Pirate The World - Online Adventure Game

Ok, lets define something here...
Newbie-- What is one. I know the mean, but lets put something quantifiable here.

This is being brought on by the latest exit drama of a 'newbie'.

Is being a newbie and attitude, or a level? Is it a time limit? i.e. 3 months, 6 months, a year? Is it an upgrade level, say having 10 or more in one or more stat?

Where's the line here? Its one thing for a player to start and get frustrated right away, but it seems a little lame to have someone who's reached the 50k upgrade hump labeled a newbie. From the looks of it, that seems to be a good mid-level hump that folks have to get over. (Hell I was stuck there for a couple months myself til I developed what strategies worked for me..)

Cap, If you are putting together changes to help the newer players, how does this affect, well, the middle class? Folks who have built up but have hit a ceiling, like the 50k one? (Seems to be the most common one.)

It's those players, who either don't have the patience to do some serious mapping and farming to get some upgrades (without attacking for several days) to then be able to withstand some of the attacks, or who happen to be in the way of the mafiafleet when the do carry some fame, who seem to be exiting--- or at least those are the ones giving the Oscar nominating performances with their exits.

I have still one thing which is not absolutelly clear for me: how are people exiting from this game. I see that count of players is in last time smaller and smaller. I read here on forum that sunken ship appers other day on same place. I cannot believe that people are cancelling their accounts. My experience is that people stop playing and let account inactive. Is there some algorithm which automatically cancels inactive accounts?

the ships are being sunk, and that takes them "off" the map

they are still there, but are in active...this is done so the seas don't get too crowded

their accounts don't get deleted, they just get sunk due to inactivity

the number on the main page is "Number of ships on the sea", not number of players in the game total

If I understand right ship will appear back after logon player (minimally after 24hours).

Yes, if someone is sunk they are removed from the "ships on the sea" count...as they are no longer on the sea but under it.

When you log back in, your ship is "floated" back up to the surface and is recounted.