Messages

If I could have a novel written by Melody to study, that'd be great. Even just a large record of dialogue would be swell.

A bit overdue but to Blackheart , I really had a wonderful experience with the muse questline. It was beautiful in many ways and I've rarely had many DM's in my years that could really produce that kind of magic, that consideration, and many more adjectives, all good in terms of storytelling. As a DM you were communicative, approachable, and understanding. Guiding when you needed to be, and firm when it was important to be. Thanks for the memories and the friendships along the way.

I feel for you on this one. I think you did right by how you feel, but I don't think that that should have to be the right option, to ignore.

In cases like these, especially if you're emphatic, you worry about the other player, and don't want to ruin their experience, however, as Jalthex mentioned above, they opted into that role, understanding that their character race/background or otherwise will, in many cases, have a negative reaction.

In times like these, one needs to trust their fellow players. The best one can do is send them a tell beforehand, to set the understanding, that your character has encountered theirs and icly they cannot ignore them, and to ask where the line in the sand is, whether they wish for open pvp or for roleplay to lead to an impass or otherwise.

I find it a real pity that player agency that is respected by other players can be hard to come by as haroshia has pointed out in their own experiences trying to navigate similar situations.
In an ideal world these types of characters would either hardly encounter one another or those that wished to remain hidden would go through bigger lengths to do so, but with the way the game is implicated, with it's closed map borders and all, that becomes harder to accomplish.

So.. what to do? Given what OP has said about not being able to out someone due to the secrets rule, it's hard to say. It's like you're sacrificing your IC play for an OOC one, which never really feels right in my experience.

If I were to put myself in the shoes of all involved, the situation would have come with a hostile roleplay, maybe pvp. Maybe I'd ask if they wanted to resolve fleeing by a dicerolls if I wanted to go the extra mile. Good aligned boy goes back to civilization, maybe talks about their encounter with a random drow out in the wild, maybe talks about their characteristics. As the drow, I'd have understood that I'd probably need to lay low for a bit, maybe invest more heavily into moving around on the surface disguised, and disguising my slave for a time until things have blown over a bit and those who heard the tale second-hand will have forgotten the details - as it is very mortal to forget intricate details over time. It's roleplay, it's a story, a continuing, consistent one, which is what I'd like to strive for.

Not saying that's how it should have gone, but just how I would have handled things from either side. Does the server allow for such? I can't really say, I haven't had a like encounter myself to refer to, but I would hope that if I ever did, those involved would all be able to handle themselves, and their feelings, seperate OOC from IC, and so forth.

:Shrug: It's hard to comment further really on my part, I think that's all I can really say from my own pov on matters in this headspace.

Agreed with Terallis, I don't feel that adding moon related scrolls will really improve anything important to the server, it would just remove their uniqueness.

Little late on the post but many thanks to BH for running the El'Tael quest to MD and our inclusion. A neat story that has opened a couple doors.

Edited original post to reflect what is actually being looked at for inclusion, and for better clarity for the team.

Here are some models that I and some others would personally like to see in the server. All from CEP 3.02 (haven't checked older versions)

My personal preference highest to lowest:

1) CEP , Shoulder appearance: 046

2nd) CEP, helmet appearance: helm_215

3) The Gil-galad shield! CEP Tower Shield, Appearace: iAShTo_040

Image of shield and shoulders as part of a set:

I was really surprised by the amazing work DM Blackheart and Melody did for Evelyn's garden party. Handling all those various NPC personalities and player interactions was really quite something. I hope you both got some good rest after that. Know that we greatly enjoyed it.

Had a really wonderful scene with Melody  's guidance. Both Caerylia and I enjoyed it so very much.

I enjoyed the rp today with Melody, Celebrithrade and Caerylia.

The philosophical angles challenged me a bit, but it was an enjoyable mental run-around, and I look forward to the next time - after some history revision.

More not named were involved and helped flesh out the experience with their add-ins.

Firstly my thanks go to Caerylia Durothil   for all the top tier rp since we began together on the server.

Thanks to Melody   for the hosted history recounting. That was a lot of typing to do, and it felt very fluent and well-constructed. Thank you also to those in the elves of Deepingdale for being so welcoming to us. Especially Blackheart  .

Also to many others, including but not limited to, Elzevir, Yrlisa, Vilaatha, Vilaraal, Dietrich, Grimlock, Daniel and those who were present at the Aelou and the history meet for the added experience.

Thank you Eidolon  (Eidolon) for the wonderful short quest. I really enjoyed the way you portrayed the NPC's and the environment, and the attention of the NPC's to us as our characters.

Jan 12, 2022 11:14:40 GMT -5 Meadows said:

If the staff and others feel that opening the daily ticks isn't worth it, you have to get more creative and ask for other forms of progression or ask how you can help them with the labor/justification of coding and placing it all in the module.

-Exploration XP
-Crafting XP (in which one only levels up within the crafting skill, not necessarily character level)

I really do like the idea of crafting xp. I've seen it elsewhere as well. It does seem like a lot of work to go into it but moving around maps to collect crafting ingredients to level up your crafting skills to me was a really good system that allowed players to invest deeply into it and be rewarded when they were able to make good potions and things like that.

I know that this server has the crafting skills as the usual levelling ones, but I much prefer a system based on ability modifiers where everyone can craft and get better at it so long as they put in the time and effort, they can get better and so on and so forth. It provided a really nice and rewarding time sink for players to progress in that was completely seperate to their character level.

Jan 12, 2022 9:38:48 GMT -5 Nymera said:

More XP will not enhance roleplay, nor will it remove any feelings of ""not being part of something". What it will do, is help you level faster.

"Forward progression", as you call it, is another way of saying "leveling faster".

You could have proposed a lot of new reward systems or DM events to encourage roleplay, but you proposed more XP.  XP is not used for roleplaying, it is used for: leveling.

I understand what you're saying and, don't worry, no hard feelings. I do think we're approaching this from two different angles, so I'll just try to give some clarity where I'm coming from.

I called it forward progression because it was an easier way to term it without going into other fields of research and study surrounding consumer-focused tactics. XP at it's most base is as you mentioned, used for levelling. However, what does the term "XP gained" feel, and mean for a player? These are things that should be considered if you want to cultivate a product that makes the consumer feel good, not just what it is used for.

So lets open the board for other considerations, though I do still feel that my original suggestion is a solid one still.

Going off the knowledge that there'll likely never be enough time and manpower to cater to everyone on a regular basis, aside from the well known saying "too many cooks spoil the broth," what systems or ideas might there be to engage players in a way that makes them feel happy?

Admittedly my imagination is lacking in this department where it comes to a wide array of ideas, but here's two I could think of:

More npc quests that maybe instead of rewarding just XP (or any at all), reward items instead that could be based on the characters primary class.

Something else might be a sort of gathering items for one off quests that could reward more trinket-like but useful items. Maybe like high level potions of spells that could be used to help in difficult dungeons or so on.

Things I tried to consider when thinking of these things were what would place the most burden on those who are working for no profit to make this server a good place for their players, and what would offer a stable, rewarding experience, now and into the future.

Jan 12, 2022 9:40:06 GMT -5 Garage Trashcan said:

I did read your full original post, I just quoted the part that was relevant to my response.

Jan 12, 2022 9:26:07 GMT -5 Eruheran said:

Because those unable to be involved in DM-related questings will at least then have something to feel forward progression with outside the daily 300xp cap. Also the more XP gain, is so small that in the opinions of myself, that even though it's small, it's still something rather than nothing.

I think what you're underestimating here is the fact that, as long-time players, we've already seen exactly this happen. Some of us have done exactly this already. The admins spent a good number of years testing and iterating on the XP system to find a balance they felt was comfortable - including earlier level caps, later level caps, and faster/slower iterations of the daily fairy. As you've said, 2.5 hour investment for 300 xp is decent enough. If anything, I'd argue the admins would rather disincentivize the players who spent 16 hours a day online across multiple alts than encourage it, even minimally or unintentionally.

I see, for the point that you mention, I do fully agree. For what it's worth, myself and others have also been playing on nwn servers and in honestly ones that have a much more punishing levelling process, where it literally reduces the amount you get from combat xp, and can take sometimes years to get to lvl 20 even with dedicated, active play. (which I have done)

The meaning is being lost as "more xp = faster leveling" which is not the purpose of it. The purpose is the feelings of the people who are feeling left out, who, for one reason or other, can't participate as much as they'd like to.

To make this simply about the numbers, the xp in of itself is missing the concept. The concept is the peoples feelings, the unhappiness, the wanting to be a part of something but not being able to. The suggestion, if I were to work in figurative speach, is a soothing balm, meant to placate said feelings even a little bit.