Is Arelith "too big"?

[Razmo_de]

I'll just say, that if you are reducing settlements, the huge arelith map still needs small places to go to.Not just empty wilderness. Like soulhaven. Or taverns. Interesting places for setting up adventures, restock, rest, RP, or simply as a destination for your walk.

[Morderon]

I'm going to go with no to wilderness areas,

Never traveled and thought 'this is a waste of space' and I like all the different routes you can take from A to B. BUT I'm also not running into low levels like I used to. But there's tons of other factors that go into that.

[P Three]

I really disagree with getting rid of Myon, for one reason; Elves, by lore, are isolationists. It makes absolute sense that Myon is a thing. What I always hear is "The mythal is a mechanic that keeps people out". Yes. It is. And it should be. This is SOP for elves. (And, as I've said before, if you're not willing to invest in the RP needed to bypass it, because it certainly can be/has been done, I'm not sure that the Mythal is the actual problem. That is solely MY take, though.)

[Sazu]

There's no need to visit any of these places more than once. I agree with Mord... more wilderness areas are a waste of resources that could be utilized for real player advantage, like housing.

I made a list of things I've noticed that could be improved:

1. Settlements should have something needed. NOT WANTED... NEEDED. This would ensure they get more visits from other places. Why go to Guldorand to get wood when I can go to bramble forest right near Cordor and get it there. Resources, weapons, hell even healing packs, should be located in specific towns.

2. Some wilds are much more traversed than others. Who wants to go to some highly difficult area to get the same XP as an easy area? Some areas are rarely if ever traversed.

3. More Housing. Better to have excess than less. Less housing means more quarter logging(and posts in the forum that state such). Also there's more OOC fighting for houses than actual in-game conflict, and as well, those players who do not get as much time acquiring a house, don't have to feel put out, can have their house, and the words quarter-logging wouldn't even exist, as players would have their own houses.

4. Actually Razmo has a good point. If you had a fair balance of wilderness and settlements, you could have waypoints in between travels and hunting. In the UD there's only one settlement, so the chances that players go far without portal lenses is slim at best, and usually by the time I am done hunting I am so tired I feel like logging. Settlements of even Inns give the players actual breathing time, and a way to RP in the middle of their grinding. I can tell you with 100% surety that more RP happens in settlements than in the wilds.

5. Get rid of some of the least used wilds, and trade in that info space for more storage boxes. Also allow storage boxes to be owned as well as a house. This keeps factions from trying to use their own members to take as much housing as possible. If storage boxes weren't so few and the rules set so stringently, there wouldn't be arguments over them. The reason the rules exists is because the server only has so many resources.

6. Make the surface smaller overall by getting rid of unused wilderness areas. As I just counted at present there are only 7 more players on the surface than in the UD, and in most cases there are LESS players in Cordor than the UD overall. Take the resources from the unused wilderness areas and use them to bulk up settlements... with common areas. EVERY settlement should have a common area for visitors to see the place. Every settlement should have a proverbial Hub... even Myon, Because truth is every settlement should and in real life cases, DO trade with neighbors.

[Cortex]

Wether it's fitting or not is not quite the matter, it's about how it creates interaction. Why would I want to go through all the effort go into Myon to interact with the dozen mayonese(ayy) elves I can just interact with outside? It's not exactly isolated when the denizens actively go outside of Myon do things, it's a very little populated quarter mall. And before anyone else says "just go play an elf", been there, done that, numerous times.

edit: @Sazu, I'm pretty sure that module size/space does not interfers with playability, specially a hak-free one. And your sixth point is... not well explained enough, isn't that already existant?

[roy rutan]

Lets See, since we are pretty much fifty fifty on being divided here on how to handle this lets look at settlements / Random Housing across the Isle

Surface and cordor server areas Being used Regularly
Warftown, Gulderand, Bendir, Cordor (by way of starting point) Brog.

as for the above from what I have seen in last two weeks Warftown, Guldorand and Bendir are Most Active.

Removal of Cordor and Brog could consolidate things but would Majorly impact the server in regards to housing.

Locations that could be removed with out major impact other then to single faction
Campsite, Crows Nest, Foxes Den, House by Iron mine on cordor server, Shadow Cordor, The Grove, Sencliff Institute, cricket caves.

Pros would for such would be these areas could be turned into quest areas.
Cons again it would impact housing. negatively impact player factions and could cause a further diminished player base.

My suggestion would be not to make things more Expansive map wise like the recent change to the swamps. consolidate the map areas back to what they were say five years ago, then expand the Dungeons themselves. add npc Quests that can be completed 1 time to such dungeons.

Honestly Arelith is a Great place but it is currently seeing less life then ive ever seen it since 2005.
we lost a lot of people with the hack. or so it seems. we have some Great old players returning but seriously when you can play for three hours and see 5 people on cordor in that whole time in the middle of the afternoon and there is barely double that on surface perhaps its time to take some of this back to the beginning.

would doing such negatively impact me. Yes if we reverted things back it would have a negative impact on my main character. the hall I hold currently would cease to exist. and to be honest if it improved the server I would not care.

[Windude]

Just telling, Brog has a lot of players that you might be missing, it's not an inactive settlement, not right now.

And yes I roleplay a dwarf and I, just like the other dwarves, spend 90% of my time in Brog.

tldr; dont touch brog please

[Sazu]

There's not a single settlement that doesn't have a faction entrenched within it
my sixth point seemed very simple. There should be NO isolationist towns... just isolationist areas WITHIN a town.

Maybe just the heart of Myon should be cut off from non elves and the rest free for anyone to traverse.

Also note that adding more wilderness areas in favor of doing away with settlements is like saying you want more grinding and less rp. Who has time to RP when your barkskin potion has a time limit and your bull strength is going to wear out?

More RP happens in settlements than anywhere else. If I want less RP and more grinding I'll go play an MMO instead of this. I don't come here to kill beasts and level, I come here for the immersive RP that isn't found anywhere else, and certainly not in an MMO.

[Dinosaur Space Program]

I actually say no to it being too big in general. But then I am a hardcore addict of exploration.

I've played on a NWN 2 server that had the 'everything is centralized so RP happens' mentality and honestly all it came down to was one big Cordor Main Street of people of various alignments and conflicting ideals staring at each other, and then drinking and talking about relationships. The most common topic was who was sexing up who and who was then cheating on them. You would think other topics would be on hand as the server had a distinct theme of 'end of the world unless we stop it' going on.

Wilderness makes the island feel like an island instead of splotches of settlements constantly. The expansions to all the servers I feel has made them distinctly roomier, more potential, more diversity in places To go. I actually don't Want to run into people half the time I strike out of a settlement onto the open road. I want to feel like I am traveling down a dangerous path (which it is) and not pass five other people doing the same, often one or two dragging along either undead or a fiend.

I want places on the server that aren't traveled often so there is a feeling of isolation when I go there with people. That some RP can happen without interruption. You know how jarring it is to have a tender moment of conversion to another faith or talking someone down to have a fully buffed party wander in and go 'HEY! HEY THERE. WHAT'S UP?' or even worse, all run by without a word?

As someone who has ran a paladin who has died counting five PvP deaths before it was level 12 due to heading into common zones to find them full of evils it can't and won't back down from? It's nice to have Other Wilderness to head into to try and get a few levels or just RP in without a full UD raid, a murder of warlocks, or a necromancer run in on it.

On the topic of settlements, All Race settlements need to stay over exclusive one race settlements. When it comes to RP and interaction, we all know that Cordor and Wharftown provide a lot more than some Other settlements. That and they have no issue encompassing Any race that wants to work in them.

Frankly, as much as I love Burrowhome, it is the most inclined to get the axe because halflings (especially this far from Luiren) don't really fort up on their own. They would be far more likely to meld into all the other societies going on. That is one reason I actually really like the Brog/Burrowhome connection of 'It's all about the Earthkin!' thing. As it makes more sense than a primarily halfling NPC populated fort.

The other is honestly Myon. There is a lot of resistance to this idea over the many years it has come up and frankly there have been a Lot of good points as to why it should be opened or even destroyed at this point. None of which I am going to go into as it's a long list. And equally, there are a lot of elven players who have opposed it which is honestly their right (though honestly all the settlements/factions who have been destroyed or subverted at this point usually also didn't have a distinct choice, but to voice one's opinion on such things is always a right we have).

There are a lot of elven players who like the idea of an exclusive hide away fort. And it is true, a lot of lore on elves is them isolating themselves to avoid problems or to escape the problems they have made. However, the thing is that a Lot of these protective bunkers have Failed. Also ones that works are very rare at this point in FR history. I think it's quite possible for Myon to fall, almost hideously easy in fact given the mythals that have been corrupted or failed entirely at this point in history for FR.

So really, it isn't so much a 'Oh it's an unbreakable elven stronghold', it's more a 'How long do the Dev crew want it to continue holding, because there are all the RP enabled excuses in the world for it Not to if they wanted to change things.'

As for population in Cordor. While I am not in love with Cordor myself, it provides a needed purpose and cannot be removed. That and frankly, it had good population numbers until the whole council take over/Banites moving in snick that happened. While I am not Directly blaming... okay maybe I am! But a lot of people moved their RP elsewhere or were Vastly discouraged by what happened there and stopped playing characters that would Be there. Or even stopped playing at all. While I didn't personally find the situation that bad, stuff like this happens and you roll with it, a Lot of people took it poorly apparently.

I think with time and perhaps some RP pressure in a few distinct places, Cordor will be perking up again. Also remember that its the summer months for players in the northern hemisphere and numbers always dip because it's nice outside and we want to get out!

Brogendenstein and its new set up honestly did a lot to perk that place up and sort of consolidate some of the playerbase that has issues getting enough people consistently together at times. I think it was a good move for racial settlements in general. Especially ones with a long history of alliance.

In the end, I feel as if Arelith is always in a state of being Polished and tweaked and cropped as the current Dev lead feels it needs to be. Obviously opinions will differ on what is the most important thing to focus on and I feel that a question like the one posed here will suffer immensely from Bias.

Bias that is really not formed on reality so much as time zones, pure chance, and our own conceptions of what is and isn't used. People who use an area will be inclined to defend it, even if it is to the server's health for it to be changed. Reality might be that an area is only used by a small group of people and only marginally and has been for some time, but people are resistant to change of any sort.

In the end, I do not believe that the playerbase really has the right to make a call on such things outside of merely voicing our opinions. So I truly hope that our Dev team doesn't take anything said in this thread immediately to heart.

[Sazu]

Here's a question:

How is Myon any different from Udos'Droxun outside the type of elf?

[Cortex]

Assumebly, less cyber.

[Scurvy Cur]

Relax, guys.

My only point was that if you are considering removing areas, looking at stuff that's not tied to any settlement for removal is the wrong way to go, and if you consider removing settlements, remove the ones that are accessible only to part of the playerbase before you start axing the ones that are accessible to all of it.

I'm not actually advocating the destruction of Myon.

This time.

[Durvayas]

Assumebly, less cyber.

We don't cyber down there any more than people in any other part of arelith. I do wish people like you would stop perpetuating false stereotypes.

If anything, we do it less, because drow don't do romance.

[Cortex]

Assumebly, less cyber.

We don't cyber down there any more than people in any other part of arelith. I do wish people like you would stop perpetuating false stereotypes.

If anything, we do it less, because drow don't do romance.

it was a joke

[Durvayas]

Assumebly, less cyber.

We don't cyber down there any more than people in any other part of arelith. I do wish people like you would stop perpetuating false stereotypes.

If anything, we do it less, because drow don't do romance.

it was a joke

It needs to be amusing to be a joke.

[CragOneEye]

We don't cyber down there any more than people in any other part of arelith. I do wish people like you would stop perpetuating false stereotypes.

If anything, we do it less, because drow don't do romance.

it was a joke

It needs to be amusing to be a joke.

It needs to be funny for it even to qualify as a joke.

Buuuut back to original topic I -like- how far spread out things are. As I remember back in the day when things were closer together and you didn't have settlements being large in Wharftown or Guldorand, all the "cool" kids would hang out in Cordor outside of the nomad, especially all of the epic level characters. And I found that emersion breaking

[CragOrion]

I agree that Bendir should prolly be the first to go, and that Soulhaven should be on its own again. It just doesn't make sense for a monastery to be inside a settlement. The point of monasteries are to be isolated, away from distractions.

I like Myon and Brog where they are, because they provide ambiance for the setting.

So after Bendir, I think I'd axe Wharftown. That would make Cordor, Brog, and Myon your main choices for affiliation(as they should be), and even make Myon a starting place option for elf PC's, and then you have Guldorand as an alternative for ppl that don't fit it or get exiled from the other places, and then Soulhaven, the Grove, and Crows Nest for those who want to be secluded.

I'd also replace Fox's Den with some kind of undead themed dungeon, for all the necromancers that have holed up there over the years.

EDIT: after axing wharftown, I'd also move crows nest geographically to where wharf is now

EDIT EDIT: and move Mayfields to where Bendir is now, to make it sort of like a crossroads wayhouse

[Stath]

The Settlements honestly seem fine as they are now(IMO). I think removing them would be more negative than positive. The Island feels nice and big but not empty, there's plenty of variety for every avenue.

[CragOrion]

I'd disagree. Feels very empty to me. Unless it's during a very select set of hours, hours that I can only meet once or twice a week, any other time I go anywhere, I can rarely find anybody to rp with.

[CragOneEye]

I'd disagree. Feels very empty to me. Unless it's during a very select set of hours, hours that I can only meet once or twice a week, any other time I go anywhere, I can rarely find anybody to rp with.

Again I feel if removed settlements you'd get the problem of Ryan Valtherans and Aristotelus remakes sitting on the same street corner idle in cordor.

[Urch]

Lots of wilderness + messenger pigeons/smoke signals/cross area horns and more of a feudal fiefdom with small villages type scenario (kind of like what Greyhammer is to Burrowhome/Bendir). That'd be something I'd love to see.
More accessible forms of IG long distance communication apart from speedies and high level mages, is what I'd especially like to see.

Also more interactive content, like river canoes, climb spots, caving/spelunking, copious uses for rope, narrow ledges, isolated monster communities (perhaps surface gnolls spawn), swim checks etc.

[Irongron]

As some of you might have seen that in addition to setting up random spawns on the surface I have also been expanding the wilderness areas, not least because random spawns really require space to explore.

The jungles, and lowland swamps are a lot larger (Its taken a lot of work, but I'm really happy with the results), the latter so it matches with the rest of server geography. I also have a feeling that Bendir Trade Route and the Skull Crag Foothills should be larger than a single area.

I'm posting here in this thread to see if players have noticed any other areas that don't quite match up, distance wise, to the surrounding lands. There's certainly a mismatch at the Ruins of Stonehold connecting to the northern part of the forest but also below the southern edge via Bendir Hills.

I think that more winderness between towns adds a lot to the feeling of space and capacity for exploration, so I'm really open to input here (But not on Minmir -for there are 'plans' for those areas...)

[CragOrion]

...but I'm really happy with the results...

Me too!

Howling Pass maybe?

[Yma23]

Two things to keep in mind

Part of the problem with the question of ‘which settlement should go.’ Is that the numbers in settlements very much wane and wax dependent on the activity there. There once was a time when Bendir was –the- place to go. The biggest and busiest settlement around then, with the departure of certain players, that changed.
Cordor is very quiet right now – but give it three months and that may shift again, as new players emerge, new governments arise, new events occur.
There’s not many settlements that I’ll argue are consistently quiet. I’d say maybe Brogenstein and Guldorand? But even those have their bumps of activity, and defiantly serve a purpose.
Indeed any settlement we suggest for destruction, someone will be seriously unhappy.
*Guldorand is great for isolationism
*Cordor is wonderful as main hub
*Wharftown is easy to get to, but delightfully shady at times (and perhaps the most consistently busy of all sentiments IMO)
*And all the racial settlements have long running player bases who would be devastated to loose out on settlements that they’ve worked long and hard to build up. I can confirm that Myon at least is fairly consistently busy, even if some may not view it as very ‘active.’ (though I will join the chorus in saying that I would love to see it opened up more.’

One other problem I can see with reducing ‘quiet’ settlements, is that I worry it’ll make more… niche/drastic governments more rare.

A perfect example, actually, is Guldorand and the Banites.

Now – the Banites are a big faction. No one is arguing. But they are also a very deviding faction. A lot of Bad Guys TM will argue that the main problem they have is that they always tend to be outnumbered 5-1 by Good/Neutral guys.
Not many people are really interested in Guldorand, due to it’s remoteness. This means that an evil faction can, with much more ease, take it over. Because they can use the disinterest of the populace against themselves.

If there were fewer settlements, then the populations would rise, and it’d be harder for small ‘groups’ to get in power, (esp evil ones) as their numbers would constantly work against them.

[DreamOfCream]

I love the new areas Irongron. Thanks so much for your contributions and effort!

I do think some care should be given as to the distance between settlements. More walking does not always equate more fun. Random encounters or not.

I love the frontier idea of Arelith. I also like guildhouses/houses outside of settlements. They've always contributed a lot to conflict on the server and housing evil factions. I think settlements could be downsized. Cordor, Myon, Bendir they are all huge. Maybe too big for their own good. Just my two cents.