I've been meaning to write on this thread for awhile, ever since it was posted but I've been very busy with different things constantly cropping up and also focusing my writing ability towards things I thought to be a higher priority. At this point I feel almost silly pulling up this thread that's as old as it is now but I nonetheless wanted to share some of my perspective as a long time UD player.
Andunor for what it is mechanically is a great place. Andunor and the surrounding zones have, to my opinion, the superior level design, writs and all around gameplay. Every single character I make I always feel this pull to run back to the Underdark to grind out through some of the levels there. The Stingers for instance is one of my favorite dungeons on the server due to how rewarding it is and its circular design. Terrific place I think.
On the surface I've found every starting location to have some kind of large drawback. An exception being I've not played the Brog start. With Cordor I find there to be a
ton of dead space. Cordor is massive, all of the NPCs are miles apart. I find what I end up doing is just running back and forth mostly and of course there's a server transition right outside of Cordor that makes things a hassle when most of your writs and adventures are on the Surface server. Not to mention the experience that is doing the same set of low level writs: Archives, Sewer Rat Gang and the Sewer Patrol. I've never found it particularly enjoyable.
Skaljard is probably my second favorite of them all. Its problems, at least from the last time I played as these may have been corrected with the recent overhaul, there wasn't a place to sell from a scroll case and the only place to sell potions was far out in the tundra. Overall XP and GP rewards are lower across the board with some strange difficulty spikes and overall harsher PvE content. Not that the difficulty itself is a bad thing, just that it feels harder to level there and you're also compensated less than other places. Since it's relegated to low level characters and people tend to not bother with professions at low levels you'll find it's extremely difficult to get a hold of basic essentials like a jewelry case. The only other gripe is the lack of shortcuts at the end of some dungeons so once you clear them you have to turn around and run the entire length back to exit it.
As for how level design influences roleplay, this is where I'm certain our opinions will diverge greatly it seems.
The surface is very expansive. There's tons of incredible places you can run to that have their own vibrant and lovely communities. Lots of incredibly talented players that pour everything they have into creating great narratives regardless of the settlement where they holdup in.
This expanse breeds entirely new narratives that are completely exciting and thrilling, narratives that by level design are inhibited or otherwise greatly diminished in Andunor. Spies working on behalf of other
cities lurking about, always having escape routes and a very large sandbox to create and playout stories in. The concept of war is exciting when you have entire cities opposing other entire cities. The cities themselves actually matter despite being numerous and very far spreadout. Exilements and other repercussions matter and are great narrative tools.
To contrast this in the Underdark everyone is forced into the same two rooms essentially. Districts are just places for item storage and are entirely irrelevant for all intents and purposes. They don't really do anything. As long as you aren't exiled from every single one you can still get your citizen storage and even then so long as you own a quarter in any of the various non-district spots you'll be just fine.
With everyone being so confined and so limited on cool spaces to RP in you, from my own observations and experiences, ironically see less conflict happen. People are more likely to be friends with each other because of the lack of freedom. Since in Andunor if you do anything that disturbs the status quo you find yourself being forced to delete the character since there are no alternatives or options for extending that roleplay or character concept.
Now, onto how attitudes of the player bases as a result of level design: While it's true that spreadout hubs as is on the surface can allow people to congeal into cliques and while that certainly does happen to an extent I've been unable to find it problematic in the greater scope in that it rarely affects roleplay. I think most cliques that form would've formed anyways but with the larger space they end up being more diversely spread. Cliques tend to keep to themselves and have very little to do with larger storylines unless they choose to want to participate.
Contrastingly comparing this to Andunor in particular a few cliques form but invariably one clique or two becomes larger than the others. The greater issue here is that these are cliques you cannot avoid and are forced to play with regularly. This is exactly how groups such as Xyvil'kor spiraled out of control into something that was universally considered harmful and anti-fun roleplay, at least I think those are fair summarizations to make. It encourages and breeds groups and factions that are actively detrimental to the environment which cannot be contended with because of superior numbers for PvP and cannot be avoided due to the confines of the space. And due to the proximity this group might think that anything that doesn't conform to their standards is playing the wrong way, something I'm sure we've all seen happen at some point during our time on Arelith.
Purely anecdotally, as if the rest of what I typed wasn't anecdotal, while I can't say I've had the outright opposite experience that you're describing I can say it's not the way that you've described it. The Underdark as a whole is certainly not more mature or kinder than others on the surface. There are plenty of bad apples down there who detract from the experience. Just as there are bad apples woh detract from the experience on the surface. I think people's views of these different player bases is subject to which end they find themselves interacting with. I've probably experienced more Underdark grief than surface grief despite the vastly different amounts of playtime I have invested into each.
I'll go ahead and start quoting a few things that I want to directly respond to.
Aurian wrote: ↑Mon Nov 25, 2019 9:19 am
I just wish we had more efficient means of keeping Surfacers out. Killing them repeatedly, while they respawn repeatedly, gets old at some point.
Petrifictus wrote: ↑Mon Nov 25, 2019 9:48 am
We need to put an end to surfacer's "Weekends at Andunor" and really limit their presence at the city, Hub included as its getting silly watching elves and halflings walking around free without anyone being able to do anything, as otherwise it would hurt feelings.
Put same policy on surfacers like the monstrous races have in Sibayad and Crow's Nest with a huge sign if people are keen to keep hold on trade city theme in the Andunor. We should inspire and encourage people to play with the actual UD races.
If you really want to play in the UD as surface race, pick an outcast (or RP hard enough to become one at the surface) or become a slave. Having pirate ink dont suddenly make character one with the Underdark either.
These are in my opinion very ill thought out at best character motivations/goals and at worst cultivates an extremely toxic environment. Andunor is a trade city. That's why Outcasts exist, humans and half-orcs are very much a part of Andunor just as much as any other monstrous race is. It is why any surface character can apply for Uutcast status and move in more permanently.
It's also the reason why UD characters cannot see Outcast tags. It doesn't mean anything to them like it does for surface characters.
To be able to justify a character saying one human is okay but another human is a "surfacer" (especially when a lot of the monster races in the Underdark are definitely surface creatures as well) requires a considerable amount of cognitive dissonance.
The sort of conflict roleplay in that regard is best suited towards ousting surface agents. People that are well known to work towards underminding Andunor. Someone that is well known to work against the death of the inhabitants and against trade. Those are people where it seems absolutely appropriate to hassle. But the human that walks in to purchase a few things from a local shop? They're a boon to the economy.
Now there's other things you can target to such as if someone is a goody-two-shoes then maybe they stand out as being very against the Andunorian culture. But you wouldn't scream "HUMAN" and start stabbing for instance.
Truly, I think most of the Underdark's issues would be fixed if there were multiple settlements that characters could distribute themselves out among like how the surface is currently configured.
The important things to remember however beyond all else is that horrendous notions such as "UD culture" or "surface culture" need to be eradicated. We're all Arelithians playing in the same sandbox, even if it's massive and some of us end up at different ends of it. It's better to focus on us all being one player base and improving together.
Thanks for reading, it feels good to finally get all of this off of my mind.
