Ragnagoats - 1/1/1 (An in-depth review)

[Maidrx]

I do want to preface this with that I am playing on the server currently and am enjoying it so, feel free to take what I say with bias.

As someone who had not played RO in 15+ years, I was just simply looking for a low rate server to play for a long term at my pace that is actually NA/EU based since I am playing from NA, a server that is stable, and last but most importantly it seemed almost looking around at what was out there..., free of toxic drama/rmt/bs with a team that is open, dedicated, and care about the server they run.

So far in my almost 4 month of play time, I can say I made the right choice for playing on this server. Also met some great people to play with too for group content.

Sorry to butt in here, but imo it will never really take off as long as multi clienting is not allowed.

As nice of a server as this could have been, it's too much of a hassle to even do the most basic things like transfer items over to a Merchant just to vend.

Like you said the multi-client vs single client is definitely each player's personal opinions but there definitely enough servers out there when I was looking where to play to satisfy each type of players.

Personal opinion of course as someone not looking to sweat over a 20 year old game and play at my own pace, definitely could not be bothered with running live 3/4 slave clients just because it is somehow a norm. When I was looking around for a server, there definitely seemed more multi-client servers out there, but also just as many of them seemed dead.

As to the transfer from @autotrade/vendor with your actual playing account, it is simple as mailing zeny/items right over by typing in your other character name in Mail... not sure how that is a hassle unless RO changed that much since last time I played. 

Instead, now changes and skills are introduced that take it further away from being an authentic(~ish) classic server.


And I can tell you one thing, leveling a Pure Forger will absolutely be NO FUN with that Inflation skill.
First of all you'd have to find a party that would be willing to take you in for that measly exp boost, which at the current population would be a miracle to find.
Secondly, the cost on top of the time invested just to level it.
Thirdly, no loot. Good luck on ever getting a valuable Card while leveling that Pure Forger. Noone will ever give you that Porcellio Card that just dropped.

For merchant class player who is looking for the ZERO change authentic classic RO, the additional of inflation skill definitely won't appeal to those players. As for the other in-game changes, it feels more QoL and/or corrections to what is known to be broken even back then where it still feels to me like playing RO just as.

Party with the current player base definitely still seems hard to find on the off-times but server's definitely growing since I started playing, almost had I believe 70 unique players after last patch/this weekend active times (non-vendors, and no-multi clients) but given that it is a 1x with it's niche audience, I would say it is doing decently well and hopefully keeps growing.

I had to google some old guides when I started again, but correct me if I am wrong, you don't do a "Pure Forger" as a starter character or by yourself... in a 1x rate unless you REALLY enjoy playing that slow gameplay. Most of the guides recommended just hunter/knight/wizard to get you started off. I went with Hunter which was enjoyable and let me solo self fund/hunt majority of my needs and made a Priest to play with other people in group content.

And in the same sense, even if it is your non-starter character, when would doing a Pure Forger leveling be fun at all on a 1x, whether this server or not and inflation skill added or not...you would just be leeching anyways with 99 dex and luk even back then no? I do believe the Pure Forgers we have on the server are guild/group/friends combined efforts getting it there which I think is perfectly fine and well deserved.

[Buralabo]

As nice of a server as this could have been, it's too much of a hassle to even do the most basic things like transfer items over to a Merchant just to vend.

Just mail your items and zeny, I don't see the issue with that. It's not Travels, where you had to send your items and money to another person and hope they gave it back to you. There's a mailing and banking system that 100% works.

And I can tell you one thing, leveling a Pure Forger will absolutely be NO FUN with that Inflation skill.
First of all you'd have to find a party that would be willing to take you in for that measly exp boost, which at the current population would be a miracle to find.

I see people party with Merchants quite often, forger and non-forgers. Most parties want a Merchant to use Inflation instead of searching for a Kim Dancer+Bard duo. But this is purely from my experience, maybe others have had the misfortune of not finding people to play with.

Secondly, the cost on top of the time invested just to level it.

Could bring a friend or find a guild to do these things with you.

Thirdly, no loot. Good luck on ever getting a valuable Card while leveling that Pure Forger. Noone will ever give you that Porcellio Card that just dropped.

What's stopping you from making a farming alt? Just farm the card on another character. If you really don't want to make another character and stick to one forger, then join a guild and have them piggy back you. Can't expect free things if you're going to solo with a Forger.

[CordialLamp]

And I can tell you one thing, leveling a Pure Forger will absolutely be NO FUN with that Inflation skill.
First of all you'd have to find a party that would be willing to take you in for that measly exp boost, which at the current population would be a miracle to find.
Secondly, the cost on top of the time invested just to level it.
Thirdly, no loot. Good luck on ever getting a valuable Card while leveling that Pure Forger. Noone will ever give you that Porcellio Card that just dropped.

Pure Forger were never supposed to be played as the first or only char and without help from the community/guild/friends. Why then do you act as if that would be a valid argument against this server?

[2k2]

Pure Forger were never supposed to be played as the first or only char and without help from the community/guild/friends. Why then do you act as if that would be a valid argument against this server?

You're right that Pure Forger should be a group/guild effort instead of a solo player (especially on a no-multiclient server) and even worse if you try it as your first character, but the rest of his points makes sense.

No-multiclient server is actually terrible because you're stuck 99%/fully reliant on others to progress. On a small/dead server such as RagnaGoats, feels awful, especially when you have little time to play or the time you have to play coincide to be a non-peak time in the server. You're doomed if you don't start already with a group.

Most of these "no-multiclient" servers never grows past their tryhard players (all with their groups) exactly because of this: they actually do get a lot of new (solo) players over time, but these players doesn't stay long term because they feel stuck and behind due to the difficulty that is finding parties, groups or doing anything solo without buffs and what else. To make it worse, people are elitist as f*** these days (in contrast to the old days where nobody gave a f*** about meta compositions) and want to play in full efficiency, so good luck finding parties if you happen to be playing a class or build that's not part of the "meta".

This server is good but continues to be the same size of 4~6 months ago because of all the problems I just described. I personally know around a dozen unique players that tried the server at some point but they all quit after 1 or 2 days, all for the same problem.

[Seekr]

You're right that Pure Forger should be a group/guild effort instead of a solo player (especially on a no-multiclient server) and even worse if you try it as your first character, but the rest of his points makes sense.

No-multiclient server is actually terrible because you're stuck 99%/fully reliant on others to progress. On a small/dead server such as RagnaGoats, feels awful, especially when you have little time to play or the time you have to play coincide to be a non-peak time in the server. You're doomed if you don't start already with a group.

Most of these "no-multiclient" servers never grows past their tryhard players (all with their groups) exactly because of this: they actually do get a lot of new (solo) players over time, but these players doesn't stay long term because they feel stuck and behind due to the difficulty that is finding parties, groups or doing anything solo without buffs and what else. To make it worse, people are elitist as f*** these days (in contrast to the old days where nobody gave a f*** about meta compositions) and want to play in full efficiency, so good luck finding parties if you happen to be playing a class or build that's not part of the "meta".

This server is good but continues to be the same size of 4~6 months ago because of all the problems I just described. I personally know around a dozen unique players that tried the server at some point but they all quit after 1 or 2 days, all for the same problem.

Those players didn't quit because of single client. No sane person actually wants to have 2 extra windows open to buff yourself. They quit because the grind was too much and they felt they were getting nowhere. Which is just what 1x is. Even if you optimize, the grind is real, and if you don't, well it's easy to be getting absolutely nowhere after playing many hours.

Now as for multiclienters. I would say multi-clienters are a tumor that needs to be banned and cut out. It's great many servers now are single-client servers. Some are even pulling good numbers of players like UaRo. Others don't explicitly ban it, but server mechanics clearly discourage multi-boxing.

Kind of like WoW did by effectively banning multi-boxers. It's really a form of cheating, and the game is a lot better without seeing 10 characters or buff slaves on follow oneshotting everything.

[dahman]

Remember playing OriginsRO.
Having Bard Dancer Couple outofparty in bio3 on 2 Clients, selling leech on both slots for lots of money by pressing 2 buttons every now and then,
while farming Geffenia at the same time on my Stalker with all its additional Multiclients to buff up.
8-10 clients open at once, but easy tripple money.
aw good ol times.
/$

edit:
i also like to play single client servers from time to time,
wish there whould be more such servers with some kind of multiclient restriction, it could help to bring some balance but its harder to enforce.
like max 2 clients at once.

[Aeroskye]

Remember playing OriginsRO.
Having Bard Dancer Couple outofparty in bio3 on 2 Clients, selling leech on both slots for lots of money by pressing 2 buttons every now and then,
while farming Geffenia at the same time on my Stalker with all its additional Multiclients to buff up.
8-10 clients open at once, but easy tripple money.
aw good ol times.
/$

It's interesting how this is the exact reason why I stopped playing Origins (which was otherwise an excellent server).
It was like a Massive Multiplayer Solo RPG with everyone trying to just run after efficiency and losing the game's essence.

[ForgotMyOldAccount]

I personally cannot get into this server because a 1x is far too grindy for me. HOWEVER, I must say that Ragnagoats seems to be a labour of love. The server seems clean, well put together, and is always receiving updates. You can tell the GMs actually care(a rare thing these days, really). If you're a vanilla 1x enthusiast, this one is the one for you.

[Aeroskye]

Bumping because Ragnagoats implemented its biggest patch just yet. The Core Mechanics changes that touch upon a lot of skills & skill trees being modified to create more vivid varieties of play.

[Smalblind]

 
Leaving the server beacuse they implemented its biggest patch just yet.
Reading all their changes and constant "maybe we will do this in the future" is just too much for me. I can't be bothered to think about a new build on a 1x server every 2 weeks.

[dahman]

every server nowdays is adding "diffrent this, diffrent that, we changed this, we changed that".
in the end its their server and they can do / try out whatever they want.

im just sad that there is no real vanilla 1x server out there anymore.

[oRnuH]

Hi, sadly I aggree with dahman. Every server goes and adds some "custom" content, for me that's just makes RO not RO anymore. I played on Ragnagoats for a few months and it was good for a while. Too bad the GM-s and Devs don't really like some classes and they are not shy about it.
It just made me leave the server.
After reading the "Core Mechanics" changes it just made me more reassured that the server goes in a way that I don't really like.

I hope we can get a really Classic server in the future. (I don't feel that I have the qualifications to run my own server, but with time it looks like I need to learn how to make and run one. )

[OrcLordDaddy]

im just sad that there is no real vanilla 1x server out there anymore.

Same... I'm so craving for an authentic episodic vanilla Classic into Pre-Renewal server with the proper iRO skill and class names...
But every damn server is like custom here custom there no MC, no Mercenaries, no MVP, no OP this and that.


Ragnagoats is also going that way.
Just by walking around you'll see Renewal stuff like Baby Ants in Ant Hell...
"No MC is biting us in the butt, so here have CUSTOM SKILLS to mitigate that"


And iRO seems nowhere near "hmm shall we make a new cash grab classic server", even though many people would instantly play there and spend money on it, including myself.
Not to mention, they completely gave up on their english translation on the Renewal server.
Just hover over the skill descriptions of a Sage for example, "Flame Launcher" instead of Endow Blaze, it feels like they have degenerated into a low quality pserver, too.

[ForgotMyOldAccount]

Same... I'm so craving for an authentic episodic vanilla Classic into Pre-Renewal server with the proper iRO skill and class names...

But every damn server is like custom here custom there no MC, no Mercenaries, no MVP, no OP this and that.


Ragnagoats is also going that way.
Just by walking around you'll see Renewal stuff like Baby Ants in Ant Hell...

Hi, sadly I aggree with dahman. Every server goes and adds some "custom" content, for me that's just makes RO not RO anymore. I played on Ragnagoats for a few months and it was good for a while. Too bad the GM-s and Devs don't really like some classes and they are not shy about it.
It just made me leave the server.
After reading the "Core Mechanics" changes it just made me more reassured that the server goes in a way that I don't really like.

I hope we can get a really Classic server in the future. (I don't feel that I have the qualifications to run my own server, but with time it looks like I need to learn how to make and run one. )

This is funny because YanisRO is a vanilla server and has been around for ages and has a population of like 10 people. Ragnagoats also was vanilla for a long time and suffered from a similarly low pop. People claim they want a vanilla pserver but when one exists they don't play it. Even old servers like KokoRO and Travels only got like 30 active players or so at a time! I hope for everyone who wants vanilla RO to stay in one place and put your metaphorical money where your mouth is so you all can play on one server together that finally caters to your needs.

[oRnuH]

This is funny because YanisRO is a vanilla server and has been around for ages and has a population of like 10 people. Ragnagoats also was vanilla for a long time and suffered from a similarly low pop. People claim they want a vanilla pserver but when one exists they don't play it. Even old servers like KokoRO and Travels only got like 30 active players or so at a time! I hope for everyone who wants vanilla RO to stay in one place and put your metaphorical money where your mouth is so you all can play on one server together that finally caters to your needs.

First of all. I never heard of YanisRO, and currently its not even working. I did searched in RMS and Google and the website is down.
KokoRO is fully customeized.
I played Travels until it just closed one day without any notice.
Really want to know: What do you even talk about?