Event Brainstorming and Suggestions

[Forward]

And you not answered my point about casual players/wide community involvement. There is no reason making events for 2.5 alive houses and rewarding already rich players. Elitism is killing this mod.

Ofc various players like various event ideas. But I remember April servers and we had spike of new players in the mod, many people would like to play NI if it was more new player friendly. Some players even have difficulty to get player crafted gear in the first place, it's too hard to find people to craft this and that, and many people don't want to communicate at all and see that as difficulty, they will rather play more casual game or mod. NI has no future if making content only for 20 (maybe 30) most dedicated players.

Many games have both casual-friendly and more competitive modes, even MMORPGs where all characters might uses same PvP gear and level, but need to gather gear for PvE for example. Or card games with draft modes where players don't need to have any collection to succeed. Implementing similar mode in NI might help, whatever it will be called event or not. Maybe even several rotating events with no or lowered gear requirement.

What you have pointed out in saying this is we have a problem, yes but I think its some were else. I think this mod has a retention problem not a "We need more new people one".

You say elitism is killing this mod... Elitism pointed at the 1% or just wealthy people but is that really the problem for dwindling player numbers? Are you blaming the people that have stayed to play this game the reason why others have left? really?

This mod at this point needs to be more focused on veteran player to keep them playing vs new players. Imagine if the some of the most veteran players did say "Ye im done" basically more people like NKA. Its this is what will kill the game. Without the elite in the game, the game will be dead vs without new players at least the game has the core people to run Ni as long as it can.

I think the best example of what I'm saying would be an analogy.

New games are a bucket where the aim is to fill the bucket up with players. In turn, they will make its very focused on the new person as they have no one.

5+ year old game like Ni is a filled bucket with holes in it with new but mostly old players dripping out every day. The aim here is to repair the holes in the game for why the new and old people are leaving.  

The aim of a game like Ni is to hold us, players, as long as it can. Ni has proven over the years it works for new players. If you leave on week one well this game was probably not for you anyway. We have beginner that most elite didn't have and runs are more successful with better gear and better game knowledge now. This game is pretty good with its new players already. Yes, it could be better but my point is it worked for us when we had less so it still works today. 

Don't take this as I want the game to be focused around me... I want this game to be focused on someone that got bored of doing 1 rag run after another. AKA. I think this mod has a retention problem.

No new player is bored they just need help or a hand to get to the exit. New players come in all the time from people telling others about this mod and other means. I don't think this mod needs to focus on the new aspect much if any at this point. It would be good to point out the new player is different to the player thats idk a few weeks old in my mind. I do agree newish player may have a problem getting things crafted but this, in turn, this is a veteran problem of we don't have as many people that want to craft for people. Go look any of my crafting requests and you will see this on a basic level. Why should I craft for other people?

I pointed at April event as an example of event both good for old and new players. Designing events suitable for new players doesn't mean they should be bad for old ones.
You should not craft for other people, indeed. It could be solved by events without gear requirement or by simplifying whole craft system.
Many 'old' players you talk about not even really play outside house events. House events don't evolve community, public runs do. Same with retention, people will return to mod with alive pubs/public events, not to the mod with super-mega-custom-house events.

EDIT: Another idea: seasons. Everyone making new character and compete in event servers. No materials drop. No craft. All items (player/house craftable and legendaries/upgraded legendaries) drop from bots. Legendaries drop rate like x100-x1000, so everyone might get top gear fast. Also might be experiments like crafting random legendary from 4 legendaries and similar ideas like Woody posts usually here. Ofc all gear not equippable to non-season characters. After season end (~3 months or so) players get I don't know some amount of gold/materials/collectibles/even legendaries for things they collected in the season, and seasoned characters reset. Might be pause between seasons. Should be good for both new and old players.

https://forum.nordinvasion.com/showthread.php?tid=42958

I think the community has had the time to think about events like this. 

Anyway, I don't want more legendaries ingame till we find out what we are doing craftables and the influx of mats to the market. 

I'm not sure were Terath is on this anymore but I remember him saying in his mind the avg player has light blue stuff. Guess this was years ago at this point but I did agree on it a bit. I think a team with no legendaries should be able to do all modes not easily but well enough. No one should "need" legendaries they should be the want when either Light or Dark Blue is the real need. In saying this no legendary should seem overly op even more so with the upgraded version so its a careful balance. I've said this before but gear should be balanced from the top downwards. Make all upgrades as good as you want them to be then make house craftables good enough to do all modes. This will tell you how good a normal orange and red legendary should be and from this info, you can make the rest of the crafted gear as good as you need to. 

The newer player should want legendaries sure but they should need the crafted stuff in the meantime. Players are not using 25-50% of gear because the community has deemed it as useless. Its the same with maps... Players are not using 25-50% of maps because the community has deemed it as useless.

We have content in this game that is heavily underutilized and it's this that should be worked on.

My idea was about making mode without crafting and trading at all, where all gear either bought on the market or looted. Crafting and trading are big hurdles for new players. As for housecrafteds balance, these items might be good for you or me, but new player thinks another way. No one will blame his own skill when can blame bad items.
About useless gear community is right, there are no reasons to use suboptimal classes/gear, it could work on Normal, but goal is perform well on Rag. It's different with maps, though. Some maps deemed bad because bad on Rag, though nothing prevents playing them on lower modes. Just yesterday I played normal pub with newbies, they told me 'bad map, go change server', I just told them 'no' and showed place to cade, where we easily won. They afraid to do something they did't see before, we need just show them. Just don't play Juggernaut, you'll teach them bad.