Classic and pre-renewal close-to-official servers not so official after all

[distilled1]

I don't know about Monster stat changes in Ragnarok Travels since I haven't got time to play, but I did notice that the Prontera church map was recently reverted back to the original style instead of the incorrect episode style it had in the beginning. I for one would welcome corrections like these any time, even if they are late.
There is nothing wrong with that in my opinion. If you're of the opinion that there's something wrong with "better late than never", then that's fair, but mistakes happen. I've seen it happen in many other RO servers where they had to correct something after players had already "taken advantage" of it.

Even if it was something radical like 999x more exp from the beginning, then a month later corrected down to 1x exp, it's still better late than never. At least I believe it is.
Should new players feel entitled to be on the same level as those who began a month earlier than them anyway? No, and Ragnarok Online shouldn't be a rush to the end of the game anyway. It's not supposed to be a race, and once people reach max level, it's not supposed to be over and done with. It's supposed to be a social game of cooperation to take down giant monsters or conquer WoE castles for your guild which you can always get to eventually, regardless of when you joined.
With any half-decent community, the ones at higher levels would want to help out new players most of the time anyway. Giving them help leveling or in WoE. Maybe even giving them items.

Even players who all joined at the beginning can have vastly different amounts of spare time to play, giving some players more advantage than others to progress faster. Some players are level 50 by the time others are still level 20 for example. Nothing wrong with that, and it shouldn't deter anyone from playing.

[Playtester]

Even if it was something radical like 999x more exp from the beginning, then a month later corrected down to 1x exp, it's still better late than never. At least I believe it is.

If something like that happened, then the server should definitely wipe. Maybe give existing player a small compensation, but definitely revert them back to level 1/1.

Ragnarok Online is mainly alive these days because of the competition, if you give players who start early an advantage, it will stop more players from joining and eventually the server will die.

If you are afraid that you might not be 100% accurate at launch, you could however put lower rates at first. Or go by the "when in doubt always pick what's more disadvantageous for the player" rule. Because then you could increase the rates after a fix so get new players.

[distilled1]

Ragnarok Online is mainly alive these days because of the competition

While I do disagree with that, maybe I'm thinking of RO from a female perspective too much. Personally, I never cared for the competitive side of RO, but you're right, competition is a major part of it, equally as important as socializing and cooperation.
However, I'd say the reason RO is alive these days is nostalgia more than anything. Just to be immersed in that old world we remember fondly. I think players who want a good, competitive gaming experience these day go to games like Fortnite, or League of Legends, no?

[Playtester]

While I do disagree with that, maybe I'm thinking of RO from a female perspective too much. Personally, I never cared for the competitive side of RO, but you're right, competition is a major part of it, equally as important as socializing and cooperation.
However, I'd say the reason RO is alive these days is nostalgia more than anything. Just to be immersed in that old world we remember fondly. I think players who want a good, competitive gaming experience these day go to games like Fortnite, or League of Legends, no?

Don't get me wrong, I don't care about PVP either, but you will not get 1000+ players on your server without getting some strong competitive guilds to join at launch.

[Imperial Regalia]

Official Ragnarok Online had many buffs and nerfs throughout its history. Kafras used to warp to dungeons, Double Strafe used to cost no arrows, Claymore used to be significantly more powerful of a skill, drop rates went down and then up, spawn density went down and then up, and so on. The nature of an episodic server will ultimately involve changes like these. I am also idealistic enough to believe that owners of non-episodic (static) servers should not be afraid to issue changes if they need to be done, but I digress.

We were aware of these differences before starting and our decision to add them in was intentional. We did so based on the fact that the scope is not too large, we are a very young server, the changes are actually dispersed throughout the entire leveling spectrum (they affect all players), and quite simply because the community wanted it. New and old players alike are enjoying the greater leveling diversity.

[iceman]

This why I always checkout mob and item database before we jump in   Lot's of server we tried offering they said Classic but yet its not so classic when you play it. I am particular with episodic events. Me and my friends testing from server to server so far ok with the current server play-retro . n e t but we still continue to evaluate because it is new.