Wrong, i would not play without upkeep.
Then you must be one of the old players that have Millions of Gold!
Otherwise you dont think enough about the upkeep.
At the moment its alot of more peasant vs. heavy gear fighting.
Before january the people could play in the armor the would, now they have to play in the armor they are allowed to...
An Elite player will kill everybody from rags to plate... but with plate you have perhaps a better chance even if u just damage him, then your teammates can kill him easier.
But what to do against elite player now? He kills everybody in 1 Hit, because you dont have the gear to match up with him.
I agree that the upkeep would have fit better to pre-january. It was sometimes crazy. Huge amount of WPF and those crazy endtier weapons.
There was no limitation in the old days, just murder around. But now we have a limitation lvl cap 34-35, no WPF from retire, weapons, armors and horses were nerfed and balanced and so on.
But now upkeep is just making a time sink... play (grind) hours to play an hour for real...
If upkeep would be removed, no tincan can murder around like in the old days. The weapons got balanced, same with the lvl cap (there are no such crazy builds like before, lvl 35-45, huge amount of wpf, HP and so on!)
Even today we have some tincan, they have gold and can use their armor, it helps them, but doesnt make them invulnerable like prejanuary.
But normal players cant use their armors/weapons today, because of the crazy upkeep - it keeps them away to be helped by their gear and so they are just poor victims!
similar? i see from padded armor to plate armor, not to mention great weapon diversity as people wear different armor so there is no ultimate weapon and all weapon classes are viable.
Sure, they were padded armor because they have no gold - or they are archers - or have an agi built and want to be fast - or just for the style!
And as you say, people use also different weapons. Thats not because there is upkeep, weapons were balanced and are more even.
If the upkeep would be removed, most people will still use different weapons, because there are no uber weapons anymore (like the old long espada esvalona, 95% of 1h players used it pre january - nowadays its the most expensive weapon and only a little percentage use it, for the most the stats dont fit).
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What about you chadz and your def-team if you just try it out.
Make a little test. Perhaps for around 2-4 weeks. And take a look what happens to the game, if there are more tincans around...
What people think about the removing of upkeep.
I swear you, people would like it. Espacialy the new/middle ones will like it like the heaven!