Flying Mounts

[Amnath]

The gulch wyvern was also exploitable outside of that chunk, it was something you did while equipped in your horse slot.

What did you really need a flyer for? Named runs.

[Blackstorm]

Hi,

I played VG from the beginning (beta 5), and in first times of the game we didn't have the flying mount and the riftway system.

After many complain devs add the riftway system to simplify travelling especially for friends groups and to not take 1 hours to go from west to the east part of the map, avoid highter zones that can aggro you by the aggro level (i remember a friend that was killed at least 25 times, near darknarg, because he was to close from the swamp and each time he released to the safe spot, all mobs from the zone rushed him :p), travel to one continent to others without pain of finding the appropriate boat and placement... (if you are in Darknarg and want to see a friend in Tanvu... you must go to New Targonor before, and using your horse ??? if you already have one)... also, you didn't have IoD to test the game with your friends, so in the first time you was completely spread into the map and continents in reference of your races...

After that, they implement the flying mounts (not really after, because they had this feature on the latest beta, but extra bugged), that was another big immersive piece of the game! you could go to some inaccessible dungeon easly with your groupmate etc. that not the point ^^ they give us Randolph for the Christmas days that enabled the flying feature for your low level characters, just for this period (great period for all grinders ^^ and alts) after that, it was just a simple horse ^^. It was really good, and give sense to the feast days (more than double xp!).

The only thing i can deplore about flying mounts is the "temporary" rental flying mount you can buy for 10min and the possibility to buy one with brokers/merchants.

All flying mounts should be available only at level 40-45minimum (redesigned from their flying mount speed points). Randolph should be usable at lv15 (fly enabled only for Christmas days). If a quest require a flying mount before that, find another way to do the quest but do not give a temporary flying mount (poeple will retain the quest forever to keep the mount forever -> delete/accept quest). You should be able to buy a flying mount (broker/merchants) only if you are flagged like someone which already "win" (loot or quest reward) a flying mount. Rift should be usable only if you unlock it a first time and have the appropriate level (only the purple rifts are exceptions). That should be the more "tolerant"/permissive way according to me.

[Kinshi]

^ i would agree with most of that, but as a casual at best player, I found the ONLY flying mount I could attain was via Diplomacy and the city faction mounts (aka the Pegasus) system, because due to my work/play schedule availability, and VG's low even at peak population made it impossible for me to go on raids to get them, or to even get groups for the world bosses that dropped the coins.

As such I had to do an insane amount of Diplomacy to get the coins (450 platinum coins and 18,000 city faction)..and the diplomacy method of getting coins was a long slog.

Not complaining, it was worth it to be able to fly something other than a reindeer, but it was a bit of a bummer knowing that was going to be the ONLY flying mount I would ever have a chance of getting not being able to devote the time to raiding.

Though I imagine you guys are not going to be emulating the "Cash Shop" and such lol.....BUT I imagine because of that cash shop, there are a LOT of extra things that can be added in game via new quests (like since there were mounts, inc flying ones that came only from the cash shop, there could be new quests to off former cash-shop stuff as quest rewards)

At any rate, it would be nice if there was at least one other flying mount that could be had by the non-raiders.

[Jakkal]

I definitely agree with you Kinshi. We've been talking about (down the road a ways) making some quests so crafters and diplomats can earn fliers as well. At least something better than the pegasus. It was really an insult that the pegasus was slower than randy.

[John Adams]

I was informed that if I added one single thing from the "Cash Shop" into this game, that even the mere appearance of it in the game would "make everyone quit the game" because it "destroyed the game for most" and threatened that "they would not play a game like that" and that I "must not care about the community by introducing game-destroying content" (paraphrasing community feedback over the past year).

While I believe the only person to suffer is the player who refuses to play our (free) game because of a former cash shop flying Wyrm mount was now available via a challenging quest line, still I am hesitant to utilize a literal ton of items as custom quest rewards if the server is a ghost town because of it.

[Jakkal]

I honestly wouldn't listen to those people John. If they can't make their case without threatening to leave then, IMHO, it's not worth listening to. The players have been strongly against just about everything the developers did, in all stages of the game, but people still played it. If they leave because you put in a clockworm wyrm for a new fun questline for crafters - then just let them go. We probably don't want those types around anyway.

Quality over quantity when it comes to VG and that goes for the players as well. I'd rather have a server full of 10 quality players than 100 that will gripe, bitch, moan and cause the dev team stress for no good reason.

The threatening to leave thing might have held some leverage to SOE because of subscriptions, but it really doesn't hold any weight here.

[Koralith]

On board with Jakkal here.

Besides which... There's no point in not making use of assets made available to us. Just because they were in the Cash Shop doesn't mean we can't re-purpose them into something more appropriate for the game and acquired with a suitable amount of effort (equivalent or dependant on existing similar content).

[Jakkal]

Except Slappy.

[John Adams]

"Especially Slappy"??? Ok Jak!

[Jakkal]

I'm leaving forevers!!11!