Compared to the forum activity in a lot of other games, I find find that a lot of the threads here pertaining to the shortcomings of the game to be very constructive and you find very few personal attacks(something that is indeed rare on the internet).  Really, you have to give credit to the community here in that regard.

I'm sure I can speak for most current and former players in saying that we completely respect what Wu, Spec, Coma, Zer, and all the other volunteer GMs throughout the years have done to make this this game enjoyable for as many people as possible.

In summary, Faldon is like an ever-lasting case of blue balls.

LMFAO.

Philanthropy, you've been playing plenty long to have an opinion.  The reason nobody else is bringing up that point is because that's how it's been going for the last decade.  Zer will work tirelessly on the game for a brief period, drum up excitement, and then burn out and ignore it for a long period of time.

In summary, Faldon is like an ever-lasting case of blue balls.

The running joke of the whole conversation is , i built mechanic from level 1-650 in about 3 months. Leveling is plenty easy, i dont think noobs getting intimidated by high levels is as big of a factor as the non-playing visionaries behind faldon would like to think.

Im not going to pretend that i know what the main issue behind a non-growing faldon population is. I could make a few guesses though.
- I started a noob a little while ago , i had a hard time getting into a spawn , the Brazilians work very well together. They hold down spawns for along time , and are very aggressive to outsiders.
- I also think the lack of a real guide is a major factor, This game is too complicated to not have an actual complete guide.
- The great gold hoarder has done his part to put plenty of speculators into hoard mode as well, the economy is just creeping along , its hard to buy and sell items , as GP is not easily obtainable in the amounts that is already hoarded.   A big part of this , is the fact that so many people rely on NPC's for raw materials and Potions . The trade skills are not balanced with the current economy.  I've already stated my thoughts in this on a different post.
-The common knowledge of the lack of GM activity is well known threw out faldon , and it's a frequent topic of discussion . Im sure any new player who logged in and saw a conversation about this would think , why should i play this game?

I am fine with a wipe, i would be all for it . It would be a self defeating process though  . The people who use faldon as a chat client and wished items just fell in there lap would still complain. The people who obtained good levels would do it again , and the people who use faldon as a chat client would still complain.

If it comes off as being negative, it's really not my intention.  I've defended the positive aspects of this game many time, but if current and former customers don't express exactly what they don't like about a game and why, the developers don't know to fix things in future releases.

The secret to creating a successful MMO is to give all types of players a compelling reason to log in the next day.  The secret to getting new and casual players on the treadmill is to have them aspire to be like high levels as well as giving them a means to achieve this.  Besides making a games content much more balanced and easy to create, level caps are used in most games in order to give new players the sense that, no matter how much they play, some day, they will be the same level as all the other high level players.  And then there's Faldon...

So, you have a game that the power of the character is entirely based upon how many levels have(and how well you can exploit glitches, but that's a whole other story).  So, years after this client comes out and player levels are already extremely inflated because of players literally leveling for hours every night, you add a feature to the game that caters strictly to these players(it takes 4-5+ hours just to get into GeG), reward them with a large variety of spawns that drop some of the best items and gives gold every level.  This game has never had a huge player retention rate, but it has always relied on new waves of players coming in.  When most players log in the first time, they notice a lack of players and, as soon as they play for a while, they realize that there are always going to be infinitely higher level players than them because there's never been a stop to leveling or resets and active players are literally a decade ahead of them.  This is my main problem with GeG. To put it in a different perspective, when given the choice between leveling multiple players to max level as well as being competitive and having to drop years into a game with 20 players logged on and still being way behind, customers are going to choose the option one.

As previously mentioned, from a religion standpoint, it made no sense at all.  Originally(as stated by zer), religions were implemented in order to give players reason to create teams and compete in pvp with more meaning behind it(like factions in DAoC).  All the religions were set up to provide advantages and counters against each other to make it more interesting.  Unfortunately, it didn't work out that way because, right away, there were balance issues that weren't addressed.  If we pretend for a minute that, at some point, the religions will be balanced, GeG doesn't fit into that picture at all without heavy modifications to say the least.

To be honest, if you're going to balance religion you need to make an attempt at balancing the rest of the stuff as well, which is going to require a wipe.

Mechanic, I'll grant you the point on GeG's waning influence - level escalation has probably rendered it less relevant (tbh this is true of all of the religions).  At the time of its inception, it was guilty of all of the things I listed.

Which is my exact point on why when it comes to game balancing, Past situations should not even be considered, as they are irrelevant. If any new balancing should be done , it should be done by Spy, honestly hes the only one who has an active relationship with current players , and a general understanding of how faldon actually works currently(some times is more of a hindrance than a help.).

While i don't always agree with spy , i feel like he does as good of a job as anyone could.

It's silly for people to throw in their .02 when they really don't have a proper understanding of the current situation.

As far as the "Private spawns" go , i think even futi could agree with me on this one, The spawns in there are normally packed, "Private" is a bad word.  And you also know that there is a lot better spawns outside of GeG.

Regarding the "for his friends" thing - it wasn't explicitly built that way, that would have got his Gm taken away immediately.  Basically, his guildmates were whining (another reason Gms should not actively play), and so he built GeG to grant what they wanted, and used their chars as the model initiate for the religion.  That is to say, the religion was built around his friends' needs and abilities.

It absolutely was an abomination. 

It wasn't balanced with the other religions, it entirely broke lore and made no sense within the perspective of the Faldon universe, it encouraged aspects of the game that were already overemphasized, it exacerbated preexisting issues with sparsity of player population, and it gave an extra entirely unnecessary assist to citizen players.

Once again , my point being ignored, GeG is a trivial at best assistance for players with high levels, It really helps those in the 150-350 bracket the most.  I still fail to see where you think this is a bad thing, Since it seems most of the powers that be , or lack there of , seem to think the "High Levels" have too many advantages.

If it was built only for his friends why is this area available to everyone? Beside the point that its not even that good of a leveling zone, Which you would know if you had any idea what current game play was like.

If your trying to say i don't have proper perspective on the issue , you obviously have no idea who i am , i played for along time long before GeG was even around , i reached top 10 before geg was around , and i did it on a new character after its here as well.  Your only proving my point more with your lack of knowledge of the current players and game play of faldon.

As far as this goes, i'll agree with you there. If you recall  my previous posts about expansion of GeG into factions or expanding GeG into less of a religion and more of a C perk.

As the  spawns  are concerned, They are some what stale and sterile , ill have to agree, but it goes back to my original point , GEG IS NOT A GOOD LEVELING ZONE. The new lethe is much more effective. Bangle Beach is also a faster place to level. The Vampire and TO spawns in HP spawn are available in the desert as well. There is nothing especially advantageous about GeG after you get to a point where your levels are 10-15million exp + apart.

It wasn't balanced with the other religions, it entirely broke lore and made no sense within the perspective of the Faldon universe, it encouraged aspects of the game that were already overemphasized, it exacerbated preexisting issues with sparsity of player population, and it gave an extra entirely unnecessary assist to citizen players.

This isn't even taking into account the fact that Lothar was basically building it for his friends, when he should have been spending time helping me script the NPCs to finish off desert map (that's a whole other issue, though).

The game was considerably worse for its existence, which was players who had been around long enough to have perspective on the issue.