On behalf of other fellow MMORPG players, I'd like to address some issues that are bothering me in western release of TERA.
I think that people should know what was removed from the game and why current custom features are killing it.

First let's take a look at the trade system, namely Trade broker. As simple as it may be it's actually harmful. Why? In original TERA there were private shops. I know that western publishers decided to get rid of them for... esthetic reasons (?).
Bad decision. All margin trading, essence of whole concept of merchant had been destroyed. Instead western players received auction house functionality which CAN be used to do margin trading but majority of players won't do that.

That is because it seems like both US and EU versions of the game are aiming to maximize "casualization" of every aspect of gameplay.
Removal of trading pets, guild houses, private shops, possible raising drop rate (cannot confirm that one, but seems like it's actually true) killed main aspect of the genre: social interactions.
In my opinion MMO should be hard. Getting your character that you create and care about to level up should be an achievement. Well... it is if we are talking about ingame achievement system, but on the other hand leveling up as it is now lacks some kind of personal victory.
Not to mention that it's supposed to be MMO from Korea known for hardcore challenging games (Ragnarok, Lineage and so on). Getting to next level was both hard and rewarding, death was painful. Death in TERA gets somehow annoying on later levels if you take crystals and stamina into account but other that that it's just another 5 minutes lost in town recharging and restocking.
I can somehow agree with this aspect, whole action oriented gameplay calls for such mechanic but still game is just too easy.

Difficulty level should be adjusted. TERA is an easy casual game.
Drop rates are ridiculously high, with no real variety of items and possibility of getting superior tier 1-12 set just by visiting auction house and spending quest money gearing up does not exist. Every player can get any item without an effort just by using gold with is given to him on every occasion. In high amounts.
It gets even worse when you realize that players are geared with instance superior items BEFORE they even run it.

Speaking of which, instance matching is kinda useless. Long queue times and cross-server matching is making people sure that they won't be punished and therefore they destroy runs periodically.
Item griefing, impoliteness, no real engagement is very common. Lack of "Greed" button on roll, problems with leavers, not giving a damn about party chat and being rude is one side of the problem.
Looking from another point of view whole concept is wrong. Social game based on community shouldn't even have such thing as instance matching. Namely, party is a group of people who agreed to join forces. So why they are forced to get into random party?
Removing instance matching would make it actually more MMO-like with people standing at the entrances and talking, getting themselves party and therefore SOCIALIZING with each other. As it is now, instance matching is clearly against basic MMO concepts.

Lastly, Nexuses aren't fun at all. Fixed timeframes and no real late game alternative without proper sever-side support make them rather painful part of so called action gameplay. Lags (sever- and client-sided even when computer meets recommended game requirements!), dozens of players in one place because of fixed timetable, best practice to stand by and hope to set off this nuke between freezes are just too annoying.

There is more to it than just these few paragraphs above but to sum up: US and EU TERA is for casual players with no real MMO aspects, aside from their imitations (ENCHANT SYSTEM! ...without real danger to equipment). There are more problems like extensive and forced censorship, even if PEGI 12 allows some sexual references, no real way to grind and so on.
Seems like every added/changed by publisher game feature should be reconsidered in terms of actual MMORPG genre, not some multiplayer 5-man coop happy TPP shooter with extended censorship.

Please, don't make us think that our money spent for actual game and subscription is going to waste. TERA US is just worse compared to orginal version. People are leaving. Change the game, it will help.

Do you want to play L2 with better graphics?

lets seeee....

BoE items - korea had and has ALL items as boe

nexus' - only thing different between the different versions is one has better fps, still the same thing though...

instance que times - welcome to all mmos with a tank class dps classes and healer classes. DPS is always easier and fast to level and easier at cap...

drop rates - are low here actually... higher is korea... and since enchanting eats piles of blues and golds every tier I see no problem with this.


guild houses are not even a thing in korea... and pet shops are pretty damn lame.


Covered all bases.

Ok first of all EME didn't remove guild housing. It hasn't even been added to the korean version yet because they're still adjusting it. As for the game being dumbed down you can blame that on the trash market WoW brought to the genre. The majority of MMOs lost any sort of difficulty or necessity of time investment once WoW became popular.

Did he just say he wanted the game to be horrifically difficult?

You do realise the american populace (and the entire world apart from korea/china) arn't avid super grinders like they are? Implementing these changes would KILL the game. See Aion. What a failure that was.

If theres one thing you don't do with a subscription MMO, is that you make the game the most grindy experience you can imagine. It simply doesn't work in a western audience. Mainly because Casual players always outnumber the hardcore players, by a significantly large margin as well.

Game isn't even hard in korea, grinding open world one shotable mobs for gold is not hard.

doing bosses that just one shot everything is not hard either.

Guild housing - I didn't play much last months, figured it's already in the game.

As for difficulty level - It seems easier to me here tbh.

And I want SOME ways to grind for players who want to, there is none real ones for now.

want to grind, go bloody grind for the love of god.

..... i guess this guy doesnt even know the definition of GRIND.

It's just not rewarding. Following story line with overrated effort/reward balance is just not fun, but better.

are you serious.


Grinding, rewarding, head, explode....


AHAHAHAHAHA