This is what makes maplestory lost its originality, where people partying up together. Training/levelling together, having fun together while making their char stronger
If you go to high level maps such as Vanishin Journey or Chuchu or even higher level map, not many people party up leveling/grinding anymore. Probably only 1% who actually doing it. It is because at higher level, classes gain better skills that can hit a lot more monsters in 1 go. In result it is very easy to clear up whole maps. In result, if they partying up with others, they will get less exp because they have to wait for the spawn time and have to share the exp with low exp bonus. That is why only 1% of the community partying up anymore once they reached especially 5th job.
I know it looks like that giving 50% or more exp bonus seems a lot. But in actuality it not. It is too low so that the players are discouraged to partying up on grinding/levelling up. Facts tell that 99% of high level doesn't partying up. They try to get their own channel and solo. that Facts alone proves that your exp bonus upon partying up is too low. You can go to chuchu map on famous maps for grinding. you are lucky enough to see 2 players grinding together. Even 3 players to grind together in 1 map is nearly a myth. FInding 6 Players grinding/levelling together in 1 map? Are we dreaming? Pls call me hurry, we need to make it a history. oh there is possibility 2 players, but the other 1 is their kanna mule to just kishin the map. I don't count that as partying up.
How to Reproduce :
1. Play solo grinding on any map in chuchu island. Open up statistic so you can record the exp gain
2. Levelling for 15 mins or more and write down the exp gain
3. Gather 6 players. Also levelling /grinding for 15 mins or more. Also open up statistic so you can record your exp gain
4. You will see a huge drop in exp you gain while partying up. Mostlikely around 70%-90% exp drop depends on party combination.
My suggestion is for developers to find a way to encourage players to party and levelling up more. The originality on maplestory was that players are encouraged to party up and make friends. If you have a lot of friends, you get more benefit in playing the game. But right now, it is not. The more friends you have, the more they will bring you down, create disadvantage. You will get less exp if you levelling up together.
You can increase the exp bonus upon partying up. To prove my opinion above, that exp is less with the more people you have in party, you can open up battle statistic and try to train/levelling solo in any of chuchu map/ lachlein/high level maps, lets say for 15 mins. Most players at chuchu map will have around 1.5mill damage range. So use a char with at least 1.5mill damage range clean. After that go with 6 players partying up/levelling on the same map. You will see soloing mostlikely give you 5x more exp compare than if you go with 6 players. When you partying up with 6 players in 1 map, your exp gain will drop by 90%. The disadvantages is so huge making players reject any party up offer. So my suggestion to increase the exp bonus especially if they party up with more players.
Increase the amount of mobs in 1 map from lets say 40 monsters in 1 map to 500 monsters in 1 map. So that the map is enough for 4-6 players to train together. It is not like the old days, where best skills only hit up to 3 enemies. Nowadays, our skills hit like 15 or more enemies in a few seconds. But it is not currently possible to increase the number of monsters as it will crate a huge lag.
Increase the mesos bonus. Even rare to see players partying up to mesos farming. It is because we don't get mesos bonus for partying up. It should be the same as exp, where people will get mesos bonus when they party up. Especially when they have 6 people in party which will give them huge mesos bonus.
Increase drop rate bonus upon partying. When players partying up, give more bonus. And especially when they can get 6 players in team, they will get a lot more drop rate boost than with solo. Especially now that you have nodes for farming. Giving more drop rates on partying up will encourage more players to party up and socialising.
If you want, you can also apply all of the reccomendations/suggestions above only on high level maps only like Vanishing Journey. Chuchu or higher level maps. it is because at 1st-3rd job, players doesn't really have skills that can clear 1 map very fast. So it is still okay. But on high levle maps, when skills hitting 15 monsters or more, and players can kill very fast, we absolutely need more boost on partying.
In all, this suggestion is meant to encourage players to go out and makes friends. Playing with friends in game will make the game less boring. Because we interact with living people who can give different experriences and fun everytime we play the game. It is not similar to boss and npc who always doing the same thing again and again (BORING and REPETITIVE). Your actually great asset to keep your players to play is to encourage them to interact with other players. Grinding/levelling, Bossing, farming nodes and Arcane force is boring after some time because they are repetitive. But socialising, interactions, communicating with other players will never be boring, because they are living human being and not repetitive. That is actually your great asset which you have lost. As the more you encourage your player to play solo, you will see less and less customers/players quitting because of repetitive play. That is why actually interaftions with other players comes to play.
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