Arelith

Live now:

An RPB of 20 or above is now required to roll for an award.

Awards otherwise have the same requirements to obtain.

Is there a reason this was made to trigger on rolling for the reward as opposed to spending it?

Two reasons I can think of for making it upon spending instead.
1. If you're a 20 RPB player that rolls a bunch of characters and stacks up a few rewards and then get lowered to 10 RPB you can still spend them.

2. Might discourage newer players from setting down their first characters. I suspect initial characters would likely be less than stellar examples of RP in comparison to later characters once the server culture is known and discouraging -delete_character might not be for the best. If it was on creation then you could still gain the reward, just need to be positively noticed to spend it.

I know plenty of roleplayers who are definitely worthy of 20 RPR by definition but after like a year of playing they are still stuck there. Isn't this just making a big chore for the DM team when tons of players start submitting tickets about having 10 RPR despite being perfectly fine roleplayers?

This change is really confusing to me. What purpose could this possibly serve? My first inclination is that it's meant as a shadow punishment to some sort of real or imagined plague of people who do not RP at all just power grinding character after character but, as people in this very topic have already illustrated, this seems like it would be pretty ineffective at stopping those people. Meanwhile, it looks like a very direct punishment of people who, for one reason or another, have simply never gained a DM's attention and strongly pushes the server towards an in-crowd and out-crowd mentality that I thought it had been actively trying to shift away from in recent years.

Surely, if there is some problem that the devs are attempting to address there is a better way to address it that doesn't cause massive collateral damage to a huge portion of the player base that have done nothing wrong besides go unnoticed by a particular clique of people.

I am going to assume the increased number of players lead to an increased number of rolls, and hence more Major Awards being generated. This puts a heavy load on the Dev Team.

This change only delays a player's rewards. You can just keep the character in your vault and keep playing with whatever character you were going to play next. It limits your slightly, as you do not have an award to spend but you do not lose anything. When you get 20+ you can go roll all of the characters you have stored.

I think it is a good change. It doesn't really affect anyone until they've been on the server for quite a while, and by then the DMs will have had enough time to view and raise their RPR as necessary.

If RPR has been lowered, maybe it is time to think about the reasons why and try to improve! (Which is directly beneficial to everyone on the server.)

Would be great with some clarification on why this change was needed?

The majority of our playerbase currently plays at 20+ RPR. Part of the reasoning for this change was to lessen the amount of 5% chances with respect to players who put mechanics first and roleplay as an afterthought in order to get a Major reward. This change is not meant as punitive, but rather in keeping with our roots as a RP-first server.

As always, the DM team is ever watchful and I can say a few of us devote time each day to watching 10 RPR players specifically with the goal of raising to 20 RPR. It is not a high bar. For me, this means yes to the following two questions:

1. Does the player stay IC?
2. Does the player add to the story around them?

If you feel there is a player at 10 RPR that is undeserved, feel free to drop a line in DM chat, or contact me directly at DM Senke#5198. This does not guarantee we will review you right that moment, but I do keep a running list of folks to review.

Wouldn't it be far simpler to just manually review all Major rewards earned/redeemed by people with <20 RPB (let's not forget this is supposed to be a bonus, not a rating). How many major rewards is this collective minority of players earning in a given month? I obviously don't have any stats (though it would be very enlightening if one of the devs felt like sharing) but I'm just going to hazard a guess that, on average, it's less than 2. Probably much less. But if I'm wrong that would be extremely interesting to know and would cause me to wonder if this isn't just a pattern of behavior of some limited number of individuals who clearly aren't using the server as intended.

In fact, I thought you guys were manually reviewing all major rewards anyway. If not, I don't see why 20+ RPB players should get a free pass. They ought to be reviewed too.

There does seem to be something awkward about simultaneously

> Arelith supports multiple playstyles and wants to be accomodating to all kinds of players
> but really we want to reward roleplayers

I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but to echo n00bdragon, I've always found the Rewards something funny. It's unclear if this is an issue with the Rewards system, or solely the 5% award.

Every player I've introduced to the server has either stopped playing after a few days or gotten to 20 RPR within a month.

This is a roleplaying server. It makes complete sense to want to focus on roleplaying. I think it's safe to say that if you haven't reached 20 RPR in the time it takes to grind your way to level 26, you need to change your approach. Either you are focusing on leveling too much or not focusing on RP enough.

Seven Sons of Sin wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 16, 2019 4:17 am

There does seem to be something awkward about simultaneously

> Arelith supports multiple playstyles and wants to be accomodating to all kinds of players
> but really we want to reward roleplayers

I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but to echo n00bdragon, I've always found the Rewards something funny. It's unclear if this is an issue with the Rewards system, or solely the 5% award.

The server is not accommodating to all kinds of players. We do not support sexy elven fun times, as other servers do. We do not support other forms of more R-rated adventure, as other servers do. We are not a Star Wars setting, nor are we a Ravenloft one. We are not an ARPG Diablo clone. We are not an arena server.

We are an online persistent role playing world. While no one is suggesting that grinding a dungeon is a bad thing, if that is the extent of your experience with Arelith, you are missing the point of what roleplaying entails in the DnD multiplayer sense. Gating rewards behind 20 RPR allows us to incentivize the type of play we're cultivating -- that which puts roleplay first (which can absolutely include dungeon grinds). There are communication lines made open for any player who feels they have not been appropriately evaluated.

DM Senke wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 16, 2019 4:59 am

The server is not accommodating to all kinds of players. We do not support sexy elven fun times, as other servers do. We do not support other forms of more R-rated adventure, as other servers do. We are not a Star Wars setting, nor are we a Ravenloft one. We are not an ARPG Diablo clone. We are not an arena server.

We are an online persistent role playing world. While no one is suggesting that grinding a dungeon is a bad thing, if that is the extent of your experience with Arelith, you are missing the point of what roleplaying entails in the DnD multiplayer sense. Gating rewards behind 20 RPR allows us to incentivize the type of play we're cultivating -- that which puts roleplay first (which can absolutely include dungeon grinds). There are communication lines made open for any player who feels they have not been appropriately evaluated.

Hnnnnghhhhh.
I really like this post, a lot.

This change seems weird.

If it's to slow the rate of rewards, but the :majority of players have 20 RPR" anyway and it's "very easy to obtain", then it's not going to slow the rate of rewards impactfully.

The problem with the system in place is that it incentivises high turnover of characters and minimum RP.

Putting a tiny band aid on it won't solve anything, especially when this particular one pushes things towards dangerous server-killing elitism (rather than taking up 6 blocks of inventory space).

As an alternative system, because I don't want to just roll my eyes and walk away, why not:

Only have a 1% major chance at 30, 26 no longer includes it (increases length of time for each attempt)

Remove gold bonus incentive. (Relatively easy to obtain, requires little interaction)

Add playtime incentive in its place. 1%/100 RL hours up to a cap of 9%. (Doesn't count afk ticks where you wouldn't receive rpr xp and it'll be very easy to spot anyone trying to farm this!)

Add a DM system in which characters performing great RP / events are awarded a small extra % roll bonus with a cap. (They're subject to a DM vote on whether they're applied. They could even be shown when the character in question is rolled as a final thumbs up to them!)

E.G. Received bonus 2% for your excellent dragon event!

Major rewards would require bigger investment in this system, RP is rewarded. Greater and below remain around the same.

The problem with the system in place is that it incentivises high turnover of characters and minimum RP.

Yeah. This always struck me about the current system. Long term epics never going away is an issue but people churning through disposable characters is just as bad, if not worse in some ways. At least long term epics are played by people who actually like their character and want them to be invested in the world long term. Constant turnover by short term characters who're just placeholders gets fatiguing and I think leads to some burnout or general disinterest in new faces.

Something like Sockss' idea would be nice to limit rushes for special request/major race rolls. I also think most races should be application based instead of requiring a character sacrifice and lucky roll. Put a limit on how many a player can ask for in a given time frame (like, one greater a year or two, one minor every six months?) and how many can exist at a time if necessary but if someone who's been a solid player is inspired to play an ogre why do they have to go through the hoops of deleting another character and hoping for a good roll?

I don't know, there are a few problems intertwined here and there's probably no perfect solution. This just seems like a slightly misplaced bandaid that's not going to fix the real problems the epic sacrifice system causes.

The only thing I have against this change is that it'll make players keep their (boring, worn-out) characters - that they, in many cases, have become unhealthily overly attached to - for even longer.

i think maybe this is to stop the powergrind cant rp til 30 group, who then find out they havent gotten the right connections, so they then just roll for the award and start it all over again

obvously when you do this you wouldnt be at 20rpb, imo they shouldnt be at 10 but that just me

Seven Sons of Sin wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 16, 2019 4:17 am

There does seem to be something awkward about simultaneously

> Arelith supports multiple playstyles and wants to be accomodating to all kinds of players
> but really we want to reward roleplayers

I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but to echo n00bdragon, I've always found the Rewards something funny. It's unclear if this is an issue with the Rewards system, or solely the 5% award.

Not... quite getting this. This is like saying 'Our racing team will take anyone at all. But as only one person can ever win a race, then that's wierd isn't it?'

There's this mindset you kinda see in sports too. 'If you're not really, really, really, really good at X sport, why the heck bother?'

You 'bother' because it's fun.

Now if you're good at something, or more to the point on arelith, if you can add to the world, to the fun of others, then great! You should be rewarded for that! If you're just here for your own fun, if you don't much care about rp, or the integrity of the world, then you can still probably play - but don't expect to get all the nifty little treats others do.

At the end of the day it's Carrot Vs Stick approach. Either we punish more severely those who arn't rping well (more bans and such) or we encourage them via rewards. I have always preferred the carrot approach myself.

This is an extremely unintuitive update that could have been handled far better and differently, the sacrifice system was added to give incentive to start new characters, to limit it takes away the point of it. If the problem is excess of awards (which it isn't if majority of players are 20 RPR), reducing reward payouts for each character rolled within a time span would've been more ellegant, or gate all greater/major awards except for ECL reducing ones.

Using the carrot analogy provided above, the reward of sacrifice is the carrot, but the design is to keep new fresh characters and stories flowing in instead of sticking with the same character for months/years.

disclaimer that this update doesnt affect me in the least but it doesnt make it less yikes

Cortex wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 16, 2019 12:44 pm

This is an extremely unintuitive update that could have been handled far better and differently, the sacrifice system was added to give incentive to start new characters, to limit it takes away the point of it. If the problem is excess of awards (which it isn't if majority of players are 20 RPR), reducing reward payouts for each character rolled within a time span would've been more ellegant, or gate all greater/major awards except for ECL reducing ones.

Using the carrot analogy provided above, the reward of sacrifice is the carrot, but the design is to keep new fresh characters and stories flowing in instead of sticking with the same character for months/years.

disclaimer that this update doesnt affect me in the least but it doesnt make it less yikes

A majority of players playing at 20+ RPR can mean a lot of different things in the grand scheme. Our largest offenders for the grind to 26->roll with little RP were players who purposely did not invest time to get to 20 RPR.

This change will likely have no demonstrable effect on character longevity players at 20-40 RPR, but it is something we will monitor nonetheless. There are several posts here painting a picture of an assured future that remains unknown. We'll see where it goes. The change was made, and we're moving forward. If we need to adjust, we'll do so with live data results.

DM Senke wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 16, 2019 1:08 am

The majority of our playerbase currently plays at 20+ RPR. Part of the reasoning for this change was to lessen the amount of 5% chances with respect to players who put mechanics first and roleplay as an afterthought in order to get a Major reward. This change is not meant as punitive, but rather in keeping with our roots as a RP-first server.

So, They wise up and start to power RP?

I think a biggers issue, To me, Is how easily you can get XP. Between writs, Killing and RPR bonus, You'd be lvl26 before you know it.
My average character on the surface, Hops off the ship, Gets some gear, Picks 3 writs, Does them and makes friends along the way, Joins a faction and makes more friends, RP's, Keeps on the Writs, Drops them at lvl 18, Goes crafting and gathering, Joins faction trainings. And like in a month, One year time IG, Is lvl 26.

Let's put that in perspective, In one year time my character can become from average joe with a bit of talent to the master of life and death.

And this is the Roleplay route.

The rate of XP gain is not an issue at stake. This change rewards players who put in the work to achieve 20-40 RPR. This means some effort put into RP.

Out of all the comments about people sitting at 10 RPR or this being punitive, we have received 1 request for RPR review.

If you draw the logical conclusion to an extreme, this change doesn't even necessarily stop the amount of 5% requests. A 10 RPR player can grind as many 26s as they like, and roll them all as soon as they get rated 20 RPR. That's fine, as the goal has been achieved: A player committed to RP enough to get rated 20 RPR. Behavior modified.

That's an interesting topic to touch on. How will you treat someone who grinded their way to epics with bare minimum RP (if any), but once they hit 30 or whatever level they like, they start getting IC and involved? It's something that happens, something that to an extent I'm guilty of (at least in the sense most of my RP starts past epics, and before then I log on to do quests, and log off after, if RP happens in that time it happens, if it doesn't it doesnt).

I don't think I'd fall under a RPB docking, and I trust the DMs will carefully gauge what each player provides, but my question stands: what of people who do not roleplay or roleplay just the bare minimum when absolutely necessary pre-epic? Will their lack of RP weigh on the decision of granting them a higher RPB once they start getting involved positively(I'm not taking into account negative involvements here)?

I think the above is a very perstinent question for the transparency here.

Cortex wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 16, 2019 6:33 pm

That's an interesting topic to touch on. How will you treat someone who grinded their way to epics with bare minimum RP (if any), but once they hit 30 or whatever level they like, they start getting IC and involved? It's something that happens, something that to an extent I'm guilty of (at least in the sense most of my RP starts past epics, and before then I log on to do quests, and log off after, if RP happens in that time it happens, if it doesn't it doesnt).

I don't think I'd fall under a RPB docking, and I trust the DMs will carefully gauge what each player provides, but my question stands: what of people who do not roleplay or roleplay just the bare minimum when absolutely necessary pre-epic? Will their lack of RP weigh on the decision of granting them a higher RPB once they start getting involved positively(I'm not taking into account negative involvements here)?

I think the above is a very perstinent question for the transparency here.

Should a brand new player to the server be doing this, though? I'm fairly sure that most new players don't think like this. There was a video on World of Warcraft that I watched where they were talking about the boring leveling content and how it was skippable by a token to redeem a max-level character that every player was given. Most new players still picked starting from level 1, because they wanted to familiarise themselves with the game.

I think, what the server staff are skirting around here, is that this ruling is aimed at players who join because of OOC friends and never need to RP in order to get to max level (and PvP effectively), and roll when the ringleader has decided he's had enough. Makes you think, if a new ruling was made to counteract this.

It is very easy to accidentally get 20 RPR. Let's not pretend this is a big deal.

Mr_Rieper wrote: ↑

Tue Jul 16, 2019 6:40 pm

It is very easy to accidentally get 20 RPR. Let's not pretend this is a big deal.

This is where my mind's at with this change in specific, but I can see how someone might like to discuss it more for the precedent of changing how reward rolls work and are tied to RPR or some alternative method of determining roleplay quality in general.

I'm picturing a new player that has heard of the reward system but misses that tiny tidbit that it applies to 20 RPB and above. They spend a week or two playing their first character as they learn about the culture and mechanics of Arelith and make it to level 16+ and decide that they're going to roll them and pick something that fits in better to the culture, maybe they'll use a minor or normal for a reduced ECL.

Then they -delete_character x2 and get nothing. The character and that chance for reward is gone in a "gotcha!" moment. They're not encouraged to RP better to enjoy the reward, just to feel like they got screwed and probably get ticked at the staff because their PC cannot be restored. Shift it to upon spending and while they still can't spend it on their 2nd character its not gone, they just have to be positively noticed. More likely to be an encouraging mechanic than the current implementation.