Was some type of SBMM introduced in the most recent patch?

a lot of the organic middle is gone/playing less/producing less

leads to less server activity but the skilled pvpers are still around (many of them involved in the content creation game in one way or another so it keeps them around to some degree)

It's why streamers running into streamers is WAY more common now, why seeing streamers is way more common, people seeing other familiar names is way more common.

There is a randomness to what you run into but also that activity isn't as filled with the mid-level organic play that typically would keep things more varied.

Interesting activity is low so there are a lot of hoppers trying to get in on very little interesting activity which means people that still are around and regularly producing at interesting levels are gonna very often run into a lot of heat.

@maximusarael020 said in Was some type of SBMM introduced in the most recent patch?:

@wolfmanbush What's funny is that I'm not observant enough nor am I involved in watching streamers enough to really know one if I saw one. I could totally see someone being like "Do you know who I am?" as they easily sink my sloop and me saying "Ummm.... no. Should I?"

Same is true of people who are super proud of certain cosmetics they have earned. People often ask on Reddit and whatnot "What are the cosmetics that if you see strike fear in your heart?" and I honestly wouldn't know the highest level Arena cosmetics from Emporium content or just something purchasable in the in-game shop.

Here I am in ignorant bliss as a famous NAL streamer barrels down on me.

Sot is very small world/big fish small pond when it comes to higher risk interaction because that higher risk taking is so much less common now.

Earlier on there was so much organic activity that it was just a more varied experience.

The random skilled player that nobody knows is FAR more rare now. In the glory days one would run into super skilled random players organically and had no idea who they were even if people were in the know of a lot of the skilled players.

The organic play area is just a lot less populated with the middle activity that isn't super inexperienced or higher skilled pvp.

I don't think so, we had some window-lickers and some sweatlords on the same server with us.

@thegingrprince said in Was some type of SBMM introduced in the most recent patch?:

@scheneighnay said in Was some type of SBMM introduced in the most recent patch?:

I don't think so, we had some window-lickers and some sweatlords on the same server with us.

Suggestion to replace 'Window lickers' with 'Mast Munchers'.

or just call it what it is which is inexperienced, something we all were at one point

people have different goals and different ways to enjoy a game like this, not everyone is looking to impress or to be the best at popular styles of play.

Discouraging pirates by disrespecting people isn't something that improves anything.

@sweetsandman said in Was some type of SBMM introduced in the most recent patch?:

Unfortunately, the casuals and mid-range players seem to be non-existent at the moment.

The new Ledger Rewards are some of the most boring pieces of a cosmetic set...and Season 7 was an effective QoL update and little more. On top of that, it basically dismissed any of the activities that everyone had spent 10...100...1,000...10,000 hours doing and lazily asked them to just...ya know...do it all over again. Worse yet..it's been mostly a buggy, broken, and incomplete product since it launched.

Hopefully, whatever is in store for Season 8 is BIG. Like... Ships of Fortune BIG... can't have another short-lived interest spike.

Unlikely to see a return of people that are either done with it or have adapted with far less production in their approach to their time on the seas.

I've been the canary in the coal mine for a long time on this when it comes to organic activity.

Activity levels being propped up with padded stats on two fronts.

They are using padded alliance server pve production during gold boosts to advertise activity and created a system of lurkers on twitch to advertise engagement, neither of these represent what the experience actually has become and neither lead to organic production.

Too much time has passed with the middle, they've adapted, they've moved on, they broke their habits and created new ones, they found other experiences to participate in.

There is no pool of risk takers to draw from or appeal to anymore at 4 years in.

Contrived combat is going to continue to go up, events and such because people make their living here and/or are heavily invested socially here so they will hold on to that as long as they can.

Alliance pve numbers will get more and more ridiculous just as they have been the last couple of years.

The people that are still very invested here are mostly pvpers and those that are involved in the social/financial scene. The pve side that want to participate in all the imbalances and issues while alliances are making bajillions with no risk and pvpers are chasing anything they can find while taking no risk is dwindling.

It'll continue to have the social media side telling everyone how amazing it is (which isn't insincere) but the organic activity will show that for many people without connections and those that just want to play organically without all the outside parts, it wasn't as great for them.

@sweetsandman said in Was some type of SBMM introduced in the most recent patch?:

@wolfmanbush

While I do feel that might be a tad "chicken little" and even a bit reductive, I don't think it's that far off.

People want stuff to do that isn't lore/storyline rooted... The lore and storyline only speak to a fraction of the community.

They've introduced the foundation for "quick" sessions of SoT...but there's nothing to do with that foundation outside of Sea Forts and server hopping for Reapers. More quick and high-risk/high-reward content would do a lot for the community. I think easier/faster means of starting the FoTD would be a tremendous start.

I've got my fingers crossed for S8 with some of the little nuggets we've heard, but time will tell.

Organic activity has been declining the entire time I have been bringing it up on this site, I just didn't wait until it was dead to start talking about it. These issues needed to be addressed early on in the decline not now when people have moved on.

They broke one major no no rule, trust
They didn't break trust with many people by bringing in milestones, people would have adapted.

Trust was broken by tossing out overview stats with zero transparency and zero communication on it.

They didn't lock in legacy stats, they didn't make a page where people kept their stats as they continued on, bye bye stat page, no transparency about it.

You are seriously overestimating how many long term people will come back after that. Years of people's commitment treated like a practice run.

That's a part of the disconnect, taking people for granted, expecting them to stick around and return and produce, they aren't hooked on Captaincy, there is no reason to trust stats because if the most difficult stats people worked for are silently tossed aside why would they trust the future? Why would they produce again? These weren't people that cheesed everything, these were people that took risk after risk for reward. Their stats were a part of that.

Good luck getting the newer crowd hooked on the grind because they are far less interested in participating in the combat and the higher risk/interesting scenarios.