How do you feel about the content being spread through the Season?

personally, i'm a big fan. i'd always finish everything the season had to offer in the first week or so, and so giving me a reason to come back later in the season is a great thing

I think the updates are being spread too thin at this point in time. Sea forts with no cosmetics to earn or new things/reinvigorated old content to do on the side is kind of disappointing. I'd like if they'd maybe go back and balance pass old quests every now and then, make the old voyages somewhat viable compared to the new ones.

To be fair, I have all the previous commendations done, so unless they revamp old stuff, the new stuff only cuts it for me for a few weeks before I feel like I'm doing nothing again. I like the sea forts, but I've now done them all and had the experience, I can get the commendations, but then I'm back to having nothing more to do. I want some new goals for old stuff honestly

Meh.

If it's all dumped at once I burn through it. Spaced out I spend more time in the game so someone who wants a fight can try to chase me down or bother me lol.

I think R prefers the latter.

I kinda prefer them spreading content out but I thought the whole point of Seasons was so the team didn’t have to put out as many big updates every month.

I also would’ve loved to get more of a heads up about having to wait another month for the PL stuff. We’ll see how this is handled in the future. But as of I now I think it was handled pretty poorly. The lack of free cosmetics right now really doesn’t help with my opinion of the content.

I'm fine with it, honestly. Fact of the matter is that people will complain about how content is delivered no matter how Rare does it. Personally, I like this method of delivery, because it keeps up the hype for what's coming next, while still giving players plenty to do in the mean time. My only question is when the mystery will start, as the roadmap said the first mystery begins with Season 6.

Hmm, i personally dont know yet. I see nothing wrong if Rare tries out new ways to feed us stuff. It also depends on what kind of stuff we get. I personally like the adventures and how they might change the world and/or the lore.

Perhaps we know better after a season or two. At least i think i need some more time before forming an opinion on this matter.

I think because they started this now, especially after a primarily QOL season and a start about the middle of a month (so also no new Emissary rewards either) it feels like we're not getting enough to do this way while we waited for several months.

IMO they should have packed more into the first month of the season they changed the schedule or had something at the end of previous a bit more than just the Adventure.

As soon as this kind of updates is maintained, it doesn't matter if we get all at the start or a third of it every 4 or so weeks.

@peony7185

I didn't think of it this way, you are right, the lack of communication surely had an impact on players, me too. I expected all the content to drop at the start of the Season and we couldn't have had had any doubt about it as it's always been like that, I was ready to jump on the new season and do the new voyages, knowing the delay so late surely had a lot of impact. Possibly if they communicate that together with the announce of the new content might feel less disappointing to people like me.

@ghostpaw

I just disagree, they used to evolve the world and it has never been tied to having monthly updates, it's not like making the Reaper's Island bigger was a core feature of an update that got spread through multiple months like the features in this update, Duke moving around to hint at mermaids happened during Seasons, they didn't need to spread content through the Season to do that. Evolving the world doesn't require you to drip feed the content through months, they always evolved the world and never had to do that.
Now Adventures are here to monthly evolve the world and its story, making so the new adventures start 2 weeks after the start of a Season doesn't make the world more interesting or evolve more, making ledgers start almost a month after the start of a Season doesn't help evolving the world. If Adventure 2 hints at the Pirate Legend content we have to get they could let us play the adventure on day 1 and then release the PL content 2 weeks after.

And while I do agree they are passionate, passion doesn't pay the bills. I think it's you that can't see the industry works, Plunder Pass and Season Progression are there for Lore reasons? to evolve the world? Passes are not features made of passion, passes are a cheap way to keep players playing your game and make some revenue, and there's nothing bad about it! It's part of the industry, it's what makes them able to give us big updates every 3 months.

Game Pass is a big source of players for SoT and possibly they get money from Microsoft based on how many people play the game monthly. Whether it's Rare's strategy or is asked by Microsoft, they will try to update the game monthly and give new stuff to do or FOMO content to make Game Pass users buy another month.

You talk only about passion but what do you think these stuff has to do with passion: Twitch Drops, Seasons, the events before Adventures, Login Rewards etc.

Think of the events! They didn't use to evolve the world, they were just a check list: Fish 500 ruby splashtails, Kill 500 skeletons, etc...
Those monthly events were clearly made up to make players log-in for the limited cosmetics: low effort (basically a check list of already existing stuff to do), limited time cosmetics for FOMO and zero lore. I know this because I've been asked for year for something like Adventures.

If they were just passionate about the game and its world why have we waited almost 4 years for PL exclusive content? Athena and the Sea of the Damned are some of the most important things lorewise and it took them years to start exploring them. Seriously, where's the passion in making players reach level 50 in 3 companies and then the endgame is a 1 hour voyage that is 1 part OoS, 1 part GH and part MA? And the new voyage we got after that was a Gold Hoarder voyage but always on the same islands.
Why does it take so long (not anymore with emissaries) to cap companies if the content is not varied enough to go past lvl 20-30 without it getting incredibly repetitive. They wanted to give a reason for players to play more, to complete stuff. Giving rewards to make people play your game feels the opposite of stuff made with passion. Where's the passion in making half baked features and never expand on them? 3/4 of the game's activities have so much potential and still each update they introduced a new half baked thing that players will play for a month instead of going more deep on features the game already have that could offer much more. Having 100 not fully developed system makes the game feel more bloated and bland compared to games that may have half, or less, of the System SoT has, but fully developed.

I can feel the passion on the art side, how the islands are made, the graphics, the music, the sounds, how the game feel immersive. But on the gameplay side the game still doesn't feel like each feature got to even half its potential, no matter how much stuff they add if each thing is just an appetizer of what it could.

Going back to the business discussion: big games like SoT can't live with proper marketing, don't just pretend they don't do stuff for marketing reasons because people online like to give a negative aspect to it. Good marketing in GaaS makes big content drops possible, if done well it's good for the game. Seriously, it's a good thing.

PS: Seriously tho, give me a good reason why Ledgers are not tied to Seasons. Why shouldn't new rewards be available on the first month of a Season?

@faceyourdemon

If there is a feature that simply isnt ready yet sure push it further into the season!

Yeah I completely agree on this! Even tho I personally prefer to have everything on the first day of a Season, I feel it's way more important that the content is ready so, if the reason the content is delayed is to refine it, I'm ok with that.

@whitelisted8572

No one was complaining. I avoid pvp whenever I can. It's part of the game and almost completely avoidable.

I like that they do that. Allows for continuous content.

I will know once the season finishes, really. So far so good though.

@ghostpaw

I hadn't the arrogance to criticize your post just to try convincing you of something I strictly believe in, I meant to have a discussion as arguing about something enriches your view on things, if done properly. I just gave you my counter argument to your argument as I think you are wrong here. The discussion we had wasn't about personal opinions, like enjoying or not content being spread, that'subjective, we were discussing about a topic that has a real unique answer.

I think it's naive to think big businesses don't make business but make games out of passion alone, you can be as passionate as you want but passion doesn't pay the bills for hundred of employees. If not, being passionate should inspire you to make more money so you have more to put into the project. But hey! that could be considered MY view of the industry, which is why I gave you many example of the game trying to keep up the player retention through reward systems and how sometimes they do spread content for no reason but having player login again (like Ledgers coming 20 days after the start of a season, as I asked, still feel free to give me a good reason other than mine, I'm here to have a discussion as said). So yeah, I think it's clear they also made stuff for "business purposes" (also like Seasons, Twitch Drops and the old events), feel free to give a counter argument on these too.

And, as said, there's nothing bad about working like that, games need money to be made. I don't like that kind of culture that hates on dev trying to make money regardless of HOW they implement monetization systems and psychological tricks to keep players engaged with the game.

While I could be wrong on the fact they planned the PL content to be delayed for "player retention" reasons and might just took more time to develop it than they thought, I still think it wasn't meant to slowly evolve the world: with the Adventure trailer we can safely say Wonda (and someone else as, even do there's no one but a skeleton in Wonda's cell, the spanish pirate says "So, who are they?" and I don't think he's referring to Wonda AND the crab) got kidnapped and kept in a Sea Fort cell. As soon as Adventure 1 came out, many, like myself, speculated about the fact that Adventure 2 would be connected to Forts (as we already knew it was called "Forts of the Forgotten"), as Golden Sands NPCs weren't there we also assumed they got kidnapped and possibly kept in Sea Forts. The fact in the game there currently isn't the cell key but the prompt is there we can safely assume part of Adventure 2 will be freeing Golden Sands people from the Sea Forts.
Assuming this is correct (we'll see in 2 days) then there was no Lore reasons to wait 2 weeks for this to happen. If PL content is related to Adventure 2 it should be either released at week 1 of Adventure 2 or right at the end of it at most which means all content could have been delivered through the first 3 weeks of the month. (Want to keep Ledgers reward out of the discussion here, genuinely can't think of a reason to delay them). They might give a lore reason to justify the Adventure delay, but I think delaying the content and then justify it is different from delaying the content because of a lore reason.

Still makes much sense to me as, as said, player count goes down even before the first month of a Season ends and, while Rare has all the data and we only got steam charts, I predict Xbox accounts player drop are even worse (and peaks are much higher too) as many players play from the Game Pass.

@peony7185

They always have been delayed compared to the start of a Season sure and I always hated it in fact, as I always thought it was for the same reason, I'm not saying it's something new. It's not like it's a System that decide itself how to work, Devs can decide when ledgers start and end, if it starts one month after the start of a Season it means it's intended, they have control over it.

People can't earn them this month because Rare decided to make the end of last ledger not fit with the Season patch day.

@pellahh said in How do you feel about the content being spread through the Season?:

@peony7185

They always have been delayed compared to the start of a Season sure and I always hated it in fact, as I always thought it was for the same reason, I'm not saying it's something new. It's not like it's a System that decide itself how to work, Devs can decide when ledgers start and end, if it starts one month after the start of a Season it means it's intended, they have control over it.

In the previous season that started early December, the new rewards could be earned in December.

People can't earn them this month because Rare decided to make the end of last ledger not fit with the Season patch day.

A ledger is defined by Rare from the 1st to the last of the month; they can't cut it short every now-and-then, at least without informing everyone as people might have planned to gain some experience at the end of the month as well.
What did you want to happen; should Rare have started Season 6 two or three weeks later ? Before we know it, there will only be three seasons in some years ...

@lem0n-curry

A ledger is defined by Rare from the 1st to the last of the month; they can't cut it short every now-and-then, at least without informing everyone as people might have planned to gain some experience at the end of the month as well.

They should manage it as they manage the countdown to the end of the Season: you know how many weeks are left for the Season which means they know when the last Ledger of the season should end.

As soon as a new ledger starts you know exactly when it's going to end, I don't get what players should be informed about O.o

@peony7185

@pellahh Eh I mean the ledgers ending when they do is more for consistency and reliability, if they always changed to fit with when a season launches it would be a bit unfair and get even more frustrating.

I disagree, it would be more consistent if the new rewards that COMES with new seasons would start with the season. As said in my last post, Rare knows when a Season's gonna end and the players too, why not split that Season in 3 Ledgers?

Right now it doesn't feel consistent to me.

I mean I guess they could separately release new ledger rewards exactly every three months in separate updates from season launches

Why the updates must be separate? My idea is to launch them on a Season's day 1.

@pellahh said in How do you feel about the content being spread through the Season?:

@lem0n-curry

A ledger is defined by Rare from the 1st to the last of the month; they can't cut it short every now-and-then, at least without informing everyone as people might have planned to gain some experience at the end of the month as well.

They should manage it as they manage the countdown to the end of the Season: you know how many weeks are left for the Season which means they know when the last Ledger of the season should end.

As soon as a new ledger starts you know exactly when it's going to end, I don't get what players should be informed about O.o

There have been occasions where an update was postponed, all of a sudden you might no longer be in the clear for your rewards, as you might have no time to play that week.
They could change the length of the ledger, sure but they're going to have to inform those that expect it to last the complete month.
You do know that many complain about patch-updates during their play unexpected while currently there is a notice on the start screen ? It will take some time and certainly a lot of support tickets (and at least 10 posts on the forums) from players who thought the position on the 30th or 31st would give them a reward...