Retirement and Starmourn
I'm really struggling to understand the retirement system and how it can benefit my future Starmourn character.
I have a character in Achaea; and I've been grinding levels and learning about IR's MUD systems - but I don't seem to be accumulating any credits to put towards retirement (according to "RETIRE VALUE"). It's my understanding that I can also purchase credits from other players with in-game money; but does this count towards the character's credit worth? Is it only unbound credits that count towards RETIRE VALUE? I currently need 991 more credits before I can retire. I'm also level 24 at this time.
I'm trying to simplify the whole process into a "Do X, receive Y" type plan. Should I be focusing on accumulating gold to simply buy credits from players for retirement? Grinding levels? Am I in the wrong game for my intent? What's the best use of my time to be of benefit to my future Starmourn character?
TLDR: What's the easiest and fastest way that I can accumulate credits (in any of the current IR games), so that I can retire the character and transfer the credits to my future Starmourn character? (Not including buying with real money)
Comments
Edited to add: That's not to say you can't earn 1k credits IC in any of the games. Just it may not be worth the blood/sweat/tears it'll take just to have those credits available for Starmourn.
Edited again: There might be opportunities with the 21st(!!) birthday coming up to get some credits. I don't know if leveling credits count or if they're considered promotional. You'd need @Aurelius or @Tecton for that. Personally, I'd conserve the effort and strive to earn them in Starmourn and just play Achaea for the fun you can have there.
I don't know how much they're reusing since they've learned a TON since Achaea started, but the general basis is good to learn and Nexus will be the same. I should probably play with Nexus a bit myself since it's been a while since I used it for anything.
As far as retirement credits go, it’s mainly for people who have spent real money (ie, not in-game currencies) on a certain character and want to retain some value of that but don’t want to play that character anymore (as @Syaja already explained above). It’s not really intended as a way to build up credits for another game.
Sometimes promotions (like city sales) will get you some credits you can use in retiring a character but generally if you didn’t spend real money on a character, you won’t get anything from retiring that character. And if you do spend real money, you’ll only get back a portion of it anyway. Personally I would not go to any great lengths to try to work up enough just for retirement into Starmourn. At best, it’ll take a long time, and you’ll lose a large chuck of it anyway. Better to simply put your money and/or time into SM when it opens.
If you’re enjoying your time in Achaea and want to spend money on a character, I say go for it. I just wouldn’t advise it if your primary goal is using retirement in Starmourn.
I could do everything, grind and never stop and be a top player for example, but then
BOOM
Retirement options start and all the hard work amounts to what? Being left behind by people who played a different game than this.
And to those who don't personally care or like being over optimistic, please dont try to romanticize the feature for me and say stuff like "but the game is in how you build your character, not about who's stronger" or "you wont even notice the difference".
I understand the concept and why it really is awesome for veteran players, but in the end it just creates an unfair playing field for people who haven't experienced previous MUDs or remember their login info, and there is no way I'm the only one who thinks this way.
And I'm not even talking as if I think it will make people OP strong or anything. I'm meaning that the stuff they get, the bonuses they obtain is not possible for other people to obtain in the same way.
Sure, people can pay money and get the same amount of stuff, but that's still not the same as merely getting bonuses for thoroughly enjoying and investing in a completely separate game. That's like saying "preorder our game and you'll get all this stuff that will never be available again unless you heavily invest into another one of our now outdated games." It just doesnt feel right.
TL;DR
In the end, I think the concept is neat, however it creates an unfair opportunity for people who have chosen to invest in a completely separate title.
So anyways, thanks for reading, and that's my opinion.
But can you explain exactly how you see this affecting you?
You explained why you feel it is an unfair system and you explained why you don't like it. I didn't get much of an idea of what exactly it is, in game, that you will feel affects you directly.
Is it that people will quickly get artifacts it took you a long time to grind for? Is it that they will bash faster than you with less of a time investment? Is it that they will beat you at PvP? That's what I wanted to know. Or is it their mere existence that is irritating?
I asked because knowing what part bothers you specifically makes it easier to try to work through or even propose a solution.
For context, in the past I have stopped playing certain IRE games altogether because I felt like there was a very uneven playing field and I was not catching up faster than they were pulling further ahead (strictly PvP wise). I wanted to know if that was your issue with this system or if it was something else, hence the disclaimer and prodding for further elaboration.
Realistically, I'd probably be dropping money on the game immediately. If we've got them, I'd likely be grabbing the lesson packs and the credit pack within the first week or two. Probably also some unbound credits too so I can sell them on the market for some marks.
It's probably when I'm done learning that I'd be starting to go out and it's likely that my bashing potential would be greater than those who didn't drop money on these packs. (I'd probably spend levelling lessons and credits on general skills and the like)
And that's just with the cheapest options, not the more expensive ones that others would be able to invest in.
Don't get me wrong, there's a difference in IRE games between the haves and have-nots, as there is in every other walk of life, but only to a point. There was a study a few years back that determined the closer you are from $0 to earning $75,000 a year, the happier you'll be, but that past that magic number average happiness plateaus, and more money won't statistically make you happier. I don't have a study handy on IRE customer satisfaction, but I feel like it'd follow a similar trend in terms of how happy owning a bunch of credits can make you.
Speaking for myself, I definitely find it significantly more enjoyable to play an IRE character who's omnitrans, or at least tri-trans. Though there are exceptions, transcending at least your two main class skillsets (the third often being more utility/trade focused) is often seen as a bare minimum entry-bar for PvP, and I always feel like I'm not really getting to experience all that my class has to offer when I join an IRE game as a newbie and haven't yet purchased enough credits/lessons to tri-trans.
But once you've done that and hit a few milestones like sewer access in survival, obtained a craft permit you enjoy etc., I think you start to see significantly diminishing returns from credit purchases. While there is a marked difference between a combatant who's tri-trans vs. one who's omnitrans vs. one who hasn't even transed a single skillset, there really isn't a huge difference between a combatant who's omnitrans vs. one who's not only omnitrans, but is also sitting on a mountain of credit-funded artifacts.
People love to slander artiwhores (jealousy IMO), but the reality is that all the money in the world won't buy you skill and competence in an IRE game. You can be loaded to the gills, above L100 and still get beaten by a mid-level combatant who isn't even tri-trans but has a better system. Of course if you compare an amazing combatant without a bunch of useful artifacts against an amazing combatant who also has a bunch of useful artifacts, the latter's more likely to win most fights assuming that all else is equal. But what I'm trying to say is that having a fuckton of credits isn't the end-all be-all of player competition, and past a certain point, it certainly won't make you a happier or better player, nor will it allow you to get more out of the game.
Past the benchmarks for entry-level PvP, an overabundance of credits will mostly provide some minor cosmetic benefits, like having a really fancy IG house (in Starmourn I'm assuming this'll be a spaceship with artifact upgrades) or a premium pegasus mount or a pet that greets your friends, etc. These little things will make you happy but they really aren't game-breaking things capable of nullifying all the investment that other players have made towards trying to be 'better' in various ways. Like really the worst that's gonna happen is you'll be jealous that they have a talking pegasus while you settle for riding around on a donkey.
So I don't think your fears about retirement credits skewing the playing field are founded. If you can afford to buy enough credits/lessons to max out your class skillsets, you'll be fine, and likely derive as much enjoyment out of the game as everyone else, just without some added cosmetic frills. And if you can't afford to do that, then regrettably, speaking as someone who's played these games literally since childhood — before I obtained access to my own funds to throw around in sometimes irresponsible ways — you'll have to accept that you're going to be at the bottom of the totem-pole regardless of whether people are sitting on mountains of 2000+ credits or molehills of 100+. You'll still be surrounded by people who have full access to their class while you don't.
Additionally, as an adult who's now slightly wiser with her funds, and has some regrets about prior spending habits, I would be highly unlikely to roll even another penny IRE's way if I didn't feel at least somewhat vindicated in seeing some return on my prior investments. Knowing that I can still make some use of the money I spent years ago on the now defunct MKO makes me feel more valued as a long-term customer, and safer to buy up some credits on Starmourn too. It's also the reason I felt comfortable spending some money on Aetolia when I tried it out for a bit after MKO died. I didn't end up liking Aetolia, but at least trying it out wasn't a total waste of my money/time because I can just forward that expenditure on to Starmourn, and maybe the next IRE somewhere down the line if it turns out I don't like Starmourn either.
I sincerely hope this won't be the case with Starmourn, but I wouldn't count on open beta being as short term as the closed beta period.
The dev team seems very organised and disciplined so I'm sure open beta won't drag on. The point of closed beta is so that by open beta the game is playable enough that we can all begin our stories without it all being reset later.
In other words, there is no imbalance out of the gate (unlike if there was no reset at the end of closed beta).
https://www.starmourn.com/2018/10/17/beta-time/
Other imbalances which have historically happened in IRE games out of the gate are the closed beta testers can snap up or corner resources, honours, quests, and positions in game (staff favortism). These things have on occasion been far greater imbalances then credits.
This is why it appears to me that having some sort of open beta to even the field and then a full reset would be the fairest approach.