First off, hello all, I am a fairly new player(less than a week) to this game. However I am not new in any way to MMOs or free MMOs with transactions such as this. I've developed a deep understanding of these games over the years(been playing for about...12 now started in runescape classic when it first came out and played almost everything between there and here) and thought I'd share a bit a feedback for the developers and grab some community attention here to try to solve certain....issues that appear rampant on these forums.
So lets get straight to the meat of the thread. Energy and you. At first this was a bit off putting when I saw it because it reminded me of the vitality system in dungeon fighter online, which I thoroughly disliked. However once I noticed you could buy it with in game currency and moreso that it seems to be it's own tier of currency I completely approve of it. You heard that right. A brand new player, LIKES the energy system. It works, and it works well. The only people it's going to limit is bad and/or impatient(MUST CRAFT EVERYTHING NOW)players, which is kinda sucky for them, but maybe it'll convince them to try buying some(even $.75 is enough to pick yourself up and get back on your feet). However that is to say the system is not without it's flaws. The biggest of which is that the value of the crown needs to have a presence, and with a larger influx of players over time it won't be worth all that much, thus no reason for CE to be sold for crowns, which thus creates a vicious loop. But this is not a problem with energy. Rather it is a problem with crowns and more specifically the player economy.
You see the numerical value of the crown in itself is inconsequential(Rather than it's importance as a currency) in a game where crafting is of great importance. Because materials and crafted items WILL be of value, and it will be of value that scales with the price of energy. This is because in order to collect materials you will need the energy to do the runs and free players while not able to control the price of CE, CAN place value on their items. The problem comes in to play with how difficult/time consuming trading is in this game, and people preferring to trade directly with CE, making crowns of little importance other than for vendors. To this I say the game could use, no NEEDS an auction house type trading hub. Something to spark the economy and give an easy interface for new(and old) players to trade without hassle or time commitment. And this hub NEEDS to only be able to trade with crowns, that way it encourages people to convert energy to crowns thus ensuring a stable currency exchange. I know there's already a thread about an auction house, but I'm not sure if it was suggested for it to be crowns only. This would solve alot of innate problems that people have right now. Another solution is to have the current energy exchange expanded on a bit. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you can only trade in chunks of 100 energy? Why not make smaller portions as well? Even if it's just 50 and 10 energy. That way if somebody doesn't have enough crowns to buy a full 100 they can keep going on a run they're currently in, and it allows people to play with the market. All that being said energy isn't nearly is as bad as people are making it out to be, just that it could be a bit more intuitive rather than seemingly intrusive as it is now.
Now that that's out of the way let me touch on other topics. This is a great game from I've played with so far and as far as actual gameplay is concerned I only have one slight. And that is that some equipment seems...trivial. Guns for instance hardly seem worth taking. Bombs are a nice AoE and swords are for dps/control. But there seems little point in ranged weaponry ESPECIALLY those that stall you when you fire them so you can't kite with them. And even those that you can move and fire with suffer from insignificant damage. It seems they only exist to apply status effects at the higher tiers, but even then, why not use a vial, or a status bomb/sword? I myself was using a two sword set up for awhile(troika/cutter one for AoE/control and one for dps) because I didn't have any bombs and every gun I've made is kind of trashy. Also some are misleading, such as the autogun(made it sound like a click and hold spray weapon rather than what it is not to mention it stalls you which completely defeats the purpose of using it). And on top of that from what I can tell elemental gear is the only real way to go later on, which is kind of sad that their aren't more diverse damage types. I'd just like it for all equipment types to be at least viable(I've heard you can't even use guns on the jelly king). Perhaps a more dedicated gunner could drop a shield for two guns since a good gunner wouldn't really be close enough to need a shield. Maybe just buff some stuff on the guns more to give them a better niche. I could be wrong on this too, maybe guns DO hold value in higher tiers, but from what I'm seeing and hearing they're pretty bad.
One last concern is the party system. Specifically because it's so murky interface wise and I can't actually tell WHEN party members can/will join me. Also there needs to be some sort of compensation/punishment when a person leaves in the later stages of a run, because it seems to really screw a party. Like maybe a dynamic scaling system where players become stronger the less there are and/or fewer mobs spawn(thus less loot so people actually want to stay partied if possible but not boned if they aren't).
This game has great potential and I'd like to see it kick off so I'd thought I'd throw my 2 cents in as a seasoned veteran of the MMO market. Feel free to discuss/criticize/expand on my post.
Single bump because I'd like this to get SOME sort of recognition.