Purist becoming a permanent character mode

phantasystarved

worse than a Humar
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Hi, guys. Thank you for making the suggestion forums public, again.

This is a really difficult topic to discuss sometimes, because the purist/LotL/SSF mentality is difficult to understand for those who play mainstream PSO. But this need for understanding matters, which is why I'm leading off the thread this way instead of just asking for the game mechanic that I'd like to adjust.

When the removal of PSO2 drop penalties happened, an oft-repeated comment I read was, "Thank goodness, now there's no penalty for other people joining. Now there's no reason to avoid multiplayer games." The irony is, for your purists, it was the exact opposite. To us, we don't see it as everyone getting their own drop table so much as each monster now gets double, triple, and quadruple drop rates as players join. And the only way to avoid this is to play solo.

Again, I lay this out only to hopefully increase understanding on where I'm coming from, not to convince anyone that I'm "right" or to pass judgement on the PSO2 drop changes. That change is done and over with, the vast majority is happy with it, and I'm glad you all are having fun with it. It would be greatly appreciated if you would toss the purists a bone, however.

A quick and dirty method would be to just bring the option for Classic drops back, but I think the better long-term solution is to also finally give purists their own character mode. "Separation of community" doesn't apply since we separate ourselves anyway, and having our own economy is a huge help, actually. Purist characters would have server bonuses disabled, would not be able to make or enter PSO2 drop rooms and get a spiffy new color for character names. That would be all that's necessary. Please, please consider implementing this.

Thanks again to the staff for all that they do.
 
Well, i can hardly understand why purists should sepaease from the rest of the already small community?
When you get the purists mode I would give you special boosts weeks called the "s&m boost week" with decreased rates xD
 
Maybe make a purist season that lasts for 1 month? idk I'm just throwing out ideas.
 
Maybe make a purist season that lasts for 1 month? idk I'm just throwing out ideas.

this is something i'd be down for, but it'd be cool if it had a system like D3's where you can trade the item with only the people who were in your party at the time of the drop.

otherwise we will probably see whitill being the #1 ID for that season due to it being the only ID with a good 101 and good 502 drop, with greenill probably coming in at #2.

would be a kinda shitty season for IDs without h/bat or 101. they would probably barely see any play
 
How many people on this server do you estimate are purist? Since I'm not in that niche community, I really don't know how many there are seeing as I don't encounter them.
 
Maybe make a purist season that lasts for 1 month? idk I'm just throwing out ideas.

KINDA already getting that with the current Season (since seasonal characters are locked at base rates). Unless you're talking about a month where all players are locked into Purist mode.
 
Ironman season would be lovely for the people who like playing live off the land. It's not my favorite thing to do all the time, but I do like seeing how far I can get on one character without trading. The way atal brought up is also pretty dope but I imagine that's probably really hard to implement. The main thing is just to have an account switch to turn off the bonuses.

It's not that outlandish either, with other old school games like Runescape having the option on account creation.
 
Couldn't it be argued that solo mode IS purist mode to ensure only one set of drops falls? Doesn't the appearance of other players influence the game anyways by introducing an "economy"? If the problem is the extra availability of items to trade/buy/sell, couldn't you have a "purist" economy with inflated prices? And what's the end game for the economy, is it about being the person with the most PDs? Also, it seems like the purists are already segmented from the normal play group, so it wouldn't be hard to run an altered economy like I mentioned.
 
yeah but what about the death penalty and quest unlocking
Ephenia is no longer the vanilla experience, but it's still closer to it than other servers currently. Its silly to even suggest solo mode is purist as PSO was designed with parties in mind. Everyone getting drops was not in the cards and it is a PITA to balance a PSO2 drop system with PSO drops.

PSO no longer has the population to sustain the vanilla experience either (unless you go ham which a lot of folks here do) which is likely why DAR nerfs were ditched. Its a QoL change I agree with but, yeah, if you're looking for vanilla. It hurts. I don't see the harm in making it split off but the question is, do enough people actually play purist to do it? Why bother if it isn't even true purist? Are you gonna pay Matt/Soda to do it too? (idk but I wouldn't do that for free doho)

just enable gamecube support
 
How many people on this server do you estimate are purist? Since I'm not in that niche community, I really don't know how many there are seeing as I don't encounter them.
Hi Cassie. It's hard to say, since we tend to be rather reclusive, not participating much on the forums or lobby chat, but I know the population is less than it could be. A lot of us retreat to Gamecube or Dolphin (the emulator) and the recent drop changes are only magnifying that effect.

Couldn't it be argued that solo mode IS purist mode to ensure only one set of drops falls?
Hi Tao. Not every purist wants to play solo all the time. In fact, most don't, that's only the SSF (Solo Self-Found) people.

Doesn't the appearance of other players influence the game anyways by introducing an "economy"?
Yes, but it's a more controlled economy without inflated quadruple drop rates that in our view cheapens the worth of items. Otherwise, it's the same as any other.

yeah but what about the death penalty and quest unlocking
PSO no longer has the population to sustain the vanilla experience either (unless you go ham which a lot of folks here do) which is likely why DAR nerfs were ditched. Its a QoL change I agree with but, yeah, if you're looking for vanilla. It hurts. I don't see the harm in making it split off but the question is, do enough people actually play purist to do it? Why bother if it isn't even true purist? Are you gonna pay Matt/Soda to do it too? (idk but I wouldn't do that for free doho) just enable gamecube support
Hiya CTB, I wouldn't mind death penalty, quest unlocking or Gamecube support! But I was trying to suggest a compromise that would be easy to implement. No it wouldn't be a perfect solution, but asking for such is asking for the impossible, quite frankly. As to how many vanilla players there are, I dunno anymore since they almost all ran off. Perhaps some may return? I hope so.

Anyway, thanks to everyone for their input. I just want to be able to group up with like-minded people who aren't a fan of the new drop rates. Right now, there's no opt-out except to be forever alone, haha. Any fancy additions for a more purist experience would be tasty gravy, but a separate character type that enforces Classic drops would be fine and pretty simple to do.
 
Its silly to even suggest solo mode is purist as PSO was designed with parties in mind.
Not really, if you're concerned about other people getting drops. Ok, yeah, it's designed for parties but then the whole idea of the economy doesn't make sense because then anyone with enough time on their hands could destabilize it.
...it is a PITA to balance a PSO2 drop system with PSO drops.
Not really either, a simple way is to multiply the cost by four since that's the potential drop rate reduction. If you want to get a more accurate figure you would need to know average the party size to apply weights, so maybe it's closer to 3x price increase. It's an easy algebra/stats problem, but my point it we are talking about Monopoly money. Unless y'all are paypal-ing each other IRL....
I don't know how much work goes into it, but maybe the ideal solution is a re-implementation of Classic drops, but PSO2 is the default choice so new players don't get yelled at for making Classic games.
And again, shouldn't you just have a separate trade forum for purists since the mere existence of PSO2 drops offsets the economy?
 
This is really getting into the weeds, here. Forgive me, but this is not about the intricacies of PSO economics.

I woke up one morning to learn that drop rates had been effectively quadrupled, "Because I was playing Warframe and realized PSO classic drops were dumb," without any further discussion or recourse.

Fair enough, but as one of the last remaining people that enjoys vanilla/purist/insert-alphabet-soup play, when dozens of others have left over the years because of Ephinea distancing itself from its original vision over the years, instead of quietly slinking away as most of the others have done, I am requesting something that would take little time to implement because it's all code that's already been written before. I am not asking for a perfect Purist mode, just a way to circumvent all these drop multipliers.

There are people in this very topic who, in reaction to other changes that they felt would benefit them and their playstyle, were quick to say, "If it helps even one person (or newbie) not to quit then it is worth it!" These same people see a long-time vet asking for something that has been discussed many times over the years, but all of a sudden they're concerned about the amount of work (that they're not involved with) would take.

This is not to say that I don't recognize the time and effort necessary for even this small change. I've been more than grateful both publicly and behind the scenes, and with more than simple thank-you messages. I have given hundreds of dollars of financial support to PSO community members despite being disabled and thus scraping by on a fixed income. No, I am not talking about donating to servers for items. I'm talking about instances like, "Thank you Soly, I really appreciate all that you do for us, here's $100."

I'm asking for this game mode not because I think I deserve something, but because I don't want to give up and leave, too.
I'm asking because I'm making a conscious decision to find compromise instead of just complaining about the changes I dislike.
I'm asking because I really feel it will benefit the server, unlike telling people to get lost and go play solo or Gamecube.

I think I've said my piece at this point. Thanks again for everyone's time in hearing me out.
 
Classic drops should have never been removed. Purist players deserve to play however they like, i.e. classic drops in multi mode.

Every other change, like Purist mode, seems completely redundant. Why does it matter that the rest of the community, that you are partitioned from, has an inflated drop rate?
 
Could have kept Classic drops and just make PSO2 drops default, so new characters will have PSO2 drops preselected instead of Classic. Keep Classic drops as a second option.
 
I'm sorry if I caused any offense
No offense taken, friend, thanks for reaching out to me in private.

Classic drops should have never been removed. Purist players deserve to play however they like, i.e. classic drops in multi mode.

Every other change, like Purist mode, seems completely redundant. Why does it matter that the rest of the community, that you are partitioned from, has an inflated drop rate?
Have I ever mentioned that "Superstition" is one of my favorite songs of all-time?
Anyway, thank you, and to Cookie as well, for supporting the return of Classic drops.

To answer your question on why a Purist Mode, it's not a matter of being judgmental of how other people's drops work, it's just that it holds some advantages over just putting Classic drops back in.

Advantages to just putting Classic drops back in:
1) Someone cares, yay!
2) I'm not forced to leave, double yay!
3) Very easy solution that only takes a few minutes to implement

Advantages for a Purist character type as described in my posts:
1) It fixes more issues for purists than just the recent PSO2 drop issue
2) It would be a marketable amenity that would be unique to Ephinea's BB client
3) It sets up a more controlled economy for people who may not be purists but feel that the market's become oversaturated by past events and changing policies
4) It sends a nice message to a significant number of like-minded people of, "Hey, we will never have truly Vanilla PSO as that's not what we do, but we do care about you guys, so as long as you realize this won't be perfect, we'll set this up for you so you don't feel totally ignored, or worse, forced to leave"
5) Having a different colored name that's attached to the notion that they've earned their items the "old-school" way gives me the warm fuzzies.
6) This has the potential to insulate the server from (not all but many) future issues involving legit/purist/vanilla play that have been a thorn in the community's side for a while, now.
7) It would integrate nicely with the Seasons leaderboards

The main disadvantage is that this would take a bit more time and effort to implement, equal to or perhaps a bit less than it took to implement Hardcore. But Stevie, trust me, I don't begrudge anyone wanting to play with PSO2 drops, far from it, man. Which is why I have never even implied that I want that ability taken away from you guys.
 
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Have I ever mentioned that "Superstition" is one of my favorite songs of all-time?

still a great tune and always will be. i'm a bassist and i played it every weekend for like three years when i still played in bands because people don't ever tire of it!

on topic, personally i always found "classic" drops to be inherently flawed. not discounting your opinion of them, but the number of times i had PGF ninja'ed from me back in the day was enough for me to say good riddance. so on the surface, the change to PSO2 with no penalty made me happy, but that doesn't seem to be the case for all players.

am i right in saying the purist character type you're proposing is sort of like a "hardcore mode" without the death and boosts? as in making that character type would make it so you can't pick up normal mode items...only the items that drop for you?

additional question: if a HC character were to type /purist, would it remove the HC boosts or does that only work for server-wide boosts? if it does that might be another option?

(disclaimer: i am really tired and operating at like 55% capacity atm, if this was mentioned above and i missed it, my bad)
 
Another account type would be too much imo. Just make classic drops return as an alternative dropstyle (not primary) and merge that with /purist. So once you select classic drops, there won't be any daily, weekly or HBR boosts.
 
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