Give me my colony and company Sea-wave

Culvern

My extremely excellent advice would be:..................wait for it...............wait for it............ GET OVER IT!

Act like an adult, take the hit and move on.

MikeR2

I never received any messages before my company was deleted, and I was the director, and 3 of our 5 company members were active.

I asked for proof of such a message, and was told that proof could not be provided.

I asked that admin check to see that the message function was working properly. 

They said they tested it and it was working.

So if we are both correct, then the logical conclusion is that the message function wasn't working when my company was deleted, which is why no proof can be provided.

Seems like there ought to be a better solution, like more than one warning notice, and/or multiple warning notices for a period of two weeks prior to deleting a company, plus keep the proof for at least a month.

When the system malfunctions, and no warning notice is given, and no proof can be provided, the company should be restored. 

That's what should be corrected in my opinion.

purplepirate

@MikeR2 when did you make the company, and when was it deleted?

purplepirate

Oh and what city did you make it in?

MikeR2

The company was made when Papaya rebooted about 1.5 years ago. 

It was created in Seville, and had 6 members, 4 were active, and a fully developed colony near Boston.

I realize now that companies headquartered in Seville are the most vulnerable to being deleted.

All I wish is that we would have been given a 30 day window to grow, or relocate.

Just like with the reboot, where players got discouraged by losing much of what they had accomplished, after a lot of hard work, and a significant real dollar investment, at least they were given bonuses for the restart.

If we want players to be enthusiastic about the game, then a better solution ought to found by Papaya.

Consider 3 Alternatives:

1. Be given 30 days to grow or be discontinued with more than one warning.

2. Be given the opportunity to relocate before being discontinued.

3. or if the company is discontinued, be given a "leg up" on starting a new colony.

Just seems fair.

There are currently 17 companies in Seville with 6 or less members, so that is about 100 players that could be discouraged and quit by losing their company.

Maybe that is a small number, but I wish we could gain a 100 new players every month, and not lose any.

I'm over it, but still want to help the game grow, not shrink.

Thanks for listening,

MikeR2

purplepirate

  If the maximum number of companies per city is 200 then it would seem logical that if you want to be in seville then you need to have a large membership of regularly active members or build your company in another city. I've never done the process of making a company and colony but i was deputy of our company back on OGP. I do see that they take alot of work and do agree that you should be at least given an opportunity to relocate (didn't know you could even do that). I don't know how the game mechanics calculate when a company should be booted but i get the reason for why it does (It has to keep the game flowing for new companies against older and more inactive ones). Negociant stated that he was away for 5 months! Maybe the game gives less time when the city maximum is reached like in seville? There were periods in our company (located in Amnsterdam) that months went by with little to no activity from members but the only thing that happened was our director was booted and another was assigned.

  Personally, i think for something as complex as company, there should be a guide either in game (when you create a company) or online so people can read exactly how they work and what conditions you need to maintain to have one. But now that we all seem to understand this basic rule, it'll make people more conscious in the future as to company creation.

carlalex

1. If you google "uwo company" you have a good starting point for info on how companies work.

2. For a company to be a going concern I think it needs 5 members from separate accounts and a minimum monthly contribution depending on its rank (AFAIK 100 for rank 0). If a player hasnt logged on for a very long time (months) her characters (up to 3 per account, but only counts as one of the 5 needed) will be removed from the company. Contribution shouldnt be an issue since now one member can hand in contributions for everybody in the company (this means a full company with only one active can now outcompete one with say 30 active members who all contribute.)

3. All it takes to keep a company a going concern is ONE active member (ok - has to be director or deputy to accept applicants) ensuring that the members list doesnt get too short and that minimum contrib is met.

4. I dont think any company with members gets deleted in a town where there is still room for more companies - THIS IS NOT SOMETHING I KNOW - ONLY THINK!

Alexandria might no be your first choice for a place to set of a company, but I think you will find it very easy to compete for company house and rank there.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Why is there any limit on companies?

There is no limit on the number of players that can be from one country.

If the idea is to balance the odds between countries, so that Spain doesn't dominate, then the game should create incentives for development of a new company or new players in another country other than Spain. 

Seems like it would be better to use a carrot, instead of a stick to beat on small companies, that are just trying to get started.

CrzyPsycoChick

@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Has I ever told you the ancient story about the rise and fall of the long gone player TerryFarrell? 

Ahhh TerryFarrell was a player of very few words back in the early days of OGP in the city of Seville he had max levels  fully modded ships costing in the hundreds of billions and a complete maxed set of forged his total account was worth well over 400billion in assets(NOT an Exaggeration)  he would go around deck battling people and plundering their gear using his unbeatable forged gear all while constantly laughing hysterically at everyone he beat. This pissed off ALOT of players at the time and they sought to get even with him.  At the time nobody knew how he had amassed such a fortune until one day his secret was revealed and thats when players struck back and reported him... TerryFarrell instantly vanished one day never to return he was permabanned.

At the same time about 20 companies in the city of Seville instantly Vanished into thin air back then Seville was maxed at 200/200.  It turned out that he had tons of alts all placed in companies to hoard space and goods and thats how he amassed such wealth using an army of alts to store nanban and ship parts in the various company shops.  20x 50= 1000 company slots that could have been used for actual players was used by 1 player.

So basically the limit and five active IPs is to stop people from abusing the system with company squatting with alts what was done above takes A LOT of work but it can be done and hurts the game tremendously when people do it.  Im sorry you lost your compy but...I rather that than some dude pull a Terry and hurt the game its for all of our protection 

purplepirate

@xxxxxxxxx You want to talk about incentives? This game needs an incentive for people to actually PLAY! What bothers me more than the limit on companies is when i see merchant chat FULL of people shouting WTB/WTS but yet not one of them wants to leave seville to follow though with their request! Even if you offer them an awesome deal, nobody wants to leave seville, YOU have to go to them!. You can be just in the next city yet nobody wants to sail anywhere in a sailing game! Go figure.

xD

purplepirate

@CPC loopholes are funny xD

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Wow, CPC, never heard about TerryFarrell. but does explain why the quick fix limit was installed..

I thought in today's "we know your every move" world, the system could have spotted a con like that and been able to block that guy without putting a limit on the number of companies.

Doesn't the game check IP addresses frequently?

PurplePirate, I absolutely agree about Seville and Merchant Chat, that is why Legend Exchange needs fixing, or the concept of an Exchange Shop in each major city for getting rid of the junk you don't want would let us all play the game without having to do inventory management all the time.  I suppose the new CASH SHOP is Papaya's idea for minimizing the need for inventory management, but it is certainly not big enough yet to solve the problem.

Maybe a UWO "EBay" would solve the problem.  No one has to go any where. The game handles the escrow, and moves the items that are purchased or sold between players.  You don't even have to be online for your auction to end with a sale, or if the item doesn't sell, you start the auction again with a lower "Buy It Now" price when you come back on line.  Papaya could charge a small fee for each auction to reimburse them for the management of the trades.

We all agree that the game needs new players, but inventory management, and companies being discontinued, are at least 2 reasons why players get discouraged and quit.  

What can be done to attract and then keep new players

Better advertising of the game for sure.

More early rewards for new players, 

More help for new players, 

Minimize Server disconnects, 

Eliminate Sagres School confusion

Not sure what else can be done

purplepirate

@xxxxxxxxx  Maybe a UWO "EBay" would solve the problem

Problem with this idea is that it promotes '3rd party reselling' and can lead to gold mining on the server which will hurt papaya sales. The best thing for this game would be a central auction house so we could get rid of usless items in our inventories.

CrzyPsycoChick

@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Its one of things that looking from afar you wouldn't notice as a GM at first just random companies with 5 members here 7 members here etc.  No reason to look.  However once people start reporting and the GM looks deeper then the GM will start to notice hey this toon only logs once a month for 5 mins to transfer 1k nanban from this account to the company shop and give the $ to one player or hey why has this toon never left seville for 6 monts and only trades with this account? Etc.  Multiple companies makes it harder to catch but once they're on to you...game over.

If Terry was low key and was a nice guy...I think he would have gotten away with it longer or never been caught but once he got people pissed and they reported adios.

As far as a new system as you described yes it would work but its an older game and all of our updates come straight from the asian server.  Changing the code is highly unlikely unless asia does it first sorry to say.

@purplepirate

This..."cyber world" some people feel is the single most important thing in the world and will go to GREAT GREEEAAT lengths to be successful in it. In fact people still do what terry did just to a much lesser extent I know you may have noticed some companies filled with just nanban or just ship parts....they're pulling a Terry. I've seen players do some crazy things 

Seen a player named princess...something I forget but she actually made a family of alts mom dad brothers siblings and would actually have split personalities and talk and eat with one another...weird

Seen a player spend 10k USD per month just to uplift France as a nation

Seen a player with a dungeon exploration rate in 6 figures

Seen a player named Sylphid who would fleet newbies in safe waters offering help just to leave port and attack his pirate alt and sink the newbies

I seen alot of crazy sh** I should make forum of just old tales and legends some people might like it I dunno...:P

purplepirate

@CPC Seen
a player named princess...something I forget but she actually made a
family of alts mom dad brothers siblings and would actually have split
personalities and talk and eat with one another...weird

I wonder if that was one of those people who whined on the forums about not being able to have ip use for 5person fleets for fear of banning claiming that they want to play with their 'family' members? lol Those people kill me how they always seem to have exactly 5 people in their families and that either all of them must play together or none at all. xD