Last time in Arelith ...

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Ork
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Re: Last time in Arelith ...

Post by Ork » Mon Nov 25, 2019 1:54 pm

Oh I 100% agree with that and would report folks for doing that very thing. Doesn't sound like fair play to me.

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Bunny
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Re: Last time in Arelith ...

Post by Bunny » Mon Nov 25, 2019 6:49 pm

To bring it back

A good example would be given the events in Skal recently. It would be nice to have a place that gives the state of the place, its mood, thing you'd over hear. Any public announcements or descriptives. Aka harbor full of ships flying a certain flag.

Im not looking for oocly give aways but i am looking for a little bit more to understand what my character experiences.

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The GrumpyCat
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Re: Last time in Arelith ...

Post by The GrumpyCat » Mon Nov 25, 2019 7:11 pm

I want to say that whilst I sympathise with the desire for this, it would also remove a lot of In Game opportunity for mischief and mayhelm, for misinformation and such. Which whilst it can be frustrating, also makes good game.
This too shall pass.

(I now have a DM Discord (I hope) It's DM GrumpyCat#7185 but please keep in mind I'm very busy IRL so I can't promise how quick I'll get back to you.)

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Huschpfusch
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Re: Last time in Arelith ...

Post by Huschpfusch » Mon Nov 25, 2019 8:34 pm

There is a forums part for player ic stories. There could very be part where staff dumps texts from NPC perspective thus providing some flavor to what is hot on Arelith and providing rp hooks without giving away ig secrets.
e.g.: Plague Storyline 2018:
Plague strikes Cordor stage: a commoner with the first sign of disease breaking down in street.
Plague spreads across Surface stage: the caravan master's worries.
Plague is cured: the Cordor cemeteray undertaker's perspective at the last funeral for those for which cure was found just a tick too late.

Needn't be long just oner or two paragraphs. So not much time wasted. Also there could be just a position on the team for writing this things. So DMs just run the stories and dump writing jobs n the ghostwriter's desk.

Events such as Halloween 2019 would be perfect opportunity to try things like that since it was oneshot and had no connection to the coregamestory. And with Halloween 2019 style events team could even go bananas and ask for community submission of defined minilength from player character's perspective.
"Oh look, an unidentified magical wand - let`s just see what it does by randomly using it in battle!"

Azarain
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Re: Last time in Arelith ...

Post by Azarain » Sun Dec 01, 2019 9:39 pm

I believe a lot of the statements here completely marginal other players dismissing the reason why people log on, which is to play a game and have fun.

I have read several posts here where people have stated a problem. Well known events occur and their characters do not know anything about it. Specifically, due to play and other players being not being available. The response has been, well find out IC it might be fun for others. This is the wrong answer because when people do not have fun they do not log in as they find other fun things to do. Being frustrated by lack of common knowledge of major event is not a plot hook for some other character to show up. It is a cause to play elsewhere where they can interact with the game world. :|

Beard Master Flex
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Re: Last time in Arelith ...

Post by Beard Master Flex » Sun Dec 01, 2019 11:23 pm

Azarain wrote:
Sun Dec 01, 2019 9:39 pm
I believe a lot of the statements here completely marginal other players dismissing the reason why people log on, which is to play a game and have fun.

I have read several posts here where people have stated a problem. Well known events occur and their characters do not know anything about it. Specifically, due to play and other players being not being available. The response has been, well find out IC it might be fun for others. This is the wrong answer because when people do not have fun they do not log in as they find other fun things to do. Being frustrated by lack of common knowledge of major event is not a plot hook for some other character to show up. It is a cause to play elsewhere where they can interact with the game world. :|
I agree with this.

Back in the day there was at least one DM who would post very detailed epilogues once their events were over. I greatly enjoyed that format. That was on the old forums however and likely lost to the ether.

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The GrumpyCat
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Re: Last time in Arelith ...

Post by The GrumpyCat » Sun Dec 01, 2019 11:43 pm

Arelith is, to a suprisingly large extent, a player lead server.

People misunderstand that as meaning that the players 'shape' the server. You do, to a point yes, but perhaps more to the point - players shape the vast majority of stories WITHIN the server.

90% of the plot you run into won't be DM lead. It'll be character lead.

It'll be rescuing a friend taken as prisoner by evil underdarkers.
It'll be dealing with a stone shortage in Brogendenstein
It'll be that pc who's rping that they're cursed, their heart slowly turning to stone.
It'll be that pc who your character feels romantic feelings for, but who is engaged to another pc.
It'll be that adventure, which went horribly awry, and ended in the death of a treasured compation - causing your character to vow vengence.
It'll be dealing with the corrupt mayor who has exiled all the members of your faith.

DMs run event,s yes, but what we love most is when players run and and create their own stories. Yes you don't have all the mechanical 'power' we do, but you have some. And you can and should use that, in coberation with others, to make stories. To embelish stories.
Azarain wrote:
Sun Dec 01, 2019 9:39 pm
I believe a lot of the statements here completely marginal other players dismissing the reason why people log on, which is to play a game and have fun.

I have read several posts here where people have stated a problem. Well known events occur and their characters do not know anything about it. Specifically, due to play and other players being not being available. The response has been, well find out IC it might be fun for others. This is the wrong answer because when people do not have fun they do not log in as they find other fun things to do. Being frustrated by lack of common knowledge of major event is not a plot hook for some other character to show up. It is a cause to play elsewhere where they can interact with the game world. :|
I entirely agree with this post.

Ultimatly, if the above style of Persistent World isn't for you - wherein whilst we do run events, we also highly depend on players to make their own events, and to bring the world to life - if you don't like that style? Then you probably shouldn't be playing here. And that's not a bad thing. I'd rather people were having fun on a server that they enjoyed, than felt forced to play on a server they didn't.

There's many other persistent worlds, where the main plot is entirely DM based, and you can log in and wait for the DM team to handhold you to the next event. And those servers are awsome too! A different style, but also really neat and really fun!

And I won't deny that there may be times when we should use IC info to better advertise our events, wherein that is appropriate. But ultimatly it's long been the desire of the dev team that to properly play arelith, all you should ever really NEED is the game itself. That as much information should be done though In Game resources and effort as possible.

EDIT: Just to be clear, by all means I want people to have fun here. But there are aspects that make arelith, Arelith, and the very immersive nature is one of them. If that was gone, I'm not sure we'd be the same server.
This too shall pass.

(I now have a DM Discord (I hope) It's DM GrumpyCat#7185 but please keep in mind I'm very busy IRL so I can't promise how quick I'll get back to you.)

Ascheriit
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Re: Last time in Arelith ...

Post by Ascheriit » Tue Dec 03, 2019 12:40 am

TLDR, If people can't find out about long past events that have lingering effects IG, then it will kill motivation for players to start things.

To come back to this topic again. I agree with GrumpyCats points at least when it comes with events that have happened very recently, or were small to medium in size. Some examples that I think of for such include, highwaymen robbing a caravan or two, A divine rite that goes awry, or a recently signed treaty between two factions.

The sort of thing I had trouble with were things that happened on a large scale in proportion to a group that occured many years ago in game, but still have a long lingering effect on the group. If people ain't exactly around to tell you about it IG (either due to non-overlapping play times or those involved shelving/rolling), and there are not any NPCs that give dialogue about it, or there aren't relevant messages on boards from that time period. When I tried to then even do a super simple event, I felt blindsided with stuff that came out from people as fallout/baggage from this grand event from years ago, that I had near 0 ability to FOIG about. That personally lead me to say screw it. I don't want to spend all of my time on this game trying to piece together, and clean up a mess that some people left lying around. I will instead go do my own thing that I was previously doing which is actually fun.

Azarain
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Joined: Tue Sep 03, 2019 11:38 pm

Re: Last time in Arelith ...

Post by Azarain » Sun Dec 08, 2019 8:56 pm

The GrumpyCat wrote:
Sun Dec 01, 2019 11:43 pm
Arelith is, to a suprisingly large extent, a player lead server.

People misunderstand that as meaning that the players 'shape' the server. You do, to a point yes, but perhaps more to the point - players shape the vast majority of stories WITHIN the server.

90% of the plot you run into won't be DM lead. It'll be character lead.

It'll be rescuing a friend taken as prisoner by evil underdarkers.
It'll be dealing with a stone shortage in Brogendenstein
It'll be that pc who's rping that they're cursed, their heart slowly turning to stone.
It'll be that pc who your character feels romantic feelings for, but who is engaged to another pc.
It'll be that adventure, which went horribly awry, and ended in the death of a treasured compation - causing your character to vow vengence.
It'll be dealing with the corrupt mayor who has exiled all the members of your faith.

DMs run event,s yes, but what we love most is when players run and and create their own stories. Yes you don't have all the mechanical 'power' we do, but you have some. And you can and should use that, in coberation with others, to make stories. To embelish stories.
Azarain wrote:
Sun Dec 01, 2019 9:39 pm
I believe a lot of the statements here completely marginal other players dismissing the reason why people log on, which is to play a game and have fun.

I have read several posts here where people have stated a problem. Well known events occur and their characters do not know anything about it. Specifically, due to play and other players being not being available. The response has been, well find out IC it might be fun for others. This is the wrong answer because when people do not have fun they do not log in as they find other fun things to do. Being frustrated by lack of common knowledge of major event is not a plot hook for some other character to show up. It is a cause to play elsewhere where they can interact with the game world. :|
I entirely agree with this post.

Ultimatly, if the above style of Persistent World isn't for you - wherein whilst we do run events, we also highly depend on players to make their own events, and to bring the world to life - if you don't like that style? Then you probably shouldn't be playing here. And that's not a bad thing. I'd rather people were having fun on a server that they enjoyed, than felt forced to play on a server they didn't.

There's many other persistent worlds, where the main plot is entirely DM based, and you can log in and wait for the DM team to handhold you to the next event. And those servers are awsome too! A different style, but also really neat and really fun!

And I won't deny that there may be times when we should use IC info to better advertise our events, wherein that is appropriate. But ultimatly it's long been the desire of the dev team that to properly play arelith, all you should ever really NEED is the game itself. That as much information should be done though In Game resources and effort as possible.

EDIT: Just to be clear, by all means I want people to have fun here. But there are aspects that make arelith, Arelith, and the very immersive nature is one of them. If that was gone, I'm not sure we'd be the same server.

There are also a lot of PW games were players create their own fun and DMs when they run plots post and state what is going on. It is dishonest to make a statement seeming as if it one or the other. According to the Beard Master Flex this was done on the old forums as well. Now as the discussion was about major DM plots I won't touch the conversation the speaking on player created plots. Just major DM plots .

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