Extending the olive branch to Schtserv?

[Ade]

Hi everyone.

I read the post from Varista over on https://schtserv.com/

I haven't played on Schtserv since before the FIRST wipe, and Ephinea has been the greatest PSO experience ever, hands down.

But I do think something is owed to Scht. It was the first time I could ever play on GameCube online after Sega pulled the plug, and I got YEARS of great fun on Schtserv Blue Burst before items / balance got way out of whack. (And even had SOME fun after they got out of whack.)

The post made me sad. I feel like the Admins there have tried their best but failed. And it's hard to look at a bunch of hard work and say, "I failed." I feel like they're going through that right now.

Rather than have them start completely over, would it be feasible, I mean...if this was something that Soda, Tofu, Matt, and Ender WANTED to do...to invite their Admins and players here and allow them to join the Ephinea family? Scht is still very important in that it offers GameCube PSO support and a now 90% functional Episode 3 experience (which is a huge step from where it started years ago). Is there any viability at all in merging the two servers and welcoming them with open arms?

Instead of EVERYONE having to start completely over, a lot of us could rally and give the new players some basic gear to get off to a healthy start. I know that for some, the initial grind from N-VH is just awful after playing Ultimate for such a long time. Maybe we could help.

Again; just an idea. I'm not a programmer. I don't know if their devs would be "fish out of water" here due to differences in server architecture. I just feel really sad for them. They seem really down and out, and I was just seeing if we could help.

Thanks for listening. Any input from the devs here is welcome. Or if this is a dumb idea that would never work, just say so. This isn't the usual rant where I'm going to fight and debate everything. I just felt the need to say something.

(Edit: Sorry, I didn't give any background info because I assumed everyone knew this already. Schtserv is going to wipe their server again due to balance / game content getting out of control.)

Take care,

-Ade

 

[Sodaboy]

I don't understand the logic of this post.

Ephinea has always been open for anyone to play on since the very beginning. We've never had this thought that Scht players or admins aren't welcome to play here. They could have started playing here at any time. The Scht players and the admins could already have characters ready to play here even during this time.

Scht's upcoming wipe, their own decision for their current problem and not the decision I would have gone with, is their problem and not Ephinea's to solve. (Though if you want my two cents on that problem, I'd probably have just gone with re-balancing or removal of their broken items and let everything else as is, but that's an entirely different topic.)

I don't understand why Ephinea needs to extend an olive branch and treat Scht's player base or admins any different than any other player.

There doesn't need to be any special programming done to accommodate them, should they want to come here and play, in regards to leveling up or giving them equipment and the staff of Ephinea shouldn't also be expected to go hunt down Scht players and admins out to extend them a special invite to the server.

If they want to play here, they can, and if the community wants to help them get started here, the community is more than capable of doing that on it's own.

The community can help power level them. The community can help them out with equipment. There is nothing that should be required of the staff at all for this to happen.

As I said above, Ephinea is and always has been open for anyone to play on and this is a problem the community itself is more than capable of dealing with on it's own.

Schtserv doesn't even need to host a Blue Burst side of their server, but that is also a choice they make because they want to have their own community and their own thing. So whatever arises from that should be up to them to deal with. They can handle it, I'm sure.

 

[Ade]

Well, that answers it. My idea was dumb. I guess I just feel bad for them. But yeah everything you said is right. Never mind, then.

Edit: I was in the middle of a game earlier so I couldn't expand on that. I guess I was envisioning some official person from here, like an important person or Admin, going over there and being like an ambassador or something. You're right, anyone there can join us of their own volition. Common sense has never been my strong suit.

Thanks, @Sodaboy for the reply. It makes sense.

 

[Varista]

To answer what Sodaboy said about rebalancing our broken items: I agree and it was the initial thing I was going to do but the problem with it is that there'd be too many weapons and items to have to rebalance altogether. The ultimate downfall is that everything is too powerful. The items themselves are coupled with the extremely high stats. We could remove the EXP boosts, but does that solve the issue that everything is too easy to kill? And then without going through the trouble of buffing monster stats like Ultima did its hard to make something fun and viable to play. Wiping it was the only option.

To respond to Ade: While I admit we have our differences and dont always get along I appreciate the thought. Really it's the thought that counts. Schthack as it is now is not the same as it was previous. The primary difference and most key aspect of this data wipe is that it's voluntary. We are going out of our way to reset the board and start fresh in order to fix the larger issues and as a result of the commitment we have our playerbase and our fans are extremely excited to get back to a server that feels more like what we remember; to get back to something that we love. The community response has been staggeringly positive and while there have been people that have disagreed and are upset (mostly players that haven't been playing as long) it's a loss that I still struggle to admit in my mind as being necessary. This is something we should have done 2 years ago when actually nobody played and actually nobody cared, but the fact that we're doing it now and the idea has such a giant discussion circled around it shows to not only me but the entire community that people actually do still care about what happens to us.

People have been telling me to throw in the towel, that it's hopeless. That there's nothing left to give. But if there was nothing left to give, if there was nothing left but an empty husk with no potential, why do people try so desperately to make me give up? Why do people try so hard to make Schthack seem like it's thrown in the towel? Probably because they know it's not over and we still have a lot to give back. Not the old people that lost your data on an accidental hard drive crash with no backups, but the people that willingly throw hard work out the window that they spent hundreds of hours if not thousands of hours working on just to reset the board and start fresh from a better perspective to give the players that do care and that do bother a chance at something significantly better. I think that angers people. I think it makes people mad that we still have fight left in us. I'm happy that they are, because if they are then that means we're doing something right.

 

[Sodaboy]

To answer what Sodaboy said about rebalancing our broken items: I agree and it was the initial thing I was going to do but the problem with it is that there'd be too many weapons and items to have to rebalance altogether. The ultimate downfall is that everything is too powerful. The items themselves are coupled with the extremely high stats. We could remove the EXP boosts, but does that solve the issue that everything is too easy to kill? And then without going through the trouble of buffing monster stats like Ultima did its hard to make something fun and viable to play. Wiping it was the only option.

Since you're planning to roll all item definitions back to the 2007 era, what is the issue with just REMOVING all of the post 2007 items instead of rebalancing them?

It shouldn't be very much work to implement this, I think?

In the ship or even the login code, you could scan a character's inventory for item IDs that no longer exist and just remove the item from the player's inventory and banks (ez check to see if it's out of bounds by the PMT's standard), then just reorganize the inventory for both and set the # of used inventory slots appropriately. You could also just do a global database sweep if you wanted too.

You'd also just set the EXP back to how it was in 2007 as well.

The game should still be playable, even if some of your players are at level 200 already, because we all know that PSO isn't over at 200. You're still in for the item grind.

If the high level characters are still an issue, you could always also do something like reinitialize players to half of their level or something...

I know it's your server and you've already made your decision, but just saying... I just see other ways of solving this than a complete wipe.

 

[Eistee]

At this point, seriously, just let it go, Varista. Why do people want you to give up? Because not only is your fight pointless, it actively hurts the already small PSO: BB community by splintering it even further.

What does SCHT offer besides broken items? Nothing. Ephinea does everything better. There is absolutely no reason for SCHT to exist after yet another wipe.

Just keep GC going, let BB die and don't make new players accidentally join a worthless server because Google spat out "PSO SCHThack" for some reason.

If someone is willing to invest thousands of hours into PSO:BB, then it should be obvious by now that SCHT is not a good choice to do so.

 

[Sodaboy]

Although everyone is entitled to their own opinions, I'd rather not have this topic turn into a Schtserv bashing topic.

Thank you!

 

[Varista]

Since you're planning to roll all item definitions back to the 2007 era, what is the issue with just REMOVING all of the post 2007 items instead of rebalancing them?

It shouldn't be very much work to implement this, I think?

In the ship or even the login code, you could scan a character's inventory for item IDs that no longer exist and just remove the item from the player's inventory and banks (ez check to see if it's out of bounds by the PMT's standard), then just reorganize the inventory for both and set the # of used inventory slots appropriately. You could also just do a global database sweep if you wanted too.

You'd also just set the EXP back to how it was in 2007 as well.

The game should still be playable, even if some of your players are at level 200 already, because we all know that PSO isn't over at 200. You're still in for the item grind.

If the high level characters are still an issue, you could always also do something like reinitialize players to half of their level or something...

I know it's your server and you've already made your decision, but just saying... I just see other ways of solving this than a complete wipe.

You're basically going half way there and half way back on the items so might as well go the full mile. There's so many broken and unfriendly items that if you'd do that you're essentially deleting most of the last 6 years from the game, you might as well just do it completely. A lot of people agree with me on this (people from the community anyways).

At this point, seriously, just let it go, Varista. Why do people want you to give up? Because not only is your fight pointless, it actively hurts the already small PSO: BB community by splintering it even further.

What does SCHT offer besides broken items? Nothing. Ephinea does everything better. There is absolutely no reason for SCHT to exist after yet another wipe.

Just keep GC going, let BB die and don't make new players accidentally join a worthless server because Google spat out "PSO SCHThack" for some reason.

If someone is willing to invest thousands of hours into PSO:BB, then it should be obvious by now that SCHT is not a good choice to do so.

Who decides which server player's should play on? Not you, not me. Nobody but the player. If they have fun with us then they have fun with us. That shouldn't matter to you because you have a chip on your shoulder. I'm not giving up just because some one told me "it's pointless". Sorry, but you'll have to just deal with it.

 

[Eistee]

What does SCHT offer after the wipe that Ephinea does not do better, or just as good?

I bet the player that are "having fun" on SCHT could be having just as much fun on Ehpinea, if not more.

 

[Varista]

I bet the player that are "having fun" on SCHT could be having just as much fun on Ehpinea, if not more.

I bet you would never know that and the fact that you're even complaining about it is troubling to me.
Not to mention going into the GC discord and defaming my character over a "dead and pointless server". Cant be so dead and pointless if you're willing to attack me over it.
I have nothing else to say. We can agree to disagree, and thank you @Sodaboy for the discussion and @Ade for the topic.

 

[0Salt]

What does SCHT offer after the wipe that Ephinea does not do better, or just as good?

I bet the player that are "having fun" on SCHT could be having just as much fun on Ehpinea, if not more.

Why are you being a jerk about it? Is it because you’re “having fun”?

 

[Kevdo]

I think Sodaboy summed it up really well. Also, I understand Eistee's initial response. I've played on SCHT since 2007. A lot of us saw a lot of things happen on that server, but that's neither here nor there.

At the end of the day, anyone who wants to experience Ephinea is absolutely welcome to do so, until they're not, but they would have to do something to be unwelcome.

 

[TheWeeDz]

I agree with Eis, I have so many hours on Schtserv after the wipe. Schtserv have nothing to offer, the 5k ATP base launcher for Racast or 10k/12K ATP base weps or Racaseal with resta didn't fix you server as you plan... If you get everything Vanilla or Semi-Vanilla you will be a not cool Ephinea. Ephinea is an incredible server with great community and many items for sale, join us if want to play PSO and just give up.
Can keep GC, people have fun in it.

 

[Harborer of Hope]

Hi everyone.

I read the post from Varista over on https://schtserv.com/

I haven't played on Schtserv since before the FIRST wipe, and Ephinea has been the greatest PSO experience ever, hands down.

But I do think something is owed to Scht. It was the first time I could ever play on GameCube online after Sega pulled the plug, and I got YEARS of great fun on Schtserv Blue Burst before items / balance got way out of whack. (And even had SOME fun after they got out of whack.)

The post made me sad. I feel like the Admins there have tried their best but failed. And it's hard to look at a bunch of hard work and say, "I failed." I feel like they're going through that right now.

Rather than have them start completely over, would it be feasible, I mean...if this was something that Soda, Tofu, Matt, and Ender WANTED to do...to invite their Admins and players here and allow them to join the Ephinea family? Scht is still very important in that it offers GameCube PSO support and a now 90% functional Episode 3 experience (which is a huge step from where it started years ago). Is there any viability at all in merging the two servers and welcoming them with open arms?

Instead of EVERYONE having to start completely over, a lot of us could rally and give the new players some basic gear to get off to a healthy start. I know that for some, the initial grind from N-VH is just awful after playing Ultimate for such a long time. Maybe we could help.

Again; just an idea. I'm not a programmer. I don't know if their devs would be "fish out of water" here due to differences in server architecture. I just feel really sad for them. They seem really down and out, and I was just seeing if we could help.

Thanks for listening. Any input from the devs here is welcome. Or if this is a dumb idea that would never work, just say so. This isn't the usual rant where I'm going to fight and debate everything. I just felt the need to say something.

(Edit: Sorry, I didn't give any background info because I assumed everyone knew this already. Schtserv is going to wipe their server again due to balance / game content getting out of control.)

Take care,

-Ade

*A tiny warm paw is placed on your shoulder* Ade'-Kun has the right frame of mind and a thoughtful vision. For the record, mew had always championed keeping her moar rarer toys in reserves for when a lost loved one from SCHT would wander home to Ephinea! She would try to get them as close to possible to their old lives. Mew had also hopped on scht some time ago to coax others to come over as well. Her practice Still continues to this day~!♡♡

 

[Kevdo]

People have been telling me to throw in the towel, that it's hopeless. That there's nothing left to give. But if there was nothing left to give, if there was nothing left but an empty husk with no potential, why do people try so desperately to make me give up? Why do people try so hard to make Schthack seem like it's thrown in the towel? Probably because they know it's not over and we still have a lot to give back. Not the old people that lost your data on an accidental hard drive crash with no backups, but the people that willingly throw hard work out the window that they spent hundreds of hours if not thousands of hours working on just to reset the board and start fresh from a better perspective to give the players that do care and that do bother a chance at something significantly better. I think that angers people. I think it makes people mad that we still have fight left in us. I'm happy that they are, because if they are then that means we're doing something right.

I don't mean to come across as rude, and I mean this in the most sincere and constructive way possible, but I think you may be misplacing judgement on the importance of SCHTServ as a server.

I think the simple fact is we'd like to have all PSO players come together on one server. It's not necessarily hatred towards SCHTServ, but more so that we'd like the community to gather under one roof, so to speak. You might ask, "Why your roof and not our roof", and the answer is simple too. I believe a particular distaste for SCHTServ is certainly justified. We can't ignore the troubled history of that server, or the community is doomed to repeat those mistakes. To be honest, I'm not sure why what happened on that server is swept under the rug, kept secret like some crazy conspiracy. Everyone should know that the old admin used to sell donation items for money, that some of the GMs blatantly abused their position and would ban people they didn't like, or steal items from banned players' inventories, or that the supposed data loss with no backups was just a cover up for the fact that no one there knew how to deal with the silly amount of real money trades or hacked items that players could create with a trainer.

Ephinea is, in many ways, the learning and moving on from all that. This server has so many anti cheat checks that I'm almost certain came from lessons learned with what happened on SCHTServ. I don't say these things to slander the name, though it might appear that way. I just think it's important to be honest with everyone about why we have the opinions about SCHTServ that we do. Otherwise, it wouldn't make sense to someone who doesn't know, they'd just think that we're angry, as you say.

I can't speak for anyone else, but I can tell you that I'm not angry towards you or anyone else trying to rebuild SCHTServ. For me, the simple fact is that the server lost my trust a long time ago. I poured thousands and thousands of literal hours into SCHTServ, like many others. Once a server loses its players' trust, that's it. It's incredibly hard to win that trust back. I imagine that a lot of people that played back then feel the same way. I've seen so many familiar names here, because this community has been largely made up of the same people for the past 13+ years. I don't know for certain, but I imagine that the people that still stick around there are people who just don't know about all that stuff that went down. If we tell someone they should play on Ephinea instead, it's not because we have malicious intent to destroy your dreams of a fantastic PSO server, it's just because we've seen what's happened, we've lived it. It's because we, too, want to see a fantastic PSO server!

So, I hope that sheds some light on why some of us just can't ever see ourselves going back, and why we'd love to be able to welcome everyone to this server, where we've been having tons of fun for years now. A place where I feel confident that the people running this server are competent and trustworthy. I'd love to see the PSO community come together, to see those glory days of 300+ people online on a private server.

 

[Harborer of Hope]

I don't mean to come across as rude, and I mean this in the most sincere and constructive way possible, but I think you may be misplacing judgement on the importance of SCHTServ as a server.

I think the simple fact is we'd like to have all PSO players come together on one server. It's not necessarily hatred towards SCHTServ, but more so that we'd like the community to gather under one roof, so to speak. You might ask, "Why your roof and not our roof", and the answer is simple too. I believe a particular distaste for SCHTServ is certainly justified. We can't ignore the troubled history of that server, or the community is doomed to repeat those mistakes. To be honest, I'm not sure why what happened on that server is swept under the rug, kept secret like some crazy conspiracy. Everyone should know that the old admin used to sell donation items for money, that some of the GMs blatantly abused their position and would ban people they didn't like, or steal items from banned players' inventories, or that the supposed data loss with no backups was just a cover up for the fact that no one there knew how to deal with the silly amount of real money trades or hacked items that players could create with a trainer.

Ephinea is, in many ways, the learning and moving on from all that. This server has so many anti cheat checks that I'm almost certain came from lessons learned with what happened on SCHTServ. I don't say these things to slander the name, though it might appear that way. I just think it's important to be honest with everyone about why we have the opinions about SCHTServ that we do. Otherwise, it wouldn't make sense to someone who doesn't know, they'd just think that we're angry, as you say.

I can't speak for anyone else, but I can tell you that I'm not angry towards you or anyone else trying to rebuild SCHTServ. For me, the simple fact is that the server lost my trust a long time ago. I poured thousands and thousands of literal hours into SCHTServ, like many others. Once a server loses its players' trust, that's it. It's incredibly hard to win that trust back. I imagine that a lot of people that played back then feel the same way. I've seen so many familiar names here, because this community has been largely made up of the same people for the past 13+ years. I don't know for certain, but I imagine that the people that still stick around there are people who just don't know about all that stuff that went down. If we tell someone they should play on Ephinea instead, it's not because we have malicious intent to destroy your dreams of a fantastic PSO server, it's just because we've seen what's happened, we've lived it. It's because we, too, want to see a fantastic PSO server!

So, I hope that sheds some light on why some of us just can't ever see ourselves going back, and why we'd love to be able to welcome everyone to this server, where we've been having tons of fun for years now. A place where I feel confident that the people running this server are competent and trustworthy. I'd love to see the PSO community come together, to see those glory days of 300+ people online on a private server.

*Tiny paws applauds in agreement and testimony!* ♡

 

[Bam]

As a new player here and as someone who played over there for a super brief time. This server sparked my huge interest in the game again. Both communities helped get me started and gave me a leg to stand on with help but over here its all been "legit" help or at least felt like it. People enter your game, ask if I was new or saw my weapons and damage and knew I wasnt an alt or had higher lvl friends here who gave me stuff and they themselves tossed me some items to just help out. I was always overly shocked people here would give me rares and never meseta lol I know why now cuz its actually used as currency and not just my banks full of meseta so it dont matter. When I was there, people would come in, say come to p2 and drop tons of reds and meseta just like back in the days where DC and GCN lost its appeal to me trying to play legit. Nothing seemed earned that way, Im totally for helping out and I have been storing items to keep paying it forward when I see others in my same boat. Any major items I have, I have bought with PDs from others and I enjoy the communtiy here, I havent had any negative experiences yet. I didnt over there either but if i compared the 2, over there just felt like how the days when the game was broken and items and stats werent supposed to be that easy to obtain. Im just putting in my 2 cents and I maybe lvled to 30 there but with a bank full of stuff I could only imagine having legit just cuz I was online at the right team for someone to enter. This was quite some time ago and honestly I dont know what era I fit in as, I was just happy playing PSO again and when my interest perked up again last week, I was looking into private servers again and out of the 3 I could find, this one had more players online and everything I read and saw was positive (except for an incident that was resolved and cant keep away all toxic).
Honestly I applaud them for trying to do their own thing and keeping GCN afloat is really cool but I would rather see more players on and bumping up the numbers because playing solo is ok but with 3 other people, now thats what I like. Just putting my 2 cents in and just saying how at the short time I played there and even my week here, I can see a night and day difference and will be spending alot of time here.

 

[SirLagsAlot]

Id say just delete psobb from scht if its really that bad and keep it for GC and ep 3 only. Kinda like how sylverant is for v2 only. That way each server serves a specific purpose.
Eph: vanilla
Scht: GC
Sylverant:v2
Destiny:cheesy custom stuff
And dont forget the new xbox private server with native VC is coming out which leaves gc obsolete

 

[Ade]

Id say just delete psobb from scht if its really that bad and keep it for GC and ep 3 only. Kinda like how sylverant is for v2 only. That way each server serves a specific purpose.
Eph: vanilla
Scht: GC
Sylverant:v2
Destiny:cheesy custom stuff
And dont forget the new xbox private server with native VC is coming out which leaves gc obsolete

I don't think PSO GC will ever be obsolete. It has Ep. 3, so having everything on one platform is nice. A lot of PSO players don't like to voice chat.

That said, my dumb idea turned into way more of a topic than I imagined. Neat.

 

[thegmk]

Hi gang,
I have played on both these servers this year: ephinea and schthack. I've been in contact with Varista about fun little tweaks and classic gear updates. Things that make solo play more enjoyable without breaking the game (making flowens armor and shield lower level so you can get the set bonus from basic flowens sword in Hard, etc).

Scht, to me, has been a fun deviation from ephinea. Sure, at the end of the day ephinea is home, because the QOL updates and polished content is key (along with an active in-game community). What scht offered me, as an individual, was a voice for, effectively, sandbox development. I felt like I was a part of a Classic-PSO rebuild and rewrite initiative.

Scht offered people a place to enjoy mostly vanilla pso, with exp bonuses and better drop rates. It was a great, casual experience for someone seeking a couple months worth of pso nostalgia without having to spend the next 6 months grinding TTFs to level. Forgot to feed your mag for 10 minutes? No worries! You can feed more because you waited. Want a reason to actually use elemental attacks on weapons? Scht has your back!

Sure, we have Ultima and Destiny, but those are a bit too obtuse for me. Way too much custom content and far from a general vanilla PSO experience at its core.

Again, at the end of the day, PSO is here mostly for us nostalgia-folk who loved it growing up. Ephinea is home to most of us in the community. We always find our way back here. If someone wants to play schthack after the wipe, let them! We're all a family, whether we like it or not. We shouldn't disown our brother if they decide to move to another state. We should only welcome them back with open arms should they decide to come back home.