Thread: What's the attention snare for newbies?

So these last few days I've entered Monster Play with no experience. Now, any part of any game relies on fresh meat. Without fresh meat things go stale.

So what's in Monster Play to attract and HOLD fresh meat?

Here's what I, as a newbie with no connections and no predilection to scour forums and websites for hours in order to get a tiny inkling of outdated tips, have experienced.

1. A few NPCs with a bajillion quests that tell you death is not an option.
2. A giant wasteland with no direction on where I should be looking to go. (Hey maggot, go talk to some dude that's east of some place you've never heard of, and don't die or I'll make you feel like a total idiot again!)
3. A bunch of other monster players full of disdain for people that don't know as much as they do, totally unwilling to give you a chance, and absolutely adamant on not dropping even the slightest bit of advice or knowledge in regards to your inquiries.
4. Dwarf PCs scream in my ear about Barrack Obama (as near as I can tell). While they proceed to slice open my treasurable parts and feed them to me.
5. A very intimate relationship with the spawn points.

I can probably try and come up with a few more witty things, but honestly I'm just a bit disgusted with my experience so far.

So, what's to attract and keep the average new person? And don't give me grief about "Oh you have no experience, I do just fine with my R8 Uruk of doom." Monster Play opens up at level 10. I'm sure there are plenty of more uber players than me, but I'm asking in regards to the average gamer.

What's in it for us? Why would we want to subject ourselves to the humiliation and frustration there?

I'm sincerely asking this as a possible suggestion to Turbine for a bone to be thrown our way at some point, and maybe even a place for other newbies to get some inspiration.

i wish i had the rank 8 uruk of doom

They've needed a Monster Player tutorial forever. No doubt it's confusing and intimidating all together. I guess the only hook is how fun it is to realize you're playing a character with six legs, or four and a tail, or the same brutal orcs that kidnapped Merry and Sam.

Well.. as an MMORPG.. this game is heavily driven by the community. In fact, before the little quest arrows and markers were in place, most quest information was community driven (which was a lifesaver back then).

That said, with a little looking you'll find plenty of resources like the Monster Manual (in my link), the Brandywine PvMP guide (in their PvMP forums), and plenty of advice on this very forum that you've posted on.

That's orc of doom to you, guy.

aklouie, thanks for the links, I'll have to check that out.

As for newcomers I think what developers forget sometimes is that there is really a large amount of people that don't utilize forums. I've had a number of friends in the past that loved playing various games but had no clue about forums.

Among those people there are also those people that don't CARE that there are forums.

In that mindset if there is a game you spend money on the game itself should give you all the information you need. I'm not talking about indepth quest and min-maxing type information but what elitist MMOers would consider "handholding" information.

I mean I've been gaming since the Colecovision and Vic 20 days at least and been a part of every major MMO testing and release since the beginning. Even so, I'm always looking at games with the thought of "What would my friend/fiance/wife/etc think about this game?"

Unfortunately the people that would have difficulties with Monster Play are the same people that WOULD'NT have the internet savvy skills to find the information they need for Monster Play.

I have to admit that if I wanted I could find all the information I needed and would never have had to post this thread if I wanted, but having a wife that has sort of shown a little bit of interest in these games has made me really keep my eyes open to what less initiated people would think about what's going on.

"Cool spider. What happens when you jump like that on that big guy?"

Just try and think how you'd explain that jumping in this game only makes it look like your character is jumping, and that what you're jumping towards is only an NPC or a PC, etc. etc..."

Originally Posted by Sylvarin

They've needed a Monster Player tutorial forever. No doubt it's confusing and intimidating all together. I guess the only hook is how fun it is to realize you're playing a character with six legs, or four and a tail, or the same brutal orcs that kidnapped Merry and Sam.

Eight legs if you please.

but yes, when I first started way back when, I was totally lost. No one else around. Played for a bit, got to a river, died, went back to freep, even if I could only lvl to 15. lol

What server are you on and what time where you on it?

I know that I will almost always ask greenies if they are new (and therefore in need of a tour).

For myself the snare was getting to know the other players out there. Once we started to become more familiar, had died together, killed together, and laughed and told jokes in the downtime I was totally sucked in (and still am ).

Attention snare... Able to play for a few days and be able to solo fully geared Freeps? Idk, If i was new to a game i would love to hop right on and beat the top players of my server.

Here's a tip for you:

If you're looking to play PvP, leave this game right now before you waste your time with it.

If, however, you're looking to play PvE, this game is great. Waste all your time on it.

Originally Posted by KalizaarsWrath

I'm sincerely asking this as a possible suggestion to Turbine for a bone to be thrown our way at some point, and maybe even a place for other newbies to get some inspiration.

depending on what server and time of play . i have in the past taken greenies for guide tours of the moors and or show the short cuts to doing quest for maps . Also while leading raids pick up new never before played creep people into raids and help them have some fun killing the freeps .

With that being said ; if you are not on the vilya server . feel free to roll a freep lvl him to 10 and click the creep button . I would be glad in my free time to show ya the ropes .

ya just have to ask in ooc if i am on .


yet i digress depending on server you play on . theres some creeps that don`t help anyone they don`t know . Also on the other hand some servers theres alot of creeps that go out of there way to help .

I started playing my creeps in the moors at lvl 10, what eventually helped me the most was joining a kin with people who already knew what they were doing and could show me around. See if your freepside kin has anyone that PVMP's and ask them for advice.

That said, when I was all by my lonesome I just rolled a Warg and used him to explore. That way I was at least stealthed and couldn't easily be blown apart by crazy dwarves wielding Giant Axes, only the ones with bows that could track me

Definitely find some people to play with even if you have to instigate the group. If you are unable to get any help or groups, drop by Meneldor in the evenings - maybe I can help you out.

we have a Players Guide for New Monsters:

http://community.codemasters.com/for...nsterplay.html

But you have to know German. My be you should do the same.

Baglodush, Warg, R13

Since most of the adhd types needing an "attention snare" predictably choose creepside, Turbine has already taken care of this by buffing creeps every time the whine. Now they get their fix lolzing themselves to sleep at night.

Originally Posted by KalizaarsWrath

So these last few days I've entered Monster Play with no experience. Now, any part of any game relies on fresh meat. Without fresh meat things go stale.

So what's in Monster Play to attract and HOLD fresh meat?

Here's what I, as a newbie with no connections and no predilection to scour forums and websites for hours in order to get a tiny inkling of outdated tips, have experienced.

1. A few NPCs with a bajillion quests that tell you death is not an option.
2. A giant wasteland with no direction on where I should be looking to go. (Hey maggot, go talk to some dude that's east of some place you've never heard of, and don't die or I'll make you feel like a total idiot again!)
3. A bunch of other monster players full of disdain for people that don't know as much as they do, totally unwilling to give you a chance, and absolutely adamant on not dropping even the slightest bit of advice or knowledge in regards to your inquiries.
4. Dwarf PCs scream in my ear about Barrack Obama (as near as I can tell). While they proceed to slice open my treasurable parts and feed them to me.
5. A very intimate relationship with the spawn points.

I can probably try and come up with a few more witty things, but honestly I'm just a bit disgusted with my experience so far.

So, what's to attract and keep the average new person? And don't give me grief about "Oh you have no experience, I do just fine with my R8 Uruk of doom." Monster Play opens up at level 10. I'm sure there are plenty of more uber players than me, but I'm asking in regards to the average gamer.

What's in it for us? Why would we want to subject ourselves to the humiliation and frustration there?

I'm sincerely asking this as a possible suggestion to Turbine for a bone to be thrown our way at some point, and maybe even a place for other newbies to get some inspiration.

First of all, it is true that PvMP has, and has always had, a somewhat awkward tutorial. The new quest help system is better, but it does not cover all the gaps.

Secondly, creepside is almost always wary of new players and unfortunately has often ended up treating newcomers badly because of that, as well as for a long list of other reasons:


1 - the new player doesn't know the culture of the server in PvMP, so he will have to find out on his own,

2 - the new player doesn't know anything about PvMP, so a waste of time, so let him figure it out on his own,

3 - the new player must prove himself to the other players before he will be given the time of day or even allowed to address the senior players,

4 - the new player is cannon fodder and a draw to freep gankers, so unless he is willing to die a lot as bait, he will not be welcome in many groups because he will be more of a liability than anything else,

5 - the new player has no maps, and won't really have any of consequence before a week or two at least, so he will not be able to keep up with the uber groups that have good maps to everywhere, thus he will not be welcome in the uber groups since he will be more of a burden than anything else,

6 - the new player is likely to remain a greenie for a while because he doesn't realize he can use destiny points to buy passives that will quickly turn him into a blue-ee, so let him go to STAB-EC like all the other greenies and try to solo An until he learns a thing or two, or doesn't...

7 - the new player is unknown, so he is not to be trusted until it is determined he is not a spy, a 2-boxer, or using an outside communication program to tell his freep buddies where the creeps are so his freep buddies can now gank-slaughter them with ease, etc.,

8 - the new player tends to talk a lot in ooc and consequently often has a habit of giving away too much info about creep whereabouts in ooc, thus feeding freep spies on their creep alts parked in Gramsfoot,

9 - the new player often still does not have his 1-minute cooldown map back to Gramsfoot, even after weeks and weeks of farming STAB-EC and An, so he is of little or no interest in groups/raids since he can't keep up with the rest of the players,

10 - the new player needs to "tough it out", like the other uber creeps did ONCE over 3 years ago, if he wants to "earn" the "privilege" of playing creepside,

11 - the new player - well why should any uber elitist rank 10+ creep even fool with new creep players since it will take them so long to farm... er... earn the infamy to even come close to them, and even if they do, the ubers will be at least rank 14 by then lol,

12 - the new player (at least until F2P) might be on a trial account, so once again, waste of time for ubers,

13 - the new player, at least for some of the ubers, if he doesn't choose to "live here" (aka spend at least 8 to 12 hours a day on his creep), then he's not really that serious about playing creepside, so a possible waste of time,

14 - the new player, if he wants to "run" with the big guys, must realize that he will often be the bait, and that he will often be the first and sometimes the only one in the group to fall... for a LONG time,

15 - the new player needs to realize that he is indeed a new player, and thus should expect nothing from anyone, and just shut the heck up, or leave...


The list could go on, but I am sure you get the picture. This is not necessarily server specific, however, it has happened a lot on most servers.


There are some servers that have groups that are friendly and accomodating to new players, but they are not many. However, perhaps because of the new VIP-only aspect coming to PvMP, I have noticed more and more players on servers actually now starting to occasionally offer help to new players. I guess they realize that the crop of new players is about to dry up, so they have decided to start putting on their "nicer" faces.


Be that as it may, I do agree with you that the whole creep tutorial could really use some fixing up before they get too far into F2P. That said, I actually think they really expected you to die a lot before you finally figured things out, and then get used to dieing a lot when you play your creep.


Remember, the 1-hour cd map to Grams that you start with now did not exist when the tutorial was made. It is a recent addition to avoid players "unstucking" themselves so much, which has had the unforeseen consequence of making a lot of newer players think that it is the only Gramsfoot map. That is why a lot of them don't even bother with the 1-minute map quests.


I believe you play on E, so I would suggest trying to find some sympathetic player to "show you the ropes", if you can find one on E. I imagine you also know that E is one of the most "elitist" creepside servers that there is, so good luck. If you want to get a different experience, I would recommend making a creep on BW or Landy - a little less "elitist' and more RP respectively.


Stay with it and you'll have some good fun.

Actually if you take the time to get onto the Elendilmir creep teamspeak server... you don't quite find yourself out of the community so much. We usually maintain ~ 80-90% of the creeps on it.. and if you're not.. well.. there's not much info in /ooc.