Organics!

[Undertaker]

(*&%(*%^$%$*%$*&^%$%^$@#^&*(&%$@$&*(&^$@#%^*(*%$#%^*($#^&*^$^%$^$%$$%&^%&^%&^%&^%&^$^%##^$#^%$&^%$&$& (im sure theres a word out there thats really that long)

[Aniar]

Hmmmm

[Undertaker]

hmmm is right...

[Kaiana]

Ok, so forgive me but I only got through the first two pages of responses before I decided to post.

Speaking as one of these "newbs" you speak so highly of, I would like to say that I think the current system is just fine on our end. Now I'm sure that collecting organics is expensive and such for veterans, but really, there isn't another thing you can do as a noob that makes you the kind of money you need to buy stuff around here. I say this as someone who is working on their crafting skills as well - I've been working on them for some time now and still am nowhere near even GM, let alone 120. And the amount of resources I've had to farm to get as far as I am is staggering, and if I were to buy those resources from say BadAsh, there is no way I could afford them if not for organics.

Someone made a post earlier about instant gratification - this is something I agree with completely because I've always known people to be impatient and selfish. They want things now, and if they don't get them, they get antsy (hell, I even fit in to this because I'm waiting for Colibri to get back from vacation to reward me for my first donation!).

Someone also made a comment that you could get 6k-12k organics in a day. HAH! That's hilarious. First of all, that would assume that not a single other person came along all day to farm them, which is ridiculous. Second, it would assume the person playing had no life whatsoever and could just sit there farming for 12+ hours of their day. I'm sorry, but I'd like to think that most people have lives outside of this game (I certainly do). If I can get an hour or two a day to farm organics without having to work, do something else, or deal with sharing with another player or two, I'm lucky. So it kind of bugs me how some of the comments are so derogatory towards this setup. Like I said, I'm sure it's expensive, but some things are in life, and we just have to deal with them. In order to get a house in this game so I had room for storage, I borrowed 500k from a very kind player, and paid him back in organics. How would I have possibly gotten a house if not for this setup? I'll tell you; I wouldn't have. The base houses, which while in the old days of UO were a decent size for storage at least, nowadays are simply insufficient.

I'm not saying you shouldn't make changes. I'm just saying that if there weren't this kind of system here, the amount of time it would take to get a decent start on the server would be much increased, and I certainly would have lost interest in trying to build up my holdings by now if that were the case. From some of the arguments here, I would say you've forgotten the following: it's hard to be a noob. A lot of you are very secure in your wealth, but to me, a million gold is far out of reach at the current time. I would have to spend all my playtime for the next couple of weeks farming organics if I wanted that kind of money, and yet to some people around here, one million gold is nothing. So....I don't know, I just wanted to say some of this stuff because it seems like a lot of people are very hard on newbies in their comments...and without newbies, a community dies. Trust me, I've seen it in other games.

[Undertaker]

oh gosh, another newb comment... read the entire thing befor u stop half way... and that IS THE POINT IN BEING A NEWB!!! its NOT suppose TO BE EASY!!!?!?!?!?!?!?? what part of that is so hard to understand, when i started i didnt have no organics to farm, i hunted easy spawns, making a womping 100 gps? sometimes more or less, an i built up to my first ozzy (this server is taming based incase u didnt know) an with that, 1000 hp, it helps alot, i started doing lil more challenging stuff, once i built up my army, which btw i spent 3 months as a noob befor i was actully considered good, i did balrons, an from there, i upgraded to nobles, or befor that i should say i bought a house... you want to be SO powerful in less then a week, you want to get ALL the things otherwise you get "antsy" as you put it... well learn some ^(^(% ^&% (*&^(*^(*&^*&^*^ patience!... pick up a freakin sword an go slay some bad guys, an earn some money, all this "dwelling on the organics for gold" is really sick

if you've ever played OSI, you didnt have anything to start with, other then a sword, an some cheap leather... here, at Excelsior, you have a Donation Center with some nice armor, jewlery, great for newbs like yourself to start out, an there are minor pets out there that will help you get started, but living off organics as if its the Only Source of gold, thats extremely sad in some cases... id say 99% of spawns have gold on them... so go out an work for it...

[Viola]

As a newb who got help immediately from vets, vets who want organics... I feel really guilty that I hate going in the dungeon to kill rats. I don't like grinding. I don't like killing. I have 3 raid nights a week in WoW for end game raiding. It is intense. It is time consuming. And, I don't come to UO for that kind of experience.

My newb days are ticking away and I know it. In about a week, I won't be able to get anyone any organics and I feel really bad. It's like there's all this pressure... like I'm letting down nice, friendly, helpful people because I don't want to spend hours killing stupid rats that hide under furniture and get stuck behind flour mills.

*sighs* I don't like this system of organics. There are other ways I can make money. I don't like being a dwindling link to something veterans really need and want. It's not fair from my end either. There are so many things for new people to do. I'm growing flowers. I'm raising bees. I'm building a house. I'm making kegs of potions. I've got my vendor chair all picked out, and I just need my account to be old enough to get it going! I'm doing fine without selling organics, but my friends aren't.

And frankly, that is completely poo... (pun intended)

P.S. I got help with buying my first house too, and guess how I paid back the loan? Animal Taming! I worked really hard and found what he needed at the max+ level he wanted and got 10k per animal, which eventually paid back my loan. So don't say that organics are the only way for a new player to make money. It just isn't true. Newbie organic farming is a crutch and a broken system that hurts the vets who make this server viable and turns the new players into whores.

P.P.S. My comments are not an attack against any admin, coder, gm or other personnel responsible for the newbie dungeon. It is only commentary on the current state of affairs which seemingly unfolded long after the creation of organics and how and where they drop.

[Kaiana]

Undertaker, what is your problem? Every post you make seems to be very insulting and full of spelling errors and bad grammar. You obviously have a lot of growing up to do. Because I'm new here I'm not entitled to an opinion? Screw that, and you. I haven't seen you make one post where you didn't complain about something or insult someone. You're a jerk. You're also most likely either pre-pubescent, or a very sad adult.

Now, on the comment about OSI - actually, I did play on OSI, before Trammel, for two years. And yes, it did take a long, long time to build up. But that's not what I'm looking for here. The point of a server like this is to accelerate things a bit so that you don't have to spend years getting to the point you were at on OSI. I'm sorry you think you're entitled because you had it so much rougher when you started, but that's not the case for everyone. I'm mostly just working on crafting skills, which is a lot of work. Honestly, I probably could get along just fine without organics, but what I'm TRYING to say is that it's a great helper for "newbs" like us. And, in case you don't realize (and I'm sure you don't, based on my perception of your intelligence), if you constantly insult newbies and make them feel like they aren't worth their own skin, there won't BE any newbs. And do you know what that means? A dead server. No new players creates stagnation which creates decomposition. I've seen it happen plenty of times in the past in other games, usually because of people like you.

Once again, I'm not saying, as you put it, that...

you want to be SO powerful in less then a week, you want to get ALL the things otherwise you get "antsy" as you put it

...I'm saying I want to be able to advance at a good rate. I don't at all expect to be 120 in everything in a month, which seems to be how you have taken it. You also twisted my words by saying I get antsy if I don't get what I want. I said "people" get antsy, and I was referring to my experience with my countrymen for the most part (Americans).

It's obvious to me, though, that you're going to take it upon yourself to flame every post I make now, as you have done in two separate topics already. I'd suggest learning to spell, then learning some manners. I never insulted you once, and yet in your first post to me ever you personally insulted me repeatedly. It's people like you that kill communities, and I really hope that people here realize that someday. Your posts, as I've said before, are filled with nothing but b****ing and moaning and insults. I'm going to play the game, and enjoy it, in spite of you, but I have no doubt that you have in the past and will again drive people to leave the server, and that kind of bothers me, because I've seen it before and lost many good friends because of it.

So once again, my opinion on organics is that I like the current system. However, if the powers that be decided to create a broader distribution of them in order to bring prices down, I don't think I'd care that much, it would just make other money-making options have more appeal. I'm also not saying it's the only way to make money, but as a newbie with low stats and no good equipment it's quite difficult to fight monsters for money. And to refute another thing that this ingrate said, while the newbie donation area is a very nice touch, I was only able to use it for three days, and it took me longer than that to really begin to understand how the game works again and how equipment can be used, so I'm sure I missed out on the best stuff that was donated there. I'm not complaining, however, as I intend to eventually craft my own armor. My point is that perhaps the young status should be extended for those who are truly new to the game. I am not new, but it's been so long since I played an OSI server that pretty much everything is different in some way, and it took a good amount of getting used to, at least for me.

Anyway, if the rest of you feel like Undie here about newbies making comments...well, that's pretty sad. I'm sorry that I'm not an elitist like him who thinks that only those who have been around forever should be entitled to their opinion. I'm more apt to believe that everyone's opinion counts in any community.

-Kaiana
"newb"

[Glyph]

Hi Kaiana.

Please do not take any of what I am about to say as a flame, as I do agree with some of your opinions, but not all. The ability to voice opinions on forums is universal, as is the ability to disagree with posted opinions of others.

First, if you disagree with someone's posting style (i.e...Undertaker's apparently), don't emulate it in retaliation. It just takes away from legit points you have in your posts.

Now, apart from that, I can appreciate your passion about the subject coming from a new player's perspective. I can honestly say, I have never stepped foot into the newbie dungeon. Not because it wasn't available, but rather, my own ignorance. I was looking for a new server and made characters on several, trying them out. By the time I came back to play on this one (at first just 15-30 minutes at a time), full time, my magical 21 days was up and it was no longer an option.

The big deal is that there are very limited ways to get the quantities of organics for players beyond the 21 days. Yes, there are ways (large taming bods, various "small" monsters which drop VERY small amounts, etc), but nothing that comes close to matching the 10's of thousands of organics needed to make bio-pets worthy of keeping. To add fuel to the fire, newer players have "caught on" that they have the upper hand over vets and have started escalating the prices to an absurd amount. When I started to take notice of the prices about 2 months ago, they were 100gp per. Now, IF you can find them before they are snapped up, they are 250gp+. Considering that 2 months ago we were averaging nearly 100 players on at any given time, and now in the 60's, I find it hard to buy into the whole "more demand justifies the price increase". It's just greed.

Before you condemn me as an anti-newb, please take the time to look over some of my posts in this thread. Though I have suggested removing the organics from the newbie dungeon, I have also given viable solutions for replacements, such as increasing the gold the rats drop to replace the organics, skill/stat boosting items to speed up a new player's developement to enhance their gaming experience, etc. I have also touched on the instant gratification of gamers these days and tried to accommodate these habits with my solutions.

I just think that vets should have a form of access to the organics on a practical level (and the current means are not very practical for the amounts needed), and not just being forced into buying organics from newbies.

[Aniar]

Kaiana do not let Under bother you at all....There are means for everyone to obtain organics. Not suppose to be easy at all, some people just are lazy which is sad. I got all my 90k organics ( which is all I used to obtain 2 bad bios ), utilizing new players I had helped out, farming myself, and taming bods. I still farm them myself...no big deal....Its not suppose to be easy lol....just do not let the immaturity of others ruin the game you have come to love...

[Kaiana]

Yeah, I'm sorry for being a bit harsh in my last post, but I was quite frankly a bit angry at the tone I received from that person. And I don't take you as an anti-newb :p

I'd submit that I've never charged someone more than 100 per organic....I'd feel like a greedy jerk if I did that. I don't know who's charging the 250gp you mentioned, but I agree with you if that's the price you are paying. I did see several [c messages about an auction that was going on recently for 16.5k organics (or something to that effect) in which the price got up to over 200gp per, and I was flabbergasted. You have to admit though...if people are willing to pay that, it's only going to encourage more price increases. So basically, there have to be a combination of efforts in order to reduce prices:
1. More availability of organics, but not neccessarily removing them from the newbie dungeon.
2. People buying them must refuse to pay the high prices. No matter how badly you want them, buying them at higher prices will validate those prices.

The sad truth is that people are greedy and exploitative (is that a word?), and will always do whatever they can to get themselves ahead. So in order to fix this problem (short of changing the distribution drastically), people have to fight it vehemently, by refusing to pay more than 100gp per (or whatever is the accepted price).

Don't get me wrong though - I've already been doing some dungeon fighting with my limited skills in order to find items, make money, and raise my fame/karma (mostly the last). And I've found that yes, it is easy to make gold that way too. Organics are obviously a better source of income, but now that I've got some decent skills I can hold my own on weaker monsters like ettins, elementals, etc. I just can't imagine having been able to do that earlier when I was still unskilled and unstatted. (My stats are now at cap until I donate the $40 to raise them more.)

[Glyph]

No problem Kaiana.

I also know how boring it can be, like you said, simply grinding on those rats for the sole purpose of garnering a decent income. My wife and 2 sons now play, and I let them learn from my mistake (of not hunting for organics), and they tried their hands at organic farming. All they could say was how boring it was, and as you said, other players coming in there, sometimes not even asking before they start killing rats even though someone was already there.

If you want a little more variety in hunting with limited fighting skills, I started with solens (the ants, black and red) because very easy to kill, loads of zoogi to make translocation powder, and tons of gems. From there I went to the bushido dojo, better tokens than the ants, and much better gold, with the chance at minor Tokuno arties. When I got a good ranged wep, I added Rune Beetles to my hunting circle after I checked the other areas. This allowed me to start buying better pets (started with frenzied ostards). That then opened the proverbial can of worms for hunting and I have never looked back.

Most "old" OSI style critters (trolls, ettins, etc) don't offer enough of a reward for your time/effort. Hope this helps add some variety to your gaming until you get to where you want to be!

[Kaervas]

2. People buying them must refuse to pay the high prices. No matter how badly you want them, buying them at higher prices will validate those prices.

Unfortunately, that'll never work.

Just as you have new players who feel somehow they are entitled for more than the going rate for organics, you also have older players to whom money is no concern and will gladly overpay in order to get said organics instead of another person (because the supplies that they can access with their own two hands are either very limited/contested or severely luck based).
They just don't care about any kind of price regulation since they can still afford it.

The only way to solidify a price would be to make them available from a vendor/vendorstone at a fixed price, which would put a solid ceiling on how high the price could rise (which would also never work because that would mean biopets would become downright common).

[Viola]

The only way to solidify a price would be to make them available from a vendor/vendorstone at a fixed price, which would put a solid ceiling on how high the price could rise (which would also never work because that would mean biopets would become downright common).

It's been suggested elsewhere in this thread, but I wholeheartedly concur. If a difficult price goal was set on organics on the gold vendor stone, it would control the market. Newbies who wish to farm organics would still be able to do so, and they could undercut the vendor stone slightly to drum up their business. The prices wouldn't get so out of control because if a newbie wanted to price gouge the vet could just remind them that they could buy from the vendor stone for less.

When I'm working on my alchemy, I always tell people when I have the Moonglow vendors up to many hundreds of reagents for the 3g per price (the only reagents that doesn't work is black pearl and blood moss since they're always the vendor stone price), but I like people to know so they have the option to pay less than the vendor stone. Newbies would have the same chance with their organics farming. They could still make a LOT of money.

Now I'm not saying make them cheap on the vendor stone because let's look at the facts. Bio pets are massively powerful. Many people on this server are seriously rich. And, not everyone should be able to do bio-engineering unless they're willing to put in a LOT of work and time. The price should be high enough that it could still encourage vets to maybe try to farm on their own and buy from any willing newbies, but give them the OPTION to know that if they get X gold they can get Y organics to make their pet. And they won't feel railroaded by newbie entitlement 'gimme' syndrome, which isn't from ALL of us newbs mind you, but it does happen in every game. And as usual, a couple bad apples spoil the barrel.

[Electra]

I would love to see a cap price on the vendor stones! A price of 125 per would ease the problem. It would prevent price gouging and make organics available when needed. Young people could still farm and make a tidy profit by selling at 100 per which imo is still expensive when you look at the overall cost of making a bio pet.

When I started, organics sold for 10 per because I was the only one who was making bio pets at the time. As more people became interested the price naturally inflated to a plateau of 100 per. The average price now seems to be inflated over 200 per because all the rich players can outbid each other with unlimited money as seen with the auction price at over 600 per organic.

My point is the demand is so high the prices will continue to rise unless the gms regulate the economy with a reasonable way to introduce organics into the game so they are more available or the price gets capped.
(I have made many suggestions in earlier posts including vendor stone, hard monsters loot, spawn rewards, far away locations, earning them on quests etc)

And yes bio pets should be rare, but it took me making over 20 bio pets to experiment with different dna combos to make a perfect bio pet. Some of the early pets were worthless -- how would you like to have spent over 10 million and find out you made a mistake in your dna selection and you have to start all over and collect another 100,000 organics just to try again with no guarantee of success? Well i have done this many times only to be frustrated time and time again by greedy young players or uber rich players that pay 6 times the going rate just to out bid me...

I do bods now daily to avoid the price gouging, but even then you work all day to complete a large bod you have to cross your fingers and hope to actually get organics rather than another load of leather. Even if you do get a few thousand organics as a prize (1000 organics = 1 vial), you still have to make a vial which has a high chance of failure to make...then actually sample a monster which has a high falure rate...then make a vial set which has a super high falure rate (cost 5000 organics)...then make a bio deed with a high falure rate(cost 1000 organics)...then combine them etc...and i remind you I have 4200 luck that costs over 120 million just to get to this point and I FAIL sampling dna over 90% of the time!
(FYI I have max skills, 120 tame, 130 lore and 123 tinker!)

Anyone who makes a bio pet for the first time will be very sad with the results without understanding the skill and knowledge that goes into it. Just the expense alone will make you scream:0

Basically there is not enough organics available in the game at any given time. Making organics more available would also allow me to experiment with new dna and actually have some fun with this skill, rather than a source of daily frustration...I remind myself this game is supposed to be a form or relaxation and enjoyment:)

[+Colibri]

Hmm, you all write too much

Well, adding gold to the newbie dungeon monsters is not as good as organics, because it just adds more gold to the game. With organics, the newbies have something to offer to the vets. This takes gold from the vets, and to the newbies which need it. It may need some alteration but i think it's a great setup.

Electra, as i read that you have made 12 bios so far... that's a very big amount! Bios are ment to be a rare thing, and not to create one every few days.

As for the pricing... well i see people trying to buy them for 10gp and others who want to sell it for 200gp. Means that the market isnt liquid enough to be traded. As for a cap price, I wouldn't set it. As you can't directly convert tokens to gold, or excelsior dollars, or elven notes... i hope that the new portal that will be much better for trading commodities, will help with the pricing problem.

Anyway, there's just too much stuff in this thread to make sense... if anything i will call a town meeting so that we can discuss things on the spot, seems that these forums are very ineffective in getting to any agreement.


P.S.: As for being uber... when i still played on this shard, i enjoyed taming some grizzley bears, killing some ettins and such. At least for me, that was quite fun. And i didn't use druid spells because my regularly tamed pet proved to be exciting enough, however i had no desire to solo the hardest monsters on the shard.