Ask the admin (02/15/2011)

[Opera Phantomess]

Masquerade! Paper faces on parade. Masquerade!

Good evening and thank you for holding the ATA on a Wednesday! Please bear with me as I am very detail oriented and cannot ask a simple question without giving all the nitty-gritty surrounding one! gonk Feel free to beat me for doing this. >.< Long post is looooooooooooong.

1. What is going to be done about the fact that the Quest formulas have caused those who have and do not have them alike to hoard multiple components in mass quantities, causing what should have been semi-plentiful and already rare components to become next to non-existent and worth millions of gold in the Marketplace and Alchemy Exchange. They are doing this because the Quest formulas call for these components in good sums for not just one formula in the chains, but multiple ones, not to mention there are several formulas at level ten that repeat what was called for prior. This hinders those users just looking for those components to complete the normal formulas to have to shell out way more gold than they should or simply give up because Alchemy is already hard to do without hundreds of millions of gold and large amounts of luck already. As it is, I am putting my Alchemy quests aside simply because certain components for formulas I want to complete are way too expensive, and for me to have already spent over twenty five million gold to just get thirteen XP toward reaching level four and having several incomplete formulas due to a combination of the above and the use of disappearing Cash Shop component items leaves a really bad taste in my mouth that is just getting worse.

2. Why are the Quest formulas so rare in the first place, and why do they cost billions of gold and huge amounts of luck to craft? Why do they have so many parts to them, especially after reaching the level ten stages of them? Even those who can afford to continue on are warning others with a Quest formula about going past the level nine formulas that also generate the medium-sized wings because it just is not worth playing cat and mouse with the formulas after that. Add the fact that each level has at least a low chance of being crafted (or very low), and you have numerous users questioning your objectives in the first place and being put off from Alchemy, the backwings, and even this site as a whole.

3. While the changes to the Cache and Case formulas were such amazing steps in the right direction, it does nothing when a large group of users are after the same components and formulas and other components and formulas are left in the dust because they are not used in many formulas, if any, and the formulas are too costly and not worth crafting at all. Why not at least put formulas in The Bifrost for each of the components (amount of gold to purchase should not exceed what is already established in the other shoppe formulas) that are found in the Cache that use gold shoppe items (not items from Dernier Cri, unless you create formulas for those items to be made at any time), zOMG! loot and crafted items (keep in mind some crafted items’ recipes are only given out once per person!), Fishing items, Towns items, Tickets, Credits from Word Bump, Tokens, Aquarium fish drops/items and the fish themselves (so long as they cost gold only or are free from Daily Chance), Aquarium decorations and backgrounds (once again, only gold costing ones or free ones found in Daily Chance only), housing and avatar items from both Enchanted Trunks and the other Magical Giftboxes, and whatever other things that are free by being purchasable with gold, found in nice quantities in the Daily Chance, and/or farmable? It did not take me long to make mock-ups of three components I was focusing on that would sink a lot of gold without using Cash Shop/RIG only items.

4. Are the Enchanted Trunks and other Magical Giftboxes going to be given alternative paths in their respective formulas as well? Also, the Golden Magical Giftbox formula has yet to have any of its paths reflect the changes to the Cache and Case formulas, making it more expensive to craft than the other two.

5. Will Cash Shop items be taken out entirely from formulas and replaced with gold shoppe alternatives in larger quantities? If not, are there any plans or at least ideas to make the Cash Shop items have corresponding formulas that use what I had suggested above for component formulas to keep the formulas the same, but have an alternative way to obtain them without spending real life money or enormous amounts of gold in the Markeplace or Exchange?

Hide your face so the world will never find you.

[Fractale]

Panagrammic

MrsrachaelSnape

1. Will all facebook games come to gaia at one point?

Not all of them, but definitely the ones that we think might appeal to the Gaia community.

If they come to gaia, does that mean the areas in them will be canon to Gaia-land? emotion_kirakira
*crosses fingers*

[The Undead Suitor]

When is the next plot update?


And will zhivago kill everyone?


I hope so. He's the only villain we have.

[Corinth Maxwell]

Lanzer

Hello everyone!

Let's get started with this week's delayed ATA.

I hope there's plenty of staff on hand to answer everyone's questions tonight, because I'm sure that there'll be a lot of them. cat_xp

1. Would it be at all possible to add "Go to page..." links to the top of the "View All Comments" page, instead of having to scroll all the way down to the bottom to click on it?

2. Is it possible for us to get a "Friend Tracker" to see which of our friends are online in zOMG, as well as find out which server(s) they're currently playing on?

3. Small issue, but......can we have a way to manually re-size the "Caption" speech bubbles that we place in our profiles, much in the same manner that we can re-size avatars and/or images?

Thanks as always for any answers you & the staff can provide! cat_3nodding cat_ninja cat_cool

[Bon Troyage]

Hello guys! I was wondering about a few things.~

1. Will the Alchemy Update Thread in the alchemy forum ever be updated? I know some changes to Alchemy have been made since it's creation (on Feb. 1st) but it hasn't been updated at all.

2. Any new updates on Alchemy? I haven't heard much in a while.

3. Will the payouts and betting options for Slots and BJ ever be raised? It seems impossible to get some of the more expensive items from P&J without playing Tiles for tickets.

I appreciate it.~

[Lanzer]

Fractale

Thanks for rescheduling the ATA smile

1: Why don't you change your avatar, Lanzer?

2: What would your “My Little Pony” name be, and what would your cutie mark be?

3: In both the Cirque du Gothique CI, and the Love Charm 3, Colonel Pepperpot is shown with cat ears. Does this mean that he's not human; but instead, maybe a bakeneko or nekomata with a human form, or some kind of human/ spirit cat hybrid?

With my terrible fashion sense it'll be an eyesore. smile Besides, it's easier for people to recognize me when I'm dressed the same.

Iron Pony. A glowing insignia on the chest.

Yes, those are real cat ears, call it nekotama or whatever's appropriate.

[Narumi Misuhara]

Crystal Sparda

Ϲ ʀ ʏ s т Α ʟ ♥ ◕ ω ◕

╒═════════════════════════

6) How close are we to the release of Towns 2.0?

Not close at all, we are at the beginning phases of production.

[Panagrammic]

Unfortunately, probably you'll just have to squint and ignore the fact that they're non-canon. It would be really hard to reconcile some of our upcoming games with the Gaia storyline.

(It's hard enough keeping the Gaia storyline consistent -- trying to manage a storyline across nn different properties, different development and writing teams, so on and so forth, would be really challenging.)

Fractale

Panagrammic

MrsrachaelSnape

1. Will all facebook games come to gaia at one point?

Not all of them, but definitely the ones that we think might appeal to the Gaia community.

If they come to gaia, does that mean the areas in them will be canon to Gaia-land? emotion_kirakira
*crosses fingers*

[Fractale]

The Undead Suitor

When is the next plot update?


And will zhivago kill everyone?


I hope so. He's the only villain we have.

don't make me get out the dictionary again, Suitor.
Zhivago's an incompetent lapdog. He can't kill anyone- except Johnny. His track record proves he's been able t kill only 1 of his victims, throughout the course of history.
Lousy shot, and didn't kill Ian
or Louie
Or Gino.
Or Meili (?)

[The Undead Suitor]

Panagrammic

MrsrachaelSnape

1. Will all facebook games come to gaia at one point?

Not all of them, but definitely the ones that we think might appeal to the Gaia community.

Wouldn't all Gaia facebook games appeal to the Gaia community?

I mean, I know some of the facebook games have relations to Gaia that are tentativeness at best (its a fantasy game! Gaias fantasy! Fantasy=Fantasy so it relates!)

but, *shrugs* I dunno, seems kinda like a thing

[whimsei]

brown/purple recolor of pale marionette question Y/Y

also, will you ever have a drawing every year from users who want to become a 'SDPlus Real' doll? Users enter an avatar they want to use to become a SDPlus, and the staff randomly picks 3-5 users to become one. Of course the user gets their SDPlus doll of themselves, while the rest are in a RIG/CI.

[unknownprincess]

Any Idea when fishing will be fixed. Currently only a few buckets the fish you catch goes into your inventory. Its not fun when you are questing a few fish for different stuff you need on gaia and you don't actually get the fish you catch. I would like to know when this error will be fixed.

[Sifen Yamishi]

Good evening Lanzer.

A quick question regarding the 2k12 Valentine's Day flash hangout.
Is there a possibility that we can have this as a permanent fixture into the website, but have some kinks worked out? Like have keyboard movement for our avatars as a function as in our other flash spaces?

I ask mainly because the flash hangout is so wonderfully done and it kinda helps that it has really great music to play through.

[biglanky14]

MrsrachaelSnape

Hello staffers!

my questions are:

1. Will all facebook games come to gaia at one point?
2.You think houses one day can have where we can have more than one room?
3. can the item wizard school have a re color of black and yellow?

Hi MRS,

Good to see you! Let me take a crack at your questions in order:

1) Probably not all of them, although some will (we're hoping to have a non-Facebook version of MoGa on the site fairly soon, for example). Our Social Games team works with a number of partners in developing the games, and depending on our contract, we can only release games through certain channels (e.g. Facebook). We'll bring over those we can.

2) It's possible. We've kicked around a bunch of ideas for Housing, and that's one of them, although it's by no means a sure thing at all. If it did happen, it wouldn't be for awhile though because of all the other stuff we're already working on.

3) I dunno - I'll have to ask the art team smile

[Uncle Kenny]

Crystal Sparda

Ϲ ʀ ʏ s т Α ʟ ♥ ◕ ω ◕

╒═════════════════════════

4) (For any staff to answer) Is ghosting items 100% against the rules,
or is it okay to just ghost items on your mules purely for visual purposes?
This has been a long debated issue and I believe it would be nice to get
at least a few admin's opinions or rulings on the matter.

Ghosting items is something that we don't condone in any way and is something that a user does at their own risk. We aren't going to punish anyone for ghosting since it is our fault but we definitely don't encourage it. We may make a change in the future to prevent ghosting outright but for now it's just not recommended.