful-treads, these tokens have a chance to drop from any mob in Tanaan Jungle (or purchased with apexis crystals) and yield 650 items, which can be upgraded to 695 items, which can then be upgraded with valor points to 705 items (for a point of reference normal heroic gear is 710-ish).

And my opinion is that only taking 2 days of effort to go from quest greens and blues to gear equivalent to last-tier heroic is way to short. By the same token, the grind I did in Rift to get where I am currently at was probably to long.

[StrawberryZebra]

Yes, I do play a few hours on most nights. I probably average 2 hours or so a night, excepting weekends when my play time does go up.

Assuming you play twice as much at the weekend, not an unreasonable assumption I hope, you're looking at playing for around 22 hours a week. In a previous post you said;

All in all, it took me 3-4 months of going from quest blues and greens to where I am now.

Going with the upper end of your estimate at 4 months thats a staggering 352 hours from fresh 65 to being raid ready.

And my opinion is that only taking 2 days of effort to go from quest greens and blues to gear equivalent to last-tier heroic is way to short. By the same token, the grind I did in Rift to get where I am currently at was probably to long.

I've never understood the objections to short gearing cycles. By the time you get to max level, in any MMO, you should have a firm grip on the basics of your class. You should already know your DPS priorites and rotations, you should know how to interrupt, avoid bad stuff and where appropriate tank and/or heal. There should be no need for a longer "advanced tutorial" period where you're gearing up, the best way to teach people what they're missing is to throw them in and the deep end. Its the only place where its relevent information to know anyway.

I know people are fond of claiming that Rift is the exception to this because you've got a vast selection of souls and raid specs to choose and you need to know how to play them all if you want to be successful as a raider. Given how my Mage had hot bars and macros full of functionally identical abilities in pretty much every soul I tried it seems to me that Rift suffers from quite simply having too damn many different souls and abilities contained within them. If your "advanced tutorial" period is going to take over 350 hours then I'd expect it to contain far more depth than Trion have given Rift.

[russykh]

My comment on a day or two, was how long it seems to take these days going from fresh 100, in roughly 590-600 item level gear to having 695+ gear. Once you hit 100, head to Tanaan jungle and grind on mobs there, you will get tokens like: http://www.wowhead.com/item=124552/baleful-treads, these tokens have a chance to drop from any mob in Tanaan Jungle (or purchased with apexis crystals) and yield 650 items, which can be upgraded to 695 items, which can then be upgraded with valor points to 705 items (for a point of reference normal heroic gear is 710-ish).

And my opinion is that only taking 2 days of effort to go from quest greens and blues to gear equivalent to last-tier heroic is way to short. By the same token, the grind I did in Rift to get where I am currently at was probably to long.

You're not going to get a full set of 695 gear from Tanaan in a couple of days. Yes, you can grind for tokens, but unless you get lucky you'll likely not going to get a full set of them in a couple of days. It's possible, but you'd have to be very lucky. Unless you know a way I dont, you arent going to be able to upgrade them all in a couple of days as you'd need an absurd amount of apexis crystals (20000 per item) and you simply dont gain them nearly quickly enough. I also dont think it's possible to get enough valor in a week to upgrade all of your items, but the amount of dungeons you'd need to run, you wouldnt have time after all your grinding for gear tokens and apexis for upgrades. You certainly arent going to be around the 700 ilvl mark after 2 days.

[Lathais]

Yes, I do play a few hours on most nights. I probably average 2 hours or so a night, excepting weekends when my play time does go up. That time is spend the various weekly quests and PvP.

3-4 months of playing that much? Yeah, I think i am just gonna uninstall.That is WAY too much. Here's a typical day for me:

6AM, get up, get ready, wake daughter up, get her ready, get her to school, go to work, get out of work sometime between 5-6PM. Go home, eat dinner with family, spend some time with daughter before getting her bath ready and then getting her in bed. By the time all that is done it's 8PM. At that point, gotta take care of anything the wife needs me to do and then maybe watch some TV or spend some time doung something with her. Usually around 9PM I have some time for gaming, but I gotta get up at 6AM, so if I have an hour I'm lucky.

Weekends? Good luck having time to play. Got to go to work at my second job and any spare time I have I like to spend with my daughter or my wife's family is so large there is almost always someones birthday or something going on. If I have some time to myself, that's yard work and other home maintenance task time. I probably have less time on the weekends than I do during the week.

So if it took you 3-4 months, I'm looking at at least 8, probably closer to a year. Better to just uninstall I think. Must be nice to have all that free time though.

[theWocky]

Also, I'm not quite sure how you are differentiating a 'patron' and someone who has 'subbed"

It's a typo.

It's meant to read "the fact that you're a patron (since day one) and never unsubbed re-enforces this assumption (that you are probably hardcore)

- - - Updated - - -

Yes, I do play a few hours on most nights. I probably average 2 hours or so a night, excepting weekends when my play time does go up. That time is spend the various weekly quests and PvP.

So, you're a hardcore player.

- - - Updated - - -

though it does take some planning and dedication. For example, I would insure that I did a random chronicle everyday that I logged on (granted that I would solo queue, I constantly got "Shadow from Beyond"....gods I am so sick of that chronicle, could run it in my sleep).

Yup, you're a hardcore player - and since we're picking at spelling, it's "ensure", not "insure"

So, yeah - 4 months of game-play time using 160% + 40% patron boost... not grindy at all.

~ and people wonder why raid guilds can't keep players. Rift is worse than Wildstar on friggin' release at the moment. Worse than any attunement in WoW - ever.

...Once you hit 100, head to Tanaan jungle...

The tokens in Tanaan Jungle are the "catch-up" mechanism like MoP had that island. Rift doesn't have one.

Rift's solution is to buy boxes with gear, subscribe to the game to get latest tier loot in a box each month or just buy gear with stats off the store.

Tanaan jungle was not in at release. This is the whole point of our discussion - or did you forget what we were talking about?

This is why Trion are desperately trying to provide a very messy mechanism by nerfing all the raids 50% - and driving more people away than bringing them to the game as the existing raiders feel cheated.

Most raiders would probably agree with me that they want more people to clear T3 is to put T4 raid out and the T3 gear on the cash shop.
There was already an outcry when they tried to make the new 10 man a T4 raid.

Off topic - Another really funny thing?

People were linking Steam Charts regarding Rift's decline on twitter and forums and suddenly a week or so ago, active players bumped up about 100 players on steam. Also, suddenly, dozens of "Hi, I'm a new player who used to play coming back" appeared on the forums.

More funny thing? The dates on the time joined and first post is all out. Dates from Jan/Feb 2011 with one (1) post as well as others that are "new players returning" with first post on forums in April 2016. So, multiple people who never posted on forums since 2011 suddenly decide to make their first post?

Could the company be that desperate they are creating fictitious accounts? Could be the carnival event, but I have to ask "why" during the biggest give-away in the history of Rift (or any MMO for that matter) in March did the numbers decline during that month, but a boring carnival brings new players?

I think not. /tinfoilhat

[Lathais]

The jungle was not in at release.

This is the whole point of our discussion - or did you forget what we were talking about?

Yeah, that's exactly what I am talking about. I stopped playing during SL. I am just re-installed the game last week to check out the new stuff and want to get back in to raiding. Other than opening up my wallet and spending much more than the cost of an expansion+sub, like I would have to with WoW, my only choice is spending what sounds like it would take me about a year to catch up on. I have not played WoW since the end of MoP, but I am thinking of going that route instead of Rift because from the sounds of it, after leveling to max, I could be raiding in about a week, instead of about a year.

[theWocky]

Yeah, that's exactly what I am talking about. I stopped playing during SL. I am just re-installed the game last week to check out the new stuff and want to get back in to raiding. Other than opening up my wallet and spending much more than the cost of an expansion+sub, like I would have to with WoW, my only choice is spending what sounds like it would take me about a year to catch up on. I have not played WoW since the end of MoP, but I am thinking of going that route instead of Rift because from the sounds of it, after leveling to max, I could be raiding in about a week, instead of about a year.

For WoW, I just had to pay 15 bucks. All my WoW accounts were upgraded FREE to WoD and I even got a level 90 boost! - don't know when, but it was enough of a gesture for me to sub.

Go check - sure it's for everyone!

[Edge-]

I think not. /tinfoilhat

Yeah, let's not go down that road at all. This thread is barely staying open as it is since it started off leaning towards game bashing rather than actual discussion, so if you want to keep it open let's not take things any further.

[Lathais]

For WoW, I just had to pay 15 bucks. All my WoW accounts were upgraded FREE to WoD and I even got a level 90 boost! - don't know when, but it was enough of a gesture for me to sub.

Go check - sure it's for everyone!

Not sure what I would do with the level 90 boost TBH though. IIRC that was the cap at the end of MoP right? I am pretty sure I already have at least 3 classes at 90 because when I picked it back up I leveled my 'lock, Shaman and DK to 90, possibly my Paladin too. I guess I could try another class, far easier than I could in Rift. Though in Rift I have my Rouge and Mage at 60, well, Mage is 62 now, and my Cleric in the 40s.

[Lathais]

Yeah, let's not go down that road at all. This thread is barely staying open as it is since it started off leaning towards game bashing rather than actual discussion, so if you want to keep it open let's not take things any further.

Sorry, did not mean to be bashing, just looking for a game to call home again.

FFXIV just has way too much for me to do, since if i can max something on one char, I feel compelled to, that's far too much there, lol.

Rift seems like it will just take far too long or far too much money to get back in to it again, so not sure there either. I did have a lot of fun in Chocolate and early SL though, so thought it was worth looking in to. From what I am reading here though, it appears not.

[Eleccybubb]

Sorry, did not mean to be bashing, just looking for a game to call home again.

FFXIV just has way too much for me to do, since if i can max something on one char, I feel compelled to, that's far too much there, lol.

Rift seems like it will just take far too long or far too much money to get back in to it again, so not sure there either. I did have a lot of fun in Chocolate and early SL though, so thought it was worth looking in to. From what I am reading here though, it appears not.

Off topic a bit but try mixing 2 MMO's. I do FF14 and Gw2 because there is something to do in both but I don't feel inclined to rush. On the side I play a bit of Everquest 2 and yes people still play it :O

[Brasse]

Hehe, you can put all tinfoil hats away.
None of us at Trion have the TIME, never mind the inclination, to make fake accounts to impersonate new players.
What we are experiencing is, in fact, an actual influx of new (and returning) players. While it may be a terrible blow to those who keep saying the game is dyng, it's great to see these new folks on forums and in chat within the game. Even better is the amount of excellent advice other players offer in response to all the questions. Makes me proud to be in RIFT.

But wait, WUT? Raids nerfed 50%? That wasn't in any of our patch notes, heh. Somehow I doubt it.
In any case, Dev is tinkering with raids, as one does when content is a tad too rough or too much of a cakewalk.

RIFT is a game that works hard to cater to an incredibly varied audience; casual collectors, dimension designers, adventurers and hard core raiders have very different outlooks on what's desired and what's acceptable in game. Dev has their work cut out for them in trying to look after everyone's needs. =)
It is definitely as deep and as hard core as one wants to make it as a player.

As far as monetization goes, it's another constant balancing act to keep RIFT alive and healthy. It is both at the moment, and we continue to work to keep it that way. We are always, and I mean ALWAYS taking player feedback and suggestions into account, even when we can't make everyone happy all of the time.
We offer content for sale at many different levels and players chose whether or not it is important to their gameplay. We reinvest that money in the people who make the game and in future content. It's pretty straightforward as a business model, and not that different from a restaurant or shoe manufacturer.

First time poster here, but hey, I am not made up either - Mods, feel free to drop me a line to verify identity if needed. =)

Brasse
(Linda Carlson, Director of Community, Trion Worlds)

[Lathais]

Hehe, you can put all tinfoil hats away.
None of us at Trion have the TIME, never mind the inclination, to make fake accounts to impersonate new players.
What we are experiencing is, in fact, an actual influx of new (and returning) players. While it may be a terrible blow to those who keep saying the game is dyng, it's great to see these new folks on forums and in chat within the game. Even better is the amount of excellent advice other players offer in response to all the questions. Makes me proud to be in RIFT.

But wait, WUT? Raids nerfed 50%? That wasn't in any of our patch notes, heh. Somehow I doubt it.
In any case, Dev is tinkering with raids, as one does when content is a tad too rough or too much of a cakewalk.

RIFT is a game that works hard to cater to an incredibly varied audience; casual collectors, dimension designers, adventurers and hard core raiders have very different outlooks on what's desired and what's acceptable in game. Dev has their work cut out for them in trying to look after everyone's needs. =)
It is definitely as deep and as hard core as one wants to make it as a player.

As far as monetization goes, it's another constant balancing act to keep RIFT alive and healthy. It is both at the moment, and we continue to work to keep it that way. We are always, and I mean ALWAYS taking player feedback and suggestions into account, even when we can't make everyone happy all of the time.
We offer content for sale at many different levels and players chose whether or not it is important to their gameplay. We reinvest that money in the people who make the game and in future content. It's pretty straightforward as a business model, and not that different from a restaurant or shoe manufacturer.

First time poster here, but hey, I am not made up either - Mods, feel free to drop me a line to verify identity if needed. =)

Brasse
(Linda Carlson, Director of Community, Trion Worlds)

Personally, I do not doubt the influx of new/returning players. I mean, after all, I myself have "returned" since I did in-fact re-insall the game and play a bit over the past week. Part of the reason I did that was a RL friend of mine, who remembered me talking fondly of Rift in the past decided to give it a shot. Now I know that sample size is by no means large enough to make a overall statement of growth, but if I returned, it's likely others will be as well. However, the grind/cash needed to get back into it all seems a bit much. My one complaint about your sub model always has been if I sub, I should have access to everything outside additional cosmetics for as long as I am subbed. Your Patron status makes no real sense to me at all as it seems to give nothing I need or want at all really. If there was a way to sub and have access to everything, even if I lost it when I dropped my sub, I would likely sub up again and continue to play. It also seems a bit ridiculous that at log in, I have 2 different daily login rewards?!? Just one players perspective, but nice to see someone from Trion here on these forums. Last time I remember seeing that was when Elrar was still with you.