Community Crunch 134: Small Tribes Servers, Upcoming Structure Changes, & More!

They are all PvP Aquinius

https://www.battlemetrics.com/servers/ark?sort=score&q=Small&features[2e079b9a-d6f7-11e7-8461-83e84cedb373]=true

 

11 minutes ago, JuiceStain said:

Please add more small tribe servers they have been capped for hours.

They are going to see how these ones do for the next month or so before releasing any more. They need to see how well the succeed first.

7 minutes ago, PacketShooter said:

Are the SmallTribe servers isolated like the cluster servers and is there ORP?

They are isolated cluster, you can't transfer in or out of the cluster but you can transfer between them.

Dang ok, my tribe was really looking forward to a pve server.

looks like they will be announcing the new xpac whenever that countdown starts in my opinion

 

For the pillar crap they are so out of touch with the community its sickening ....

 

12 hours ago, BlueFox91 said:

Devs have no idea the mess they are about to make with the structures change..... 

+1

11 hours ago, GreenRoc said:

If Ark had a storage system for dinos like Pixark has. I'd store most of my dinos in there, if that was a thing.

So 1) Wildcard needs to rework kibble system

or 2) Wildcard needs to add dino storage like Pixark has

Both of those, either of them, I'd be willing to cull/store half of my hoard.

I get that you are on legacy so the dinos have been with you for over 2 years, and that sucks.  My first 150 perfect tame in all of ark (a 150 anky named Pokey) was on pve-official37 when it went down.  It was a hard thing, seeing them all go but i didn't have the infrastructure to switch my 350 dinos to another server.  So I get it.  I miss Pokey, I had a hell of a time anky-strutting around and walloping the poop out of things on him.  So it's hard for you to cull your 500+ because of the memories, and might off more if they reworked the kibble trees.

But you are an exception to a rule I think many people are not seeing:

If half the kibble dinos are required to have a working kibble farm (say, only 20 needed instead of 40  *these are made-up numbers* ), people will not magically want to tame (or breed) less dinos.  They will tame (or breed) up to their limit, as we all will, with 20 other dinos.  This is not my opinion, this is a easy-to-understand fact about ark players in general.

What I'm saying is, reworking the kibble tree will only make the game easier.  It won't help FPS drops, it won't help tame-caps.  It will just make taming and imprinting a little less messy.

1 hour ago, WildManFyfe said:

Going to have to have 3x3 turret towers everywhere. inorder to not get griefed as hard and get FOB'd up on

1 Stego + 20 C4 = FOB getting built lol. You would waste more resources doing this than learning how to build properly/strategically.

1 hour ago, BlueFox91 said:

I think A structure needs to be so big before it blocks dino spawns... Maybe a 5x5 and larger.... then the minimum building requirement can't be a size minimum like a 3x3 (if that's one of their ideas). It needs to be a minimum total of how many walls, fence foundations, pillars, ect are snapped all together to the main foundation.

That way at least players that will be spamming small huts to keep control of their land wont be blocking dino spawns. Everyone knows players are still going to try to structure claim land! And least make it more time consuming and costly to do so rather thsn slapping down pillars and ladders.

Our large fences and curved structures won't be affected if there was a minimum total of how many walls, railings, fence foundations, pillars, ECT. there is all together.

 

2 hours ago, Kyrissa said:

May as well kiss all the beaver spawns and many of the metal/obsidian spawns goodbye. Our center server has those pillared to protect them. We have a small valley pillared so our tribe and several others have somewhere to do meat runs because a lot of dino spawns keep getting ruined by nubs building thatch huts everywhere. It's not an excessive area. It suits our needs and makes it so we don't have to try and walk a giga from South jungle island around all the bases and structures to get to the opposite side of the map.

There are a few issues with pillars on some servers more than others, but they do serve a valuable purpose on many servers. I hope this doesn't ruin the game for us. 

3 hours ago, TyphoidBeaver said:

I play on pve where there is no option but to claim all the land around your base to keep trolls from ruining our ability to play, I remember when no one pillared and it was the trolls and wildcards lack of oversite and punishment that made us have to start doing it

There are many things that block other players building but do not block spawns, such as gates, spikes, boxes, campfires, standing torches, cages, crop plots and signs. Most new players start on a beach, so stop using beaches for resources, if a base does not decay after a while, the people are still playing and can be asked to move. Remember, OTHER PEOPLE PLAY THIS GAME TOO. Any land blocking, for any reason including the common 'preserving spawns' BS is just a selfish playerbase on PVE.

 Pillar spam on PVP is pointless most large tribes use a combination of dino gates, spikes, foundations and signs.

 

4 hours ago, OUTCASTSHera said:

Why can't they use the same tactic as Rust? Make it so you can only have so many build boxes per tribe. Those build boxes (looks like a large storage box) can show you the structure amount and what creates the area that is blocked. You can only build within the zone of that build box. To keep people from building on certain spawns/resources the tribe can decide on what resource is most valuable to them and block others from building there with their one build box out of say 5 build boxes allowed per tribe. The only way to prevent the dino spawns or resource spawns is to start building. It'd be a simple fix along with lowering the spawns blocked and structure spamming. 

Start a tribe, place your 5 build boxes in strategic locations, ally with a friend. Start a new character on the server, rinse and repeat until the server is fully locked.

Plus on PVP the build box would be a very valuable thing to protect as it would prevent FOBs being pushed forward, defensive structures whilst attacking etc. 

Or mega tribes could just get, say 20 people on a server, all place their 5 build boxes, therefore preventing people from counter FOBs etc and allowing server ownership rather quickly.

 

 

Also, THERE IS NO MEAT SHORTAGE ITS CALLED THE SEA YOU IDIOTS, MY TUSO HAS ALWAYS OUT-PERFORMED MY GIGAS ON MEAT RUNS.

Add more small tribe servers please.  6 servers is honestly not enough

5 minutes ago, Hurleybros said:

Add more small tribe servers please.  6 servers is honestly not enough

They are.

 

Release MORE small tribe servers please, you guys should do a CrossArk one as well.

They are all slot capped!

I do believe you all will be surprised how many people have been wanting this.  They will be extremely popular.

Edited June 5, 2018 by Skiidzman

I just want to start off by saying that this game is amazing. I have been playing for a very very long time and there are few games that constantly have me coming back. However, if there is one thing I have learned from this game is that it has been catering the huge tribes up until the game neared full release with a few questionable updates with the only backlash on the updates being primarily from those large/mega tribes. The backlash was seen after the flier nerf, the turret nerf, and now the structure re-work; my opinion is think about the game, the game that we all play and--dare I say--enjoy playing.

The reason for the flier Nerf was to balance the playing field for smaller tribes to be in fairer dogfights with higher level  fliers. The developers knew that a ptera with 500% movement speed was fun and extremely convenient but in raids the lag and choppiness was unbearable and most importantly unfair to smaller; lower level tribes. Do not get me wrong, I hated to see my mutated, level 316 ptera with crazy movement speed get nerfed but I understood that it was good for the game's Future. I had Quetzals that could outrun a jet for god's sake. It was fun but game breaking. 

Then came the turret Nerf. Hell on earth. Only 100 turrets in that tiny area? What on earth are we gonna do? There is a simple answer to this: use skills and tactics. Time and time again I see people complain about the turret Nerf but for the game to feel like a survival game (which it is at its core) there needs to be contemplated risk-reward factors. Now that the Nerf happened tribes are forced to be smart about their turret placement and player skill rather than focus on how many turrets you can fit on one giant metal hatch-frame. I understand the issue. Many people--including me--had many, MANY, turrets lost in the blink of an eye. All the hours were lost and my faith in the game lost as well. But as I thought about it more and more the pros outweighed the cons. The limit in turrets brings a sense of accomplishment when building a tactically effective defense and the raids that ensue will be far more player-based, raw, and immersive with an even more addictive adrenaline rush that comes with an intense raid.

Now we have a structure re-work. To be honest the first time I saw it I was so happy (blasphemy, I know XD). I have played in gigantic tribes as well as two-man tribes and despite tribe size, structure spamming was still an issue. With lag and with annoyance. I see time and time again people "marking their territory" and "protecting valuable resources" and it's not beneficial; it is annoying. The whole point of ark is to fight for what is yours. The whole premise is that everything can be gained or lost based on whether or not you are willing to fight for it. I just think that sprinkling pillars everywhere is not a fun; immersive experience but is rather monotonous. I also understand where people are coming from on this issue though. With rapid decay people could build right next to you or the tribe itself could build decent bases all over and cause even more lag. Understandable but not realistic. Players should defend their base at all costs. If someone rolls onto your doorstep, end them. Do not let a structure play the game for you.

I want to reiterate that this is MY take on this specific issue for a game in which I invested a lot of time in. I think that we, as a community, need to look at the developers critically and look at ourselves critically. Are we playing the game because we need to in order to protect what we have worked so hard to get or are we playing it because it is fun? Are the developers making fixes for the game's health or simply trying to make us happy? I want to protect what I have worked hard for but have a blast at the same time; I want the developers to improve the game's health while also trying to make us happy. I want to play a quality survival game with an immersive atmosphere/community and a developer that wants more people to experience the game in a great way. And yes, I just wrote an essay.

I have a question or two regarding the Super Fan Edition ARK box: Has the dossier book been updated to really include all the critters found in ARK?  When I looked through the one my friend had, it was missing the Otter and all the critters from Scorched Earth and Ragnarok. It was also missing the Aberration creatures, due to Aberration not having been released yet.

I was also curious as to whether the dossier book includes the updated dossiers for the TLC critters?

With the loss of pillars I will probably lose my base.  At that point I would be finished with Ark after over two years of playing.  Been on Ark since close to the beginning.  The most valuable customer to any business is the customer that brings repeated business.

It has been said several times - give us something else to protect our bases please! 

Edit: this is from a pve perspective ofc.

Our tribe has a large yard, and to protect it from wild spawns and resources it's covered with several 1x2 foundations. I don't want to build boxes and get stuck on them all day long. I don't want to have rock elementals spawn there after the patch, or lose dinos because of respawning rocks. 

I also don't want people to build too close to our base again, we had this happen several times until we started placing pillars. 

Every time people had been building close to us we were unable to place/replace things inside our own base.

People destroy beaver dams, spino spawns, bronto spawns, river access, paths through canyons. How can we protect us now? 

Another thing; what happens to transmitters, cloning chambers, tek gens etc. That might be placed on 2x2 foundations or less? Will this stuff be destroyed?

Edit 2: what about gates? They are two structures and hardly any of them are snapped. Will all our gates be gone after the patch? 

Edited June 5, 2018 by Weiss

18 hours ago, TedyBearOfDeath said:

You realize that people are tame capping the server on purpose right? For the same reason you cancer spam pillars. To prevent new players from joining the server. 

With out a steady stream of new players the game will die out. Ark has constant bad reviews and refund requests because new players cant even play the game. They log in try to find somewhere to build for an hour and turn off the game and return it. All because people want to be entitled little children, "This is my server, I dont want noobs on it. Im protecting it" What a load of bull, youre killing the game. Even the fresh servers are getting people grinding out pillars so they can take over as much of the map as possible when transfers get turned on in 60 days. So what is just adding new servers going to do other than add more servers with tons of open slots but no where to build?

Why do you think theres 1800 unofficial PVE servers compared to the 300 official? Because official are a waste of time with the pillar spam.

sorry man, but new players need new servers, what if a noob can build but cant tame? the game isnt about build an all, u need dinos and on a tame capped server if u are new player u will cam build inland but u cant tame nothing = return

1 hour ago, Saupe said:

Start a tribe, place your 5 build boxes in strategic locations, ally with a friend. Start a new character on the server, rinse and repeat until the server is fully locked.

Plus on PVP the build box would be a very valuable thing to protect as it would prevent FOBs being pushed forward, defensive structures whilst attacking etc. 

Or mega tribes could just get, say 20 people on a server, all place their 5 build boxes, therefore preventing people from counter FOBs etc and allowing server ownership rather quickly.

 

 

I can see your point there. People would abuse it. I never noticed a bunch of spamming on Rust, but the map was HUGE in comparison to ark though. There wasn't really a need to claim a bunch of land. 

Just curious why exactly do the eu get the new rag servers. You have the whole world playing the game and you open specific servers to specific areas and if you not in that area but want to play that map you get excessive lag.. One consistant thing with every action is the lack of thought towards the customer base.. Both the fresh servers and the small tribe servers opened up with rag on eu servers.. 

Just devwipe any tribe that tries to spam structures, simple, its a form of cheating and needs to be treated as such. 

Anyway, another highlight of why structure limits to protect areas are bad, already servers look like this: To combat announced changes.....welcome to the aesthetic future of ark.

Wonderful idea with the small tribe servers. Way to implement it in the typical Wildcard fashion....with not enough servers. C'mon, 1 for each map, 2 for island? 6 total? There's no WAY that could be a bad idea. You really had a chance to bring a fairly large player base out of retirement. Still do, if you get it together.

Only opened up one server for each map for small tribes, and they were all full as soon as they opened up... there's clearly a demand for them. open more servers

4 hours ago, waylayer said:

sorry man, but new players need new servers, what if a noob can build but cant tame? the game isnt about build an all, u need dinos and on a tame capped server if u are new player u will cam build inland but u cant tame nothing = return

New servers wont fix the cancer that is the official pve player base. Like I said placing pillars everywhere and tame capping servers are both done on purpose by the players to keep people out. The servers are not tame capped because the server is over crowded, its done purposefully by a tribe or alliance. Adding a new server wont accomplish anything, the same cancerous players will go to the new servers and pillar the whole map and tame cap it. New players will barely get to play on them.

Playing devils advocate here - but I for one am glad to hear about this change as pillar spamming is a load of Horse$hit, irrespective of intent (protection of resources, pillar griefing other players, etc). 

Beaver dams blocked - tame a couple of snails or kill some mantis and farm some stone - CP problem sorted.

Protecting large metal/obsidian nodes - well that should be part of the no build zones, but maps like Ragnarok have ridiculous quantites build into the cliffs all round the are perfect for quetz/anky harvesting.

Spawn/beacon points - well thats a no brainer - the devs really need to make those no build zones and identify them as such (structures like obeslisk terminal/tek teleporter.

As for dino spawns, just suck it up and go searching the map like every other normal person - if wannabe alpha twat waffles didn't pillar spam the crap out of all the decent build zones - noobies would be less inclined to build in some obscure dino spawn place.

The only downside of the change is that it people are going to find out the minimum structure requirement and we'll go from pillar spam to small hut spamming - Another forum user addressed this issue in another post with a land claim/flag system where by players have a flag/token (single) that they can place down to claim land and then build out from there - if they want to relocate they can move their flag but the existing structure rapidly decays (24-48 hrs - allowing time to relocate dinos/resources, but unable to relocate flag again within 72 hrs preventing people moving back and forth to reset timers). Additionally as a tribe they could be limited to 3-4 flags preventing Alphas spamming and claiming an entire server and push out/pushing all other players trying to establish themselves.

Mic Drop - Rant over.