Rewards Lock

[LichBait]

I've been here since the servers split, and I've taken maybe - three 6-month breaks from playing Arelith at least semi-regularly in that time. I play my characters for 6 to 12 months per character on average before rolling them.

I have never succeeded on a 5% roll.

I have never gotten a Major.

I have gotten a single Greater award that I can remember.

I've sat on my hands humming and hawing as everyone else got to play concepts that I wanted to try out, before watching them inevitably be either removed wholesale or else restricted to majors with a set number permitted total, a number that rarely ever fluctuates because there are people who will finally get in to hold one of the limited number of slots allowed and then clutch it to their chest covetously and never roll that precious limited-number character - even long after their character's arc ended and their story and narrative ceased to be relevant or fresh.

I've consigned myself, with the rewards lock, to never being getting a Major or having a chance to play something Neat or Flash until this pointbuy system is put into place - and even then, maybe not, with some of the suggestions that've been made to take what was intended to be an egalitarian system into a headache inducing one.

This is why people grind for rewards. I'm not above admitting I'm a skilled storyteller and competent writer, and that I can tell just as good a story and make just as compelling a character with a human as I can a half-giant, but playing that weird, unique, rare creature is fun for some people.

And if people want to tell other people they're wrong and should leave the game for wanting to have fun in a way that probably will never impact on your own gameplay or narrative arc, then maybe they should go look at Server Rule #4. Unless it's for telling people off for saying bags. Then you're always in the right.

+1

As someone who has been here since 2011 myself, and never gotten above a Normal I feel much the same.

[Ork]

And if people want to tell other people they're wrong and should leave the game for wanting to have fun in a way that probably will never impact on your own gameplay or narrative arc, then maybe they should go look at Server Rule #4.

I have no issues with players playing giants or kenku or vampires. I'm not saying the want to play these races are bad. I definitely am saying that playing roll-bait characters, or characters who sole purpose is to become a chance at a 5%, is. I put a lot of the blame for this mentality on the system. It rewards players that think like this. if we're all otherwise okay with players playing null rp characters x20 so they get that chance to play their half-drow with wings, there's no point arguing. We've accepted "RP at 30" as norm behavior, why not this.

[MRFTW]

If anything, I think the rewards lock has helped with my rolling habits.

Now I know I can only roll once every two months, I can dump a normal into a Guldorand start, do the easiest 10 levels (which 16-26 categorically is), and roll. It's freed up a lot of my time for playing other things, be it other characters on Arelith, Banner Saga or practising for Pokémon VGC. It takes roughly 18-24 hours over the course of a week or two.

That said, my "roll bait" characters aren't just silent dungeoneers. They are characters, like anyone else's. Yes, they are designed to have a short, unimpactful arc, but that's fine. They act differently from each other and have different thoughts, and have probably been side characters in some grand schemes. Side characters are the supporting cast of the grand narrative.

Personally I embrace the harm principle when it comes to my thoughts about other people's behaviour, but I can imagine us as a community (myself included) arguing back and forth over what constitutes "harm" with equal vitriol as we discuss, well, everything.

[Zavandar]

I can't think of the last time I made a character to roll them. I just look at rolling as the possibility of getting something fancy at the end of role-playing my character. I actually have a few 30s in my vault because I rarely roll.

I've gotten one major (which I spent on a vampire that I subsequently rolled at 26 because I wasn't feeling the character) and a greater or two, one of which was spent on a currently-shelved aasimar.

Conversely, my most well-known characters were just base races.

I think the two conflicting schools of thought at play here are whether or not people are entitled to special races. A point-buy system implies that they are, because getting to play one is a matter of when, not if. I've already made it clear that I'm not fond of Arelith being a zoo, so I think the current arrangement (with rolling having a cooldown) is just fine. It doesn't affect me at all because I'm not rolling more often than that.

When I make a character, it's with the personal expectation that they'll be a living, breathing thing and have some longevity. Don't get me wrong, I've seen some great story-telling from short-lived characters, but they weren't made to roll--they just reached a logical conclusion quicker than anticipated, but the suddenness of it all made it that much more impactful.

I argue against the notion that rollbait characters aren't hurting anyone, because I think they cheapen the setting. If I can tell that a character is rollbait (and I often can), then I think that is a problem. When you approach playing a character with the intention of them being miminally IC and simply a means to an end, this reflects in your writing.

And RP is what I'm here for first.

[AstralUniverse]

At this point in the 7th page of this thread I'm really into seeing more semi-ordinary things (a person of x place, or with a weapon, or just very good at something mundane) as ordinary races, with thematic mechanical boons, to relieve the pressure off rare races but with enough mechanical boon to make it justify the consumed award tier. It's a bit like shoving the dirt under the rug (because we then face even more things to balance and worry about what builds they enable) but I think it's better for the server as a whole, than having limited play time on a character or MoD for example.

[Evianna]

At this point in the 7th page of this thread I'm really into seeing more semi-ordinary things (a person of x place, or with a weapon, or just very good at something mundane) as ordinary races, with thematic mechanical boons, to relieve the pressure off rare races but with enough mechanical boon to make it justify the consumed award tier. It's a bit like shoving the dirt under the rug (because we then face even more things to balance and worry about what builds they enable) but I think it's better for the server as a whole, than having limited play time on a character or MoD for example.

This is also a great idea.

If the "behavior" is undesirable, then perhaps in that case we could stop adding more and more higher tier rewards that incentivize said behavior rather than flavorful lower tier ones. The more exciting new things that are added, the more people will be drawn to them.

[Zanithar]

It’s insane to me that people are suggesting normal rewards aren’t worth anything. Get to level 16 and not have to worry about early stages is a super great option. Plus, there are numerous languages and races that a good/fun/different at that stage.

I’m seriously debating between a normal reward 16 and a giant. I’m not sure the giant adds that much to the roleplay idea.

So, a level 16 start save what, about 8-16 hours of effort depending on what you play and who you play with? It is a great option though, those first levels are pretty repetitive. I'd still recommend taking a HGiant for a spin over a level 16 start

[Arienette]

And if people want to tell other people they're wrong and should leave the game for wanting to have fun in a way that probably will never impact on your own gameplay or narrative arc, then maybe they should go look at Server Rule #4.

I have no issues with players playing giants or kenku or vampires. I'm not saying the want to play these races are bad. I definitely am saying that playing roll-bait characters, or characters who sole purpose is to become a chance at a 5%, is. I put a lot of the blame for this mentality on the system. It rewards players that think like this. if we're all otherwise okay with players playing null rp characters x20 so they get that chance to play their half-drow with wings, there's no point arguing. We've accepted "RP at 30" as norm behavior, why not this.

Strongly agree.

“Roll bait” characters are bad, and actively harmful to the server and it’s RP quality. This is objectively true and not really up for debate.

If all 150/150characters online at a given moment are “rollers”, who will only be interacting to form parties, barter, etc then obviously the RP quality of the server will be trash, nonexistent.

If 1/150 characters online at a given moment are rollers, almost certainly nobody will notice. But there is some point at which is has a negative impact, and the higher the number of rollers active at any given time, the worse off we all are. Who knows if it’s 20/150 or 30/150 or whatever number it is. The more roller characters active on the sever, the lower the RP quality is.

Any system that can prevent or eliminate rollers is a very good thing. So I’m happy with the lock, and looking forward to what comes next.

ETA: I’ve had this “debate” with people on discord. And it usually boils down to “whats the harm in me playing a roll bait character, I should be able to do what I want mind your own business”

It’s sort of the same mentality people who litter have. “It’s just one wrapper, take a chill pill”. Yeah, but if 100 or 1000 or 1 million people discard “just one wrapper”, the next thing you know your city if full of trash.

[Itikar]

“Roll bait” characters are bad, and actively harmful to the server and it’s RP quality. This is objectively true and not really up for debate.

It is actually.

The fixtures I made with my level 16 rollbait character and placed them with an event roleplay are still on Skal even after more than one real life year.

As long as the rollbait exists also for some other purpose than rolling, there is nothing wrong with devising a character whose story is meant to end relatively soon.

That usually renders (or rendered) the rollbait character slightly less efficient at getting the award sooner, because the time one spent roleplaying, exploring or doing whatever else, was time not devoted to the grind, so one can question whether such character was rollbait to begin with. To me, still, such characters qualify as rollbait, because their existence depends on the will of the player to farm for an award, and they would not exist otherwise if that need or will did not exist in the first place.

As long as one aims for minor or normal awards, with characters they also develop in some capacity, I do not see any issue with making a character devised for that purpose. In my case, it made me try parts of the server that I would not have otherwise experienced, and to which I returned later, for staying this time.

[Arienette]

Nothing at all wrong with making a character with a planned short arch.

I’m talking more about the people who make a Druid and just grind to 26 as fast as possible and even avoid interactions with others

[xf1313]

At this point in the 7th page of this thread I'm really into seeing more semi-ordinary things (a person of x place, or with a weapon, or just very good at something mundane) as ordinary races, with thematic mechanical boons, to relieve the pressure off rare races but with enough mechanical boon to make it justify the consumed award tier. It's a bit like shoving the dirt under the rug (because we then face even more things to balance and worry about what builds they enable) but I think it's better for the server as a whole, than having limited play time on a character or MoD for example.

This is also a great idea.

If the "behavior" is undesirable, then perhaps in that case we could stop adding more and more higher tier rewards that incentivize said behavior rather than flavorful lower tier ones. The more exciting new things that are added, the more people will be drawn to them.

True, I have been generally cool with not having a Major, but with the new release even my mind was blown for a bit.

It really feels odd to accuse people who want to try the fancy stuff. But it is there as a award! Put a non-desirable race.. or something no body really want into the awards, the rolling will stop instantly LOL. Who want a major for a holding carrot weapon? Sure some people might love it, but grinding years for one? Thank you, no.

[Xerah]

It really is objectively true.

If you make a character with the mindset of "rollbait" then that does negativity affect the the quality of the whole server. Maybe not while you were playing but it builds on the idea that this is a good idea that others should do this as well. Simply having a few inoffensive fixtures remaining afterwards doesn't change this. There's an Admin in this thread confirming that this really isn't the goal.

If you make a character with the mindset of "I'm going to play out this specific story/arch" then that does positivityaffect the the quality of the whole server. Consciously and/or unconsciously, this is a massive difference in the two. Your character isn't a meaningless throwaway, you give credence to the idea that characters can die (if applicable), you work harder at roleplaying because you know you're on a short timing line, etc. These are all massive positives and a world of difference than "rollbait"

[Itikar]

It really is objectively true.

Agree to disagree then. Your arguments seem not particularly convincing and quite subjective. How do you even qualify positively or negatively affecting the server? How does playing a short lived character change in any meaningful way a server mentality where a long lived character is barely two rl years old? I struggle to see your point, sincerely.

[Ork]

"Roll-bait" has everything to do with mentality of the player. This may dip a bit into the storm wind fallacy where some good writers can make a roll-bait characters that doesn't reduce from the roleplay environment, but we've got to find a better way of disincentivizing players to play a character solely to get to level 26.

[Xerah]

It really is objectively true.

Agree to disagree then. Your arguments seem not particularly convincing and quite subjective. How do you even qualify positively or negatively affecting the server? How does playing a short lived character change in any meaningful way a server mentality where a long lived character is barely two rl years old? I struggle to see your point, sincerely.

I think you've selectively chosen what parts to read and what parts not to read considering I said that playing out a character arc is a positive for the server and I explicitly mentioned "short" in the positive example.

Arienette already provided an example of why playing "rollbait" characters are bad.

[Arienette]

It really is objectively true.

Agree to disagree then. Your arguments seem not particularly convincing and quite subjective. How do you even qualify positively or negatively affecting the server? How does playing a short lived character change in any meaningful way a server mentality where a long lived character is barely two rl years old? I struggle to see your point, sincerely.

Imagine a server where 100 percent of the players are always grinding to 26 as fast as possible, even actively avoiding character interactions that might slow down their grind.

I think we can all agree that this server would have terrible or basically nonexistent RP going on.

Now, imagine a server where 0 percent of the players are playing like that. Instead, they are invested in their characters to some extent and are at least trying to tell a story. All else being equal, this server should have way more quality RP going on.

Which one would you prefer to play on?

All else being equal, the more “rollers” in a server, the worse the RP quality will be. The less “rollers”, the better it should be.

[Itikar]

I think you've selectively chosen what parts to read and what parts not to read considering I said that playing out a character arc is a positive for the server and I explicitly mentioned "short" in the positive example.

You mentioned that the important difference is that the mentality consciously or unconsciously affects the server. I can see room for the misunderstanding, but you also dismissed long standing "inoffensive" remains of such arcs.

So I think that at the very least you explained yourself very badly.

In general, I can see where you all are coming from, and having many characters made with the intent to be sacrificed, and with the /exclusive/ intent to do so, is not a good thing. It isn't, but that does not tell the whole story. Namely because characters may be done with secondary objectives, even without going into the roleplay, such as trying Skal, the Underdark, Sencliff, etc. My opinion is that whatever allows the player to experience something more of the server is not a bad thing per se. If it also provides some extra interactions to other players and groups, it is even better. If this is achieved because of a "rollbait" character then I cannot consider that "rollbait" character negative, not in the context of the award system of the server, the average life expenctancy of a character here and the gift/ecl system in general. More on this later. I don't expect people to agree to my subjective view of this phenomenon, but I cannot in earnest agree to view this phenomenon as "objectively bad".

Imagine a server

I appreciate the attempt at abstraction, however, it starts from assumptions that are fallacious.

What I see on the server usually is that players, as opposed to characters, are either busy doing roleplay and interacting with others, or not. The interactions can be of various levels, ranging from a full dedication to a bare threshold of roleplay when grinding together. The lack of interaction can also have different approaches, and going from exploration for the simple fun of it, to grind. "Rollbait" characters have a prevalence, and often exclusive predominance, of the latter. However there is more than this.

Because what matters is the player. If player X makes 30 rollbait druids and then uses the Major to play a memorable Deep Imaskari or Kenku, I have absolutely no issue with that. I feel sorry for them having had to go through it, and I certainly would not do it myself, as I would rather play a kenku or a Deep Imaskari somewhere else than here, but each is entitled to using their own time as they see fit. I do not see how this impacts me any differently than the players who grind in solo to maximize the gold for keening a masterly damask weapon on their longstanding characters. It may support the player economy a bit more than a rollbait druid, but I frankly doubt that this practice considered by itself alone can be seen as a more positive contribution to the roleplay of the server.

If they do not provide interaction /for me/, they they are not important /for me/, and not even for the server because I play here to have fun /for me/, first and foremost. If the only one interaction of a rollbait character is one that brings to me fun, I would prefer that interaction over one year of interactions of a non-rollbait characters that does not interact with me or my group or whose interactions proved not so fun or interesting to me.

I would be naive to expect the server to remove grind in favor of roleplay, and if I wanted that, I believe I would have better options with roleplay by chat, by forum, MUSHes, or even some MMO communities that do not usually mix roleplay with the game mechanics. But there is no denial that grind plays a very important role in the server economy and in the time of some of our players, whatever shape it takes is of secondary importance. As long as one is capable of reacting to interaction when they meet it, or even better initiate it, I do not really see a huge difference between a character meant to end their journey at level 16 or 26 and another whose journey is meant to end without a precise level in mind.

Regardless of our different opinions, however, I believe that the award lock is something that impacts the server in the right way, as it curbs an attitude that even for characters meant to be sent to an award roll sooner rather than later will help provide more meaningful interaction to the server. Anything other than that, I do not think can be addressed without getting rid of the award system altogether.

[The GrumpyCat]

The current concerns with the award system, as has been said, is a) that it's producing too many awards (which the current patch should help fix) and b) that it's not really encouraging the right behaviour.

Part of the award system should be encouraging people to roll long term, old characters in the hope of getting a neat award at the end of it, so they can then go on to play something interesting and exciting.

But because it's linked to leveling, what it really encourages is people to grind to 26 and roll and this behaviour is-

THE WORST THING EVER! Eh is that what you're saying Grumpy???? EH? EH? You're saying you want to ban THEM ALL! TO BAN EVERYONE INVOLVED! That anyone who does it is scum! eh? EH? IS THAT WHAT YOU ARE ACCUSING PEOPLE OF! IT'S INNOCENT BEHAVIOUR AND YOUR'E WANTING TO SEE THEM ALL BANNED!!!

No.

No it's... it's not a big deal? Like. It's fine? There are worse things out there? I can't say that I think some people 'grinding for awards' is the very worst thing to be occuring on arelith. It's not a bannable thing. At very worse, putting aside any other rule breaks, it's perhaps poor rp. But it's certainly perfectly allowable, reasonable and - what is more- understandable!

But it's... not really something that I think we should we should be encouraging so hard?

Awards arn't there to award the GRIND, the horrid force of making character after character. Awards don't exist like a cake promised to the person who split open enough rocks.

They're they're to reward someone who, presumably, had fun with their character, enjoyed their character, got a lot of fun from their character but now- at last, know its time to let go, and move on.

[xf1313]

And that is where things got hard, my best characters always come from a random spark of ideas. I tell myself every time before creating a character: I’ll have a go at this class/concept/ starting area, if it does not work out, at least I can roll it.

About half of the times, they really don’t, loose interest or found that I cannot rp something well happens. Able to get some awards felt like a good push towards deleting those characters instead of keeping then forever. Without the awards for rolling, i’d probably keep them for friend group endgame dungeon run.

I assume no one is having a issue with people deleting characters that did not work out right? Rise my hands for giving perks to minor or normal, (maybe a better chance at greater, currently only gold hoarding increases the chance...) alternative methods for getting to try nicer stuff might work. Or simply add fun, but really not so great options into Major. Something people will feel good for having it but really not motivated to grind for.

[Dari]

The solution to this is remove the award system and make all races more or less the same stat wise. Hehe

[Edens_Fall]

The solution to this is remove the award system and make all races more or less the same stat wise. Hehe

Wings and tails for everyone!

[Dari]

The solution to this is remove the award system and make all races more or less the same stat wise. Hehe

Wings and tails for everyone!

Hey if people are so obssesed with those.
It is a high fantasy setting after all. If everyone is unique then no one is!

[MissEvelyn]

Arelith Classic when?

I'm kidding! .... sort of

[Hazard]

Arelith Classic when?

I'm kidding! .... sort of

Heck yeah. Can't wait to go back to the good old Arelith, with catgirl-elves, talking animals and 10,000 year old possessed paladins.

[Slapstick]

Maybe a solution could be to just award 1 point per played hour on characers, and cap it at some high point so decades-old characters don't get you a nigh-unlimited amount of reward points (although I kinda feel like they've earned it at that point). Doesn't matter if you're high level or low level, rich or poor. All that matters is the amount of time the character has been played. Sure, you could grind multiple characters to 30 and roll them, but if you're "only" looking for award points, it doesn't matter if you play an old or new character.

You can even add some modifiers to increase the incentive to RP, such as increased award point generation if your writs are on cooldown and you're not in combat, so you're rewarded if you stick around to RP. Someone else mentioned "achievements", so you could add a bonus for "clearing all end game bosses", winning a settlement election, visiting every single map/island, etc.

And then award races/classes can cost any arbitrary number of points. The really cool rewards are for those that've invested a lot of time in RP to make a living world for the rest of us. I can see how it would make me care a less about "losing grind time" because I'm engaged in RP before 30, or spend some time around the campfire after my writs are done. It would also allow you to remove luck as a factor, which I think many would approve of.

My concern though is that a reduction of rolled and new characters is might not benefit the server. Turnover is good. The danger of having a reward system is that it becomes a meta-game in itself. You're not playing to play the game, you're playing to play the meta-game of the reward system.