State of the community, whats your opinion?

I think the best way for you to re-establish this is going to be to host your own runs and get other people to host runs with the "family/friends" mentality. The main reason things were like this in 2019 is because players were a lot weaker and needed larger expeditions to clear content.

The problem(s) with it is that although you describe it in a nicer way, its effectively some form of a charity run where stronger players are being taken advantage of in favor of weaker players, and this kind of thing goes against the flow of basic capitalism, where each person will naturally try to maximize the value they gain.

As long as you are willing to put in the effort to keep such runs or a group of runs going the sense of community you want will exist, but its an uphill battle and the moment you stop, things will regress to the way they currently are.

 

I think friendly parties still exist, you just have to find the right groups of people. For example 2 of my guildies regularly schedule 10-12 man HT runs consistently every week and the slots fill up instantly even with runners that are like 180+.

Generally I just tend to avoid sweatier crowds, of course I like running boss runs that are more profitable or with experienced runners but we all started somewhere.

As another shad main I also feel your pain on the "shad dpm is shit" meta that's ongoing. Honestly I just think people blow it out of proportion, shads are capable of dealing pretty good damage (shifter helps a lot) and with good gear and skills regularly outwhite other folks at certain bosses like Zak.

I've been lucky enough to find people who are willing to run with me despite me not being a NL / Sair with 4 mules and perfect weapons, casual bossers definitely exist but for most casual players they leave before they get to the higher bossing level. Survival of the fittest makes it so that really the only people left to run the biggest and best bosses are the people who like to optimize their gameplay and be efficient. There isn't anything wrong with that and honestly it's cool that they are willing to put in the time and effort to do so, but yeah like you said I do wish the casual bossing community was a bit bigger.

With HP challenges coming out eventually I am hoping this brings back many of my casual friends who quit at 150 because of lack of HP.

 

I think the main issue is the fact people, especially mid to end game have to fixate themselves onto two different routes (which can be applied together, but that means you're most likely playing "inefficient")

The first route is to chill, chat with the guildies and do some random runs with the friends, Zak/JC/Krex/NT on a daily basis which normally won't be major hour-investments in your non-pixel life.
This particular route means you're most likely not farming and making much coins / bank to get really good gear, which substantially means you're going to be playing as a lighter mid-game player, just enjoying the pixels in a way you didn't enjoy 15+ years ago cause of the high lvl anyway).
Maybe only attempting to do bigger bosses like HT or maybe PB on the weekend, if you allow yourself the sacrifice of hours of smashing buttons in one map.

The second route is to become the ultimate degen (not depending on timezone), farming every single daily boss for coins every single day in any way possible, do late game bosses as much as possible with the most efficiency and profitability possible such that you can afford that single coin just to get better gear just to get into the real end game of doing weekly PBs.

Most likely this second route will place you into a social circle of hardcore nerdy gamers that breathe pixels 5-6 hours a day every day.

 

As a brazilian guild leader basically since I started, I can tell I already invested long hours in "inefficient" runs. I used to take weaker people to my runs that I used to host and also used to bring all the mules needed for this happening. Also, in our guild there has always been a tradition of giving zak helmets/MoNs for our new members. Later, I realized all this effort was in vain, because most of those people I helped were ungrateful and never realized that. I'm sure that happened with A LOT of people that did the same. This is frustrating, but I keep doing all I can for my guildies nowadays.
I swear to the gods I already invested much more on keeping the brazilian community alive than on my own chars, and sometimes I hear "fael is toxic" here and there heheh

 

I believe in the cycle, at some point you carry it, at another you have already been carried it, maybe you carry it less, you are carried it more, or vice versa.

I think one point that cannot be ignored one point is that it lacks challenge, using NT for example, it's one of the most profitable places in the game if it's done in a few people. While HT/PB for most is a profitable thing but need x number of people

 

You are a silly weirdo but you’re my silly weirdo

 

Around the time I started, multi party scar, 2 party zak was a thing, and op4bish was alive and well. There's only 1-2 groups(?) that could clear HT. Not sure on the rest of the prices but items like zhelm and htp were 25m+x and 150m+y, x & y are for reloot. At another point in time, mw20, gen, meteor/blizzard, tt, and zerk were worth 750m/?/180m/180m/350m. Those prices were unadjusted to ws/cs inflation; bossing services were scarce and for the elite. People back then actually farmed things like gach, helm ints, helm dex, and the like on their NL mains. They were also a source of common gach (hello vote abuse) unobtainable by the elites of the time which allowed for some circularity within the system. Even now, these methods while no longer meta, are still very profitable.

What ruined the dynamic between the two was multivote, very bad advice, and a byzantine group we call Balance Team. Multivote allowed for washed mules, greater efficiencies for mages (30k mp is a lot), and troll builds like dex bucc/luk paladins. Bad advice comes from self-proclaimed endgame players but is really only a problem because people religiously follow those set bounds en masse. Current advice is along the lines of "zak at 135, ht 155, pb 175" which is just bossing, bossing, bossing. Given enough time, I wonder what happens to prices. Balance Team perpetually fights the battles of yore, so not much to say about that.

The large bossing groups from back then are no longer meta because bossing is a socialist activity. It's socialist because everyone gets around the same splits, but even these systems are constrained by market forces. A 6 person HT is much more appealing to join relative to a 12 person HT, so it results in a departure from the classic 12 person format. For those who wish to stay, they are effectively taxed higher and higher until they relent, whether socially (their friends move) or economically (their production is spread among more mouths). Either way results in pretty much the same outcome because 6 person parties also allow for lower prices (undifferentiated product, less cost) and price the 12 person parties out.

I know it's not an economy thread but rather than one's beliefs, people react more strongly to incentives. Beliefs are constrained to a group of people, incentives apply to all. I also personally enjoy VC, regardless whether i'm in the same map or not.

 

A few months ago, I was in a zak run hosted by lvl 135 bishop, who wanted 5-man run when we had a bunch of low lvl inted characters and i was the only strong character. Now i do not join that person's runs. I do not entertain weaker players demanding stronger players do exclusive runs for them. That's the opposite of being grateful.

When I first started my friends in Toilet guild leeched me and brought me to Ravana runs for helms. I pay back two-fold by giving free zhelms and free low lvl items. I even leeched two of my guildies from 119-120. (tho i no longer give free afk zhelm since it's too much work for me, and new people don't realize how much work that is)

Of course, I only continue to help those that don't take me for granted (which is the vast majority, thankfully). Those that do appreciate me makes the whole thing worth it.

Part of the excitement in Maple is doing things before being fully ready. And we should try our best to let new players feel that magic too.

 

Raso: "I'm not giving you a gold star for card farming a level 10 mule"

Ahem, yeah friendships.

*cough*

 

I understand your frustration. What made old school maplestory enjoyable was the fact that it was extremely interpersonal with things such as large party training, party quests and boss expeditions. Is there ways to combat this issue by implementing a system that promotes large party play? Maybe , Ive never really thought about it.

However the underlying issue is that as the server ages maplelegends is MAINLY going to retain dedicated players and dedicated players are MOSTLY sweaty. When Covid19 was no longer prevalent in the world, people went back to their regular lives and the population of our server dipped as a consequence. I played before covid and I still play and I can confidently say a lot of the people that quit the game after covid were very casual non sweaty players, and most if not all of the sweaty min max players who joined during covid are still playing. All this to say, its a hard pill to swallow but I think as the server ages maplelegends will mainly retain their most dedicated and sweaty players who view this game longterm and have personal passion projects.

I do wish the server could be more interpersonal and less sweaty (coming from a retired sweaty player lol)

 

Players, much like most things of the human condition, exist across a spectrum. While it’s easy to categorize people into terms like “sweaty” and “casual”, the reality of the situation is that the large majority of people are a bit of both.

Like tends to attract like and the people you associate and surround yourself with tend to reflect your own approach to the game. Both sweaty min-man runs and casual no-cap runs exist in communities on the server, but both are usually exclusive to the groups they’re hosted among.

I think the reasons you rarely see public or smega runs for “inefficient” content like 2-group CWK are threefold:
1. It’s unnecessary. Most people have no issues clearing CWK as 4 or 5 man
2. It’s a bigger risk. You’re bringing in additional people you do not know or trust who can mess up the run.
3. There’s no incentive. While it’s nice to believe in the thought that people make new friends from these kinds of runs, it’s all too common for the pick-up-group runners to be a combination of incompetent and ungrateful, which is incredibly frustrating to deal with and even a single instance of which is a huge turn off for hosts.

I think a large part of the kind of content described in the original post dying out is due to mistrust of people not within your circle. I’ve had good experiences with random runners, sure, but I have also had terrible experiences. In comparison, the min-maxed content I run with friends and people I know and trust is always enjoyable; I know I’ll have a good time when I log in for PB or 5 man HT, and I look forward to it each week. I don’t feel the need to stick out my neck and host content for people I don’t know, and I’d imagine others feel the same. Much of the “charitable” content I host like free AFK Zak service and 12 man HT is usually restricted to things like guild and alliance runs, because it gives me the chance to interact with people beforehand and somewhat get to know them. The runs feel more familial that way and I also have a better idea if I’m helping someone who’s going to be ungrateful.

Smega runs are just… too much of a mixed bag I think.

 

time to put yourself forward and prioritize yourself buddy

don't let other people take advantage of you. thats a toxic mindset.

 

down to general mistrust, mudslinging shit.
you could help someone for a year and at the very next year or 2, they could turn into the very person u didn't want them.
gauge for yourself who's worthy and who's isn't.
suss out their generosity.

 

dynamics are more set in stone these days barring big shakeups.

 

Actually, I just remembered about something. I used to play Tibia my whole life before MapleLegends, and trust me: there's no comparison between both communities. Tibia's community is EVIL, for real. There you learn you can't trust anyone. Maybe because there's a competitive aspect in the game and nowadays also a lot of ego involved. That also happens in other games you should know.
So, to me, MapleLegends' community is just pure love, people help each other most of times, it's really cool yea.

 

Bro he didn't pass away he's just banned

 

Personally I feel like I'm able to connect the best with friends and people if I can run content as equals, I don't want no weird power dynamic where higher levels join for charity nor would I do something i loathe just because. I'm so glad I found a group of likeminded people when I first started Running HT, were we were noobs and figuring out the ropes ourselves and took pride in it. These are the memories and friends I cherish the most.

I do agree that there is a higher pressure of running only optimized runs to attract new people, but I believe this is the cost of having rarely any new "real" new players rather than the 5th char of an already high level person with inherited gear and buffs.

 

There are moments when trying to be inclusive requires you to be exclusive and sweaty. I remember a time about a year ago when 3-4 alliance members were sad and mentioned in alliance chat that no one was running cleave content (cwkpq, scarga). I decided to run a few scargas. The first 3-4 people who wanted to sign up were all single target ranged. I turned them down cause I wanted this run to be for cleave mains. Lo and behold, those cleave mains all signed up within a couple days.

As for running with high-int chars, it depends on the situation. If they're a rando and I'm hosting for randos, I would probably not invite them to run again. It was their choice to wash to the extreme, and why must other people suffer for them, when they could have opted to wash less or buy leech instead of running content on a 400+ int NL?

If they're an alliance member and I'm running with alliance members, community is priority. I wouldn't mind how much int they have and just be glad that they signed up for content. The only except would be if I was concerned about being able to clear the content. In which case, I'd be more exclusive.

 

Go back and do it on a 0% level 7 mule. Clearly was not impressive enough kekw.