Award System Remastered - What Would You Prefer?

[Glowing Mushroom]

For the past three weeks, you have gone into your job early, stayed late, busted your butt to go above and beyond with your work you put into it and you've asked for nothing in return. You could argue that you may "deserve" an extra $100.

This is a fallacy. You don't deserve sh--.

Again, nowhere did I ever say you explicitly and objectively deserve anything. I stated exactly that you could argue an individual "may" deserve it. I don't understand why this has to be met with such aggression.

[The GrumpyCat]

Good roleplay is its own reward, and it's the gift that keeps on giving.

If this is true (and to an extent I believe it is) then why worry if someone else is getting something nice a bit quicker than you? You're having fun, that's what counts!

If it's not true, then it's a good idea to have some manner of rewarding it.

I do have a 30 rpr and am one of those "contributing players", whatever that means. I have everything to gain from such a system as proposed, but I'm still against it.

I am not worried about who gets 5%s and how fast. What I am worried about is the truly toxic and cancerous attitude it would create. Already in this very thread you have people talking about how some players "deserve" more than other players perceived as average or lesser.

Favoritism of this variety is a disease, and partially because it seems benevolent and even righteous, but only RNG is justice.

But in a system which is mixed with mechanics too - and which is not transparent - then this isn't as much of a problem. We have it now already in fact. DMs do give out XP, which helps folk level to 30. But I don't hear massive shrieks of favouritsm because such-and-such got such and such xp and so and so didn't.

[Glowing Mushroom]

I think everyone should get a shot at a 5% pc.

But I think that those who roleplay well should be given a bigger/quicker shot.

I think that Glowing Mushroom is right - that we don't reward good rpers enough.

Why?

Because XP means very little now - 50%+ of the time I see good rp? RP I want to award? It's from level 30's. So I can't give them any xp.

Oh sure after a reasonable measure of time, with other DM agreement and if their rp remains of a similar quarlity we could raise their rpr, but that depends on a lot and only takes you to a certain point.

A personal quest or such depends very much on my rl time allowance

Items/Gold don't make sense.

So having some new way we can, on case by case basis, drop a little 'wow that was good rp/good behavior/good whatever' to someone is, great!

Ultimatly nothing we bring in will be perfect, and I don't know if what I hope will happen ever will - it's a long process... but I do want to bring in changes if only so we as DMs can give out nice things more.

I'm really glad this post has at least started the debate and conversation.

Again, I don't think any one system is going to be perfect. There is no easy answer.

The best answer might be complicated and difficult to implement, but sometimes that's simply what it takes to get it right - Or at least as close as right to possible!

[Zavandar]

But in a system which is mixed with mechanics too - and which is not transparent - then this isn't as much of a problem. We have it now already in fact. DMs do give out XP, which helps folk level to 30. But I don't hear massive shrieks of favouritsm because such-and-such got such and such xp and so and so didn't.

DMs really don't give out a lot of xp relative to time spent at events. and to my knowledge, everyone at these events usually gets the xp.

i'd be in favor of adding time spent online into what tallies up to getting a 5%. let character level, time online, and gold contribute towards the roll. i still don't think it should exceed 10% and that the scaling for time online should require a lot of time relative to extra % chance of success.

this inadvertently rewards time spent RPing, which seems to be the onus of the problem here, as you get "credit" for doing anything, including just sitting and RPing. you might even get more "good" rp out of more people because they don't feel pressured to grind.

this also puts arguments of favoritism and entitlement to rest, as it continues to function in a completely random manner.

[xanrael]

The two changes I'd like to see that has been mentioned in some form:

- Time played giving a bonus, probably up to 5%. I'd suggest implementing it from recording the total adventure xp earned and then subtracting the current adventure xp to get the spent xp and using that. Higher RPR players would have a slight advantage and anything that keeps you actively gaining and spending adventure XP (crafting/exploring/writs/taverns/adventure_mode/etc) would aid here.

- If you get the lowest reward on a roll in that tier (16+, 21+, 26+) you have a +5% chance to your next roll at that tier the next time. This keeps stacking until you get a mid or high roll then it resets. So it wouldn't assure a Major ever, but would assure at some point you'd get a Greater or Major at 26+.

[Dreams]

I think the only time someone should get more bonus potential is when a character is forced to roll. Put a 3 RL year limit on characters and have them become MoD at that stage, with a 5% bonus linked to the time spent in game thing.

[Altair01]

I agree that the amount of time spent playing, and not character level, should determine what reward tiers you roll for when you roll a character. I'll hopefully post my thoughts on an alternative system in a future post.

[The GrumpyCat]

I think the only time someone should get more bonus potential is when a character is forced to roll. Put a 3 RL year limit on characters and have them become MoD at that stage, with a 5% bonus linked to the time spent in game thing.

Hay! How did you know about that!

Ok yeah, time to spill the beans on our plans.

So yeah - that's pretty much what we're planning. After playing a character for three years, you go down to a PvP only MoD. You do get an increase for each year your character 'survives' of 5% though - but you have to play for a minimum of ten hours per OOC week to get that bonus.

Further more -Recommends will also add 1%/2%/3%/4%/5% on the chance of getting and award, dependent on the person recommending. A 10 rpr is a 1%, a 20 is 2%, a 30 rpr is 3%, a 40 rpr is 4% and finally a -recommend from a DM is a 5%! Obviously this can't be done multiple times but it really does encourage you to get to know lots and lots of folk.

Also - for those lucky souls who get to be DMs? As an award for your service you get a +2 on every single character rolled whilst you're a dm! A little something to say 'thank you' to our staff.

Killing people in PvP will decrease your chance of a major though - reducing it by 1% for each person you kill! I think this will encourage people to move away from PvP options.

There is concern that there will be too many special races but we're going to fix this by firstly putting all 5% folks on an automatic 5 life MOD. So tha they won't be sticking around too long.

adding new races such as Myconoids, Were-creatures, sentient golems, liches, half-drow and also Succubi! But that's not the biggest change we're making, oh no, not by a long shot - the biggest, change... the most exciting race we're adding is... well I'm hiding it under a spoiler tag so that only those who really want to know can discover, because this is the sort of thing you may really want to be suprised by In Game. Ready?

Ready?

APRIL FOOLS!

[Straxus]

I'll be honest.. I still don't understand this at all. I get the idea, but the technical side of this is a bit of a mystery.

Grumpy Cat, that is the best spoiler ever!

[Lexx]

I think the only time someone should get more bonus potential is when a character is forced to roll. Put a 3 RL year limit on characters and have them become MoD at that stage, with a 5% bonus linked to the time spent in game thing.

Hay! How did you know about that!

Ok yeah, time to spill the beans on our plans.

So yeah - that's pretty much what we're planning. After playing a character for three years, you go down to a PvP only MoD. You do get an increase for each year your character 'survives' of 5% though - but you have to play for a minimum of ten hours per OOC week to get that bonus.

Further more -Recommends will also add 1%/2%/3%/4%/5% on the chance of getting and award, dependent on the person recommending. A 10 rpr is a 1%, a 20 is 2%, a 30 rpr is 3%, a 40 rpr is 4% and finally a -recommend from a DM is a 5%! Obviously this can't be done multiple times but it really does encourage you to get to know lots and lots of folk.

Also - for those lucky souls who get to be DMs? As an award for your service you get a +2 on every single character rolled whilst you're a dm! A little something to say 'thank you' to our staff.

Killing people in PvP will decrease your chance of a major though - reducing it by 1% for each person you kill! I think this will encourage people to move away from PvP options.

There is concern that there will be too many special races but we're going to fix this by firstly putting all 5% folks on an automatic 5 life MOD. So tha they won't be sticking around too long.

adding new races such as Myconoids, Were-creatures, sentient golems, liches, half-drow and also Succubi! But that's not the biggest change we're making, oh no, not by a long shot - the biggest, change... the most exciting race we're adding is... well I'm hiding it under a spoiler tag so that only those who really want to know can discover, because this is the sort of thing you may really want to be suprised by In Game. Ready?

Ready?

APRIL FOOLS!

Wow. You got me. Well done!

[Glowing Mushroom]

Ready?

APRIL FOOLS!

Damn youuuuuuuuu grumpyycattttttt!!!! *shakes fist*

[Skald Haldi]

What behavior do you want to reward?
There have been several different opinions and proposals.
For each, one, if that's what you want, then measure and reward accordingly.

Note that I believe it MUST be measured and automated somehow.
Anything else is going to steal valuable DM time -> and miss people who shine.

1) Encourage people to cycle out old characters and try something new
The question then is "what is old?" -> high level? long-running? participation?
I've had a level 30 shelved for two years that I'm never going to play b/c they are done.
I'm never going to roll, because I like to be reminded of that fun each time I log in.

2) Encourage people who make the server friendly and fun
The question is "how?" -> what behaviors indicate someone who creates fun?
Number of lines spoken? Number of people who hear? Number of coins exchanged?
If you can figure out and reward those behaviors, who cares if we game the system?
If players are encouraged to make the server more fun, the server is more FUN!

3) Reduce the numbers of unusual races / PrC tokens / etc
Combined with the two points above, I don't see how rewards are going to help.
If they are exceptional, once you get such a thing, why would you ever roll them?
Instead, I'd suggest giving the unusual races heavy dump-stat penalties.
For example, +4 to the major stat, but -6 to the dump stat(s).
In that case, only people who want to RP that race will play that race.
Alternately, magnify other penalties - example: give drow the vampire-in-sun effects.

[Marsi]

Why do we not think good/generous roleplayers are being rewarded? The RPR system does just that.

If the award system is not though of as something to encourage turnover, I don't see why it even needs to exist.

Special races should just be an RPR thing. There's been so much drama over the years due to less than special roleplayers being able to play special races, and clearly there's a lot of anxiety around "mindless grinders" being given access to cool roleplay rewards.

If there is to be an award system, it should just be ECL bonuses or later level starts. Make them accumulate per cd key. I think these are what awards really should be -- people will more readily roll if they knew their next character wouldn't require so much grinding. It makes sense to reward involved roleplayers with less grinding so they can spend more time roleplaying. Someone who has played 10s of characters over the years really shouldn't be made to repeat content, and this could lighten traffic in early game dungeons.

I'm taken with the idea of applying a PvP MoD, or stat penalties, after n years of consistent play time. For me, 1 year is perfect. It's an unpopular idea though. I do wish more players acknowledged the passage of time in their character's lives, rather than pretending nothing has changed as they hop from plot to plot, faction to faction chasing relevance until they collect so much baggage that their eventual funeral (if they don't just disappear) is unattended. I'm not against "long-term" characters, but after being around so long there should be recognition that one is fragile/weak and exists now only to support/advise younger characters. Mightn't make sense for non-humans, but you could make the argument for game mechanic's sake that being killed/resurrected a 100 times takes a bodily toll akin to old age.

[satan]

Reward system is fine as is

[satan]

Why do we not think good/generous roleplayers are being rewarded? The RPR system does just that.

Or it would if anyone maintained it. Pretty much only people that are friends with dms get past 20 and even then it doesn't add up to much.

Most of the most awesome role players in arelith are 20 rpr

[Curve]

Pretty much only people that are friends with dms get past 20

I am past 20 and not friends with any DM. Your conspiracy theory fails the test.

[xanrael]

I think a more apt way would be to say something like "what is amazing RP can vary depending upon the audience". For example I'm more impressed by "supportive" style characters that seem to bring the setting to life and help others with their plots than movers-and-shakers that start and progress plots and factions. Someone else may put more emphasis on how much work the latter takes to do well where everyone is enjoying themselves and the RP and events are flowing. For the sake of this example I'm ignoring the large section of people who do both very well.

To be honest, I'd rather see a Minotaur/Imp/whatever other Major be more in the background than the spotlight as I think it would send a false message to new players on goals and what "success" looks like. That's not to say they cannot be center of attention, but if it was closer to 100% then I think that could be problematic. Think all races should stay tied to the reroll system and if a specific one is troubling from an RP sense can already require a successful app as an additional requirement as is currently being done.

[Dreams]

Probably worth restating the different intentions of the two systems:

- Epic Sacrifice - Designed to encourage people to move on and not linger on one character for too long.

- RPR - Designed to encourage good RP and offer a small reward for this.

[The GrumpyCat]

Probably worth restating the different intentions of the two systems:

- Epic Sacrifice - Designed to encourage people to move on and not linger on one character for too long.

- RPR - Designed to encourage good RP and offer a small reward for this.

This is entirely correct. But I would also like to see Epic Sacrifice be given a boost so that there's further reasons for good roleplay. Also RPR is great as an 'overview' but it's not so great for small individual scenes. For immedate rewards. You'd be suprised about how many players we have who we think are 'almost 30's' but who havn't quite made it that far because they slip up badly in other areas, or because we've only seen them play one character so it's hard to judge - or for other small reasons. I want to reward these guys when they do well.

Pretty much only people that are friends with dms get past 20 and even then it doesn't add up to much.

Please name the players and the DMs who are giving rpr raises to their friends and I'll see them immedatly removed from the game.

No, seriously, this actually really iritates me for two ways.

1) It's blatently untrue
2) If believed it can DAMAGE YOUR ABILITY TO GET A BETTER RPR

This is the big thing

To get a 30 rpr, you need the vote of two DMs. DMs are NOT allowed to vote for players they've interacted with (at least interacted relitivly recently or heavily) in game- or of course their friends.

If we discover a DM voting for their ic/ooc friends - the chances are they would be removed from the team.

So if you SOMEHOW discover the identity of a DM player side, and try to 'befriend' them or 'roleplay a lot' with them - you're actually severely damaging your chances of getting a higher rpr, as that DM can no longer recommend you for such - because of that rule.

And - because people arn't seeming to get this... I'm not saying that only people who get bonuses from DMs will be able to play vampires/minotaurs/whatever.

I'm saying that DM fiat may give some folks slightly quicker access to these. That's all. 'Slightly quicker'.

[Irongron]

Pretty much only people that are friends with dms get past 20 and even then it doesn't add up to much.

You know, I don't even tell staff who I play, and regularly change my account name.

[Scurvy Cur]

In a vacuum, I'd even be completely against 5% characters altogether. I can think of no more than a handful in my unspeakably long term on this server that I've felt have been a positive contribution to the server, and I think most of the time attaching a collection of 5% features to a character tends to make the writing behind them worse, rather than more engaging. Moreover, 5% characters have an unfortunate habit of lingering long past their expiration date, because the player understandably remains in love with the uniqueness. However, we've built up the expectation that this is a thing for longer than I've been here, and some sort of incentive to roll old, stale characters is good.

I have a pretty strong preference against anything that involves manual input. Not really because I think DM favoritism will dish out special awards to friends , but because I believe that a manual system will leave too much of the playerbase wondering whether they have. I don't think that's a particularly good thing to do. It's not good for the DM team administering the system. It's not good for the awarded players. It's not good for the speculators.

To the extent I have any personal concerns about making manual judgements on whether someone deserves an award, they mostly have to do with the inherently subjective nature of what "good RP" looks like. Ask a group of 5 people whether someone's RP is "good" and why, and you'll get at least 6 different answers. I know I certainly have very strong opinions on the subject; there are many players held up as "stellar" roleplayers that I don't personally rate very highly, and many players who get dismissed as "bland social RPers" or "mindless PvP thugs" whose RP I actually quite enjoy. This isn't really because the people I think are mediocre are bad, or the people I enjoy are just inherently better at writing. It's because I have a preference for the writing and storytelling approach of some players over others, fundamentally no different from either my love for the tales told by Tolkien and C.S. Lewis and my total disdain for those told by GRRM.

For this reason alone, I do not favor any system that gives awards for "good RP", because the term itself cannot (and probably just as importantly, should not) be precisely enough defined to serve as a standard.

There's another problem, though: "Good RP" is a feel-good, but ultimately empty term. Everyone is in favor of "good RP". When we start trying to examine the criterion with any more specificity, though, we need to start asking about specific behaviors, such as quality of prose, descriptiveness of writing, believably communicated character emotion, faithfulness to character integrity, inclusiveness of others, ability to distinguish between IC and OOC/ability to reject the latter, overall aesthetic, ability to take a loss, enhancement of the setting of Arelith, OOC "niceness", and activity in the world, to name a few. Each and every one of us is going to have a substantially different take on how important these factors are (and even whether these things are desirable). To use a pretty popular example, I know a lot of people consider "Inclusiveness" the holy grail of good RP, but I believe that the only thing that matters is a willingness to avoid OOC exclusions, and to involve everyone in your story that it makes sense to involve. I also believe a good many characters are made worse when they sacrifice other criteria, such as character integrity, in the pursuit of inclusiveness. Likewise, I don't really put too much stock into how "nice" someone is OOC so long as they meet a bare minimum standard of "not an Snuggybear" and their in-game conduct is halfway decent, but a great deal into whether they've kept IC and OOC separate (put another way, I have much greater respect for a player that can stick to a compelling narrative come what may, playing it straight with no OOC favorites played than I do for a "nice guy" that arranges everything OOC in advance). Other people, however, think that an OOC willingness to accommodate the preferences of other players is the sine qua non of a good RPer. And in the end, neither of us is categorically right and wrong, we just operate under different value judgements. I don't think these different preferences can be adequately resolved into a coherent system, and I would generally rather remain at the unflinching, impersonal mercy of the dice.

My far bigger, and only somewhat related concern is that I think we need fewer 5% characters than we currently have, not more of them, and I do have some concerns that if we let any input factors stack up past the old 5% + up to 5 more percent for gold, we'll end up with more than we have right now, which would be a shame. This, however, is easily addressed just by capping the sum total of all factors (time, gold, XP, whatever) to 10% or less (though again, I'd strongly prefer the cap at 5%).

Edited to clarify that I don't think "good roleplayers" deserve awards at any different pace than others, because the term itself has no meaning, and if we start digging deep enough to find meaning, I don't think we'll find consensus on what's desirable.

[seppuku me senpai]

Scurvy Cur touches on a unique phenomena that happens with 5%. If the roll system exists to encourage a turn over rate, a 5% is counter-intuitive to that. Because of the sacristy of a 5%, a player who has one is not likely to roll it, even after the story is complete. 5% in the old-times were fine because of how small the player base was you wouldn't have so many fantastic and unique things floating around. Now that Arelith is bigger, the magic of seeing a unique 5% is gone. It's not special anymore, especially when there have been not so great executions of the 5% that have robbed it of sacred mystique. I think this can be fixed by introducing permadeath on an MoD counter to 5% concepts. This is not a joke.

I really like the noble and guldorand start awards. These are excellent rewards that appeal to the roleplay-centric player and enable a host of mechanically useful and narratively cool tools for the player experience. Personally, I would like to see more rewards that enable RP. Instead of 5% for a dragon, 5% to play an ambassador from Cormyr, or 5% to play one of the Blessed survivors of the Bane/Torm kaiju battle of Tantras. 5% to get a plot-bound magic ring with ESF divination and scrying? To a lesser degree, we could see Greater Awards to play a member of an existing NPC faction or new starting locations. I know these are more work too, but 5% to see a character made into an NPC, or have a fixture made a module permanent thing are also cool ideas.

regarding 30/40rpr special considerations. I sympathize with the sentiment. however, I do not agree it is a good idea. Your reward for being a 40rpr is the 120exp a tick you get by just existing, which thanks to the adventure exp system enables a higher rpr player to spend more time RPing and less time exping. Saying you deserve to have special thing over other people is dangerous rhetoric that comes from a place of jealousy and entitlement. relax. have fun. you don't need a reward for doing the stuff you were going to be doing anyway. if you ever find yourself tired with upholding some invisible "bar" at the cost of your own fun, take a break, make a gift of humility 0ecl warlock in the underdark and run grind for three days rping with nothing but voice lines until you feel better.

[Emotionaloverload]

I think this can be fixed by introducing permadeath on an MoD counter to 5% concepts. This is not a joke.

I 100% agree with this. Its something I already do on my 5%'s after their first three months and to all my grandfathered characters because even I, with a reputation for rolling, will struggle to let go of them for no reason other than they feel special which (to me) is not a good rp reason.

I really like the noble and guldorand start awards. These are excellent rewards that appeal to the roleplay-centric player and enable a host of mechanically useful and narratively cool tools for the player experience. Personally, I would like to see more rewards that enable RP. Instead of 5% for a dragon, 5% to play an ambassador from Cormyr, or 5% to play one of the Blessed survivors of the Bane/Torm kaiju battle of Tantras. 5% to get a plot-bound magic ring with ESF divination and scrying? To a lesser degree, we could see Greater Awards to play a member of an existing NPC faction or new starting locations. I know these are more work too, but 5% to see a character made into an NPC, or have a fixture made a module permanent thing are also cool ideas.

I would love to see more rewards that aren't flashy. I have seen so many winged, horned or tail having characters recently; it causes some unusual or subdued reactions due to sheer quantity. If this is what we're going for, awesome. Arelith can be a special island for rare races (which is fine). If its not what we're going for, it would be very helpful to have some 'mundane' rewards.

The new start reward is amazing btw. All the <3

-S

[Salasker]

So... we're brainstorming, right? No bad ideas? Reading through the thread, I had one, and I'm pretty sure it won't be popular, but here it is:

Everyone gets a major award when they hit 20 RPR.

*ducks for cover* Hear me out!

It would be like shops or quarters. You get ONE character. Until you roll it, that's the only one you'll EVER get. When you do, you get another to make when you want it. This would guarantee turnover, make sure that there was a minimum criteria for playing a 'special' character, and be absolutely devoid of any calls of favouritism.

The downsides?

A plethora of wings, tails and horns. But not everyone that wants a Major award wants to play that sort of character and it seems that's already a problem for some people.

Work for the DMs. Making sure that anyone with 20 doesn't all of a sudden go off the deep end with a strange character concept.

Some sort of restructure of the current system, as the 5-10% does make it attractive to roll characters that aren't in the rarest of echelons.

I am 100% positive there are many more downsides, but I'm not sure there aren't a couple of pretty good up ones to go alongside them, both of which I'm not thinking of currently, as I'm writing this spur of the moment.

[Quidix]

I think this can be fixed by introducing permadeath on an MoD counter to 5% concepts. This is not a joke.

I 100% agree with this. Its something I already do on my 5%'s after their first three months and to all my grandfathered characters because even I, with a reputation for rolling, will struggle to let go of them for no reason other than they feel special which (to me) is not a good rp reason.

I really like the noble and guldorand start awards. These are excellent rewards that appeal to the roleplay-centric player and enable a host of mechanically useful and narratively cool tools for the player experience. Personally, I would like to see more rewards that enable RP. Instead of 5% for a dragon, 5% to play an ambassador from Cormyr, or 5% to play one of the Blessed survivors of the Bane/Torm kaiju battle of Tantras. 5% to get a plot-bound magic ring with ESF divination and scrying? To a lesser degree, we could see Greater Awards to play a member of an existing NPC faction or new starting locations. I know these are more work too, but 5% to see a character made into an NPC, or have a fixture made a module permanent thing are also cool ideas.

I would love to see more rewards that aren't flashy. I have seen so many winged, horned or tail having characters recently; it causes some unusual or subdued reactions due to sheer quantity. If this is what we're going for, awesome. Arelith can be a special island for rare races (which is fine). If its not what we're going for, it would be very helpful to have some 'mundane' rewards.

The new start reward is amazing btw. All the <3

-S

I love the idea of more mundane and RP rewards! The amount of winged / horned / tail characters have really increased a lot...

If it was up to me, I'd make all rewards RP / visuals rather than mechanical - locked races can just mirror the stats of another race.