AMIA ARCHIVE • View topic - A Sincere Look Into Why People are Leaving Amia

I am not going to ponder about the topic, because I find it ... not that serious as it sounds (unless something rapidly changed since I have stopped playing). Players come and go - and since this is no job for hard c4$h, you do not have to explain your reasons. And I haven't notice any potentional exodus, at least according to the player count on servers when I check the forum.

On the other hand, the latest post about party chat brings back some unpleasant memories. So the only thing I'm saying is - If you are five guys on server in late hours, party chat is fine and sometimes even fun. But Party chat is absolutely no fun in the middle of RP and absolutely, horribly cheeky in the middle of DM event. Sometimes there was more party crapping than RPing, and that is one of a very few situations that would definately make me leave for good. Luckily, and I do not want to sound like an elitist, but it's true, the places I've been playing the most (Tarkuul / Zanshibon) were (and hopefully still are) very RP focused and party chat was minimal.

This is RP server, save your "social OOC" crap for Facebook :wink:

You're right Pony. Sometimes I talk too much in black and white. What I am hinting at though is more player freedom in their abilities to do things without DM supervision, or even more freedom to do things with DM supervision. It feels that sometimes certain players get stifled by DMs sometimes, and it hinders their ability to play their characters properly. I can give several examples, however they are not particularly relevant to the current DM team, thankfully.

I have noticed that DM's have been more supportive of players than they have in the past, but I do find that at certain times, roles that could easily be played out by a player, are instead wasted by putting an NPC in place instead. When that happens, it kind of feels like you're following a script over a unique and improvised story. Once again, I could give a fair few examples of this happening, but I doubt I need to. They're obvious enough if you look.

I had a book written but meh... I decided not to post it. Below is what I'm going to focus on here. Please feel free to PM me in response. If the Staff wishes to hear what I have to say on the entire topic of this thread they know where my inbox is.

There is much talk on factions and cliques. As a faction leader I feel I am ultimately responsible for my faction and it's members, their deeds and behavior, not to mention my own. No need to respond in this thread and mess any continuity of the thread up. For possible betterment of our faction, I encourage anyone who feels that the Barak Runedar faction is to much of a clique and not an approachable group of fairly responsible players to PM me and give me your feelings on the matter because that is certainly not our intention... exactly the opposite. I'm not saying we won't make your character work to earn a spot, just that if we are offputting and cliquey to the outside.

Thanks players, thanks staffers & DMs.

fairdady wrote:

There is much talk on factions and cliques. As a faction leader I feel I am ultimately responsible for my faction and it's members, their deeds and behavior, not to mention my own. No need to respond in this thread and mess any continuity of the thread up. For possible betterment of our faction, I encourage anyone who feels that the Barak Runedar faction is to much of a clique and not an approachable group of fairly responsible players to PM me and give me your feelings on the matter because that is certainly not our intention... exactly the opposite. I'm not saying we won't make your character work to earn a spot, just that if we are offputting and cliquey to the outside.

Hear hear, and ditto all of this for me (but substitute elfy references for all those icky dwarfy ones).

The game is ancient. There's no wonder people depart. And we have zero ways of advertising.

Amarice-Elaraliel wrote:

in the past new people sometimes "didn't dare" to approach the Grove because they felt the players are all a "clique" and would ignore new ones.

I don't dare approach the grove because they're insane nutjobs who threaten physical violence over planting flowers.

Amarice-Elaraliel wrote:

Also, I know frustration takes over quickly, but it is very very disheartening to run a plot and then to read how people take your work apart over party chat. And this happens a lot. If you are unhappy with a DM decision, write a PM, explain why you felt something felt wrong there or why you felt ignored/owned/whatever.

I hate this, myself. If a player stops and goes "Okay, I'm done, DM ruined the plot for me" in party chat they deserve a swift kick to the shins. Everyone else is trying to have fun and all said selfish ass can do is sound off about how much they hate the plot in party chat. There's absolutely no excuse for that, especially during an event. I saw this during BoB's Merc Camp event and I had to stop myself from responding and wasting more time.

fairdady wrote:

I'm not saying we won't make your character work to earn a spot, just that if we are offputting and cliquey to the outside.

Come join the dorfs. We have ale, dorfs, and little hairy women. Reddok does a great job!

Liz wrote:

fairdady wrote:

There is much talk on factions and cliques. As a faction leader I feel I am ultimately responsible for my faction and it's members, their deeds and behavior, not to mention my own. No need to respond in this thread and mess any continuity of the thread up. For possible betterment of our faction, I encourage anyone who feels that the Barak Runedar faction is to much of a clique and not an approachable group of fairly responsible players to PM me and give me your feelings on the matter because that is certainly not our intention... exactly the opposite. I'm not saying we won't make your character work to earn a spot, just that if we are offputting and cliquey to the outside.

Hear hear, and ditto all of this for me (but substitute elfy references for all those icky dwarfy ones).

Elves suck. <3 *Hides her 75 elves, screaming "GET BACK IN THE CLOSET!"*

Liz wrote:

fairdady wrote:

There is much talk on factions and cliques. As a faction leader I feel I am ultimately responsible for my faction and it's members, their deeds and behavior, not to mention my own. No need to respond in this thread and mess any continuity of the thread up. For possible betterment of our faction, I encourage anyone who feels that the Barak Runedar faction is to much of a clique and not an approachable group of fairly responsible players to PM me and give me your feelings on the matter because that is certainly not our intention... exactly the opposite. I'm not saying we won't make your character work to earn a spot, just that if we are offputting and cliquey to the outside.

Hear hear, and ditto all of this for me (but substitute elfy references for all those icky dwarfy ones).

I want to personally endorse both elfies and dwarfies as being perfectly welcoming and accepting (to a reasonable degree), at least to my non-member PC.

As the sole active svirfneblin our faction is horribly cliquish and antisocial as well as paranoid. This is proper svirf behaviour... you should join us if you wish to be this way too >:D

I understand that what is an issue for me, might not be an issue for others. I also would like to state that this is simply what I have observed in my 3+ months playing on Amia.

The conclusion I have come to is this: Players are starved of conflict, and as a result I constantly see players interacting poorly with one another. This is mostly secluded to Bendir Dale as people seem to be drawn to this particular spot, but I will get to that later.

I know that conflict doesn't just have to stem from good vs evil but it is the easiest example to give. I know there are a lot of different kinds of evil, but for the sake of making it simple, I am just going to refer to evil in general. Evil has it tough which is understandable considering Amia is governed and consisted primarily by lawful factions that mostly promote good and condemn evil. I generally think this is a good setting as it requires evil to be cunning and clever to survive. However, I think it is tough for the wrong reasons because most evil characters are put at a major disadvantage when it comes to finding roleplay. Kohlingen is off limits to most evil races, leaving them to skulk around Cordor or Tarkuul which, from my experiences, are generally devoid of others players and therefore interaction, and you certainly wont find people from Kohlingen in either of these places. So what does this mean? They go to the only place they can find other players to interact with: Bendir Dale.

So why is this an issue? Because it isn't neutral ground. Sure, Bendir is more lenient on their rules than either Kohlingen or Cordor and make far more exceptions, but it is still governed by laws that work against evil and favor good. This results in one of two things. Evil characters either manage to hide their true nature and successfully implement themselves, or they are discovered and banned from Bendir Dale. Either scenario creates an issue, but let me focus on what happens when said evil is banned. Where do they go from here? I already established that the other cities are often empty. This leads to a number of evil characters cut off and isolated from roleplay. That doesn't sound fun at all. So, suddenly the system that was supposed to promote more “intelligent” evil makes a stagnant and boring place as no one wants to create conflict or take risks in fear of being banned from the only place they can find roleplay.

A lot of people convene in Bendir Dale, but many of the interactions I have observed are toxic, and conflict is not meaningful. People are so deprived of anything engaging that the moment an opportunity arises, most react so quickly and with such hostility that they end up snuffing out roleplay without even realizing it. I observed a character passing through Bendir who was opening the door to more potential roleplay down the road, but instead of people taking advantage of this opportunity, literally everyone there jumped in and gave the character an ultimatum to leave and never come back. This was their first and only response to what was happening. There was, in my opinion, no attempt to even interact with the character. I was astonished and overwhelmed by how quickly everyone joined in unison and acted like a mob to kick the character out the door before he even had a chance to explain himself. A character counted to three, and then the mob of players began initiating pvp. The player was not even allowed time to type out responses before he was ushered outside by a volley of arrows.

This is just one example, but I see it all the time. I am not suggesting that these players change the way their characters behave if it is contrary to how they are meant to be roleplayed, but in these instances, roleplay isn't what I am seeing. All I am seeing are a mob of players so eager to get in on the action that they inadvertently destroy the roleplay, or conflict, before it even has a chance to develop into anything.

These interactions end up shooting players in the foot in the long term. With no one left to interact with, they grow bored and eventually they do start to roleplay their characters incorrectly in favor of finding new ways to entertain themselves. This often results in silly behavior, or jumping into pvp too quickly, or even where a player will unknowingly have their good-aligned characters do things questionably evil, not for the sake of roleplay, but for the sake of entertaining the player.

TL;DR
Players are starved of meaningful, lasting conflict, and as a result end up squashing roleplay before it has a chance to develop.
Evil doesn't have a place to find roleplay and conflict other than Bendir Dale, which they are easily banned from and then isolated.

Solutions:
I am most keen on fixing this in-game, through roleplay itself.
Aside from that, and people will likely hate this suggestion, limiting porting wands to a few uses a day, and removing some (if not all) of the cart drivers. I understand that these things were likely implemented to help find roleplay, but I feel they do the opposite. They have turned into features that exist solely for the purpose of convenience, which is not necessarily a bad thing, and it does quickly get people to where roleplay is more apt to happen, but it has done something else as well: It restricts the number of places for roleplay to emerge. It eliminates opportunity. How many times have people simply taken the cart to skip right past the grove in Amia Forest? Imagine players being forced to actually traverse the dangerous roads if they want to get to their destination. Imagine if players roleplaying thieves could actually roleplay being highway robbers, or players roleplaying knights who would actually patrol the roads they swear to protect? Anyway, that's just my opinion on what I have observed, and I appreciate anyone who actually took the time to read this wall of text.

serbiris wrote:

I want to personally endorse both elfies and dwarfies as being perfectly welcoming and accepting (to a reasonable degree), at least to my non-member PC.

I don't think the point was about non-member PCs, but about the players behind the PC's.

This topic is totally useless, because it promotes speculation, the only people that know why people are leaving are those people who have left, and they mostly don't comment on these topics.

Again. It's a very old game and we do not have means or methods of advertising for new players.

Why don't you just make that your signature.

Some asshole called Life walked up and punched me in the nuts. On a serious note, when I played in the spring it became common for me to hear of other players gossiping about others and judging them in an OOC light for roleplay decisions they made. I will name no names nor name specific incidents but it seemed to me a game of clashing interests and social quarreling than an RP server, so I took a break over the majority of the summer(the breaking computer didn't help). I will gladly play again if not to experience roleplay and friendship at the level I did again, in fact I plan to soon, just I found that many people were aware of the aforementioned problems when I played during spring and it sort of bothered me to the point of losing interest.

Its not all speculation, mate. A lot of people here speak with experience. A lot of us, including myself, have taken extended breaks on occasion, or known friends who played and quit who we still talk to. Hell, I've spoken to about three yesterday, just 'cause we're good friends.

And as DM's, we often say goodbye to a lot of the players that leave. We have our eyes on OOC issues that sometimes crop up and push people away, access to all the forums to stick our noses in the various affairs of the island. We can't catch everything, but we've seen a lot of people come and go, and spoken to them along the way.

And please cut the snide attitude, O'Raghailligh.

Personnally, I think this game here on Amia is very addictive and for some of us, it as becomed a second life, almost. People here, marry, have kids and so...

Some of us may quit because they try to do other things because this is time consuming much... For some it take all the free space of their life.

I can somewhat relate to Caldera's post of player gossip. While I was leveling here, it was not uncommon to run into OOC issues while other player characters wanted to join a party. All of a sudden you'd hear negative rants about others about things that had nothing to do with you as a player. Sometimes it even felt as if certain players were trying to "convince" you of something regarding those other players almost as if you were expected to take sides in the issue. To me it almost felt like a part of the learning curve on Amia to learn which players did not match well together. This was a relatively minor issue however and rather easily ignored.

Personally, the only break I had from here was caused from OOC drama over IC actions. Amia is no different than other servers when it comes to individuals that like to tell others how to play their characters. If there's something they do not approve of OOCly, they're going to make an OOC situation out of it and that's it - drama time.

However, this has a tendency of happening at some point on every single RP server that has existed. Especially ones with big player bases like Amia. It's just something incredibly hard to deal with.

IntheCoconut wrote:

Everything he said.

It's interesting to see someone come to exactly the same conclusions as myself, who actually doesn't play in those RP hubs. I've been in Bendir only a few times recently with evil characters, drow included, and my experiences match your description 100%.

Leyline wands and carts have killed the element of travel, and these tools are only further serving to deprive evil folks of RP opportunities. Furthermore, as you have as well observed, the lack of conflict in those areas is leading people to create silly, comic relief RP, and that is actually the primary reason i don't visit these places anymore.

I'm somehow reluctant to approach with my Serious Evil aligned character and strike any interaction with people there, who are engaged in activities such as these:

only to be insta-ganked by half of the server, have my corpse defiled and dismembered on the spot. I was amazed by the vigor and brutality my character was dealt with, easily outshining anything i have done in 2 years of playing evil. This has happened to me before several times, and it never had anything to do with RP.

I just want to say that Aeq nailed it. Especially...

Aeqvinox wrote:

The lack of conflict in those areas is leading people to create silly, comic relief RP, and that is actually the primary reason i don't visit these places anymore.

... this deserve a lot of attention. Well said, sir, it seems things haven't changed as much as I would think, as this issue's been here for some time now. Mind you that this direction of conversation would bring back good ol' painful topics like PvP Rules and such, which is something I would not want to participate much. Twice is more than enough. Just sayin... although I believe... no, I actually KNOW that some people, and very solid rpers left because of that.

beren de la tour wrote:

Personnally, I think this game here on Amia is very addictive and for some of us, it as becomed a second life, almost. People here, marry, have kids and so...

Some of us may quit because they try to do other things because this is time consuming much... For some it take all the free space of their life.

I've only played here a few months and have been absent of late simply because I have other things in real life that demand my time (taking up a new hobby is one example). I for one definitely haven't left. :p

As for advertising, maybe have a word with GOG and get them to publish a server list alongside the game details for people to check out. This is by far the best PW I've ever played on and there are some great people around.

Narj wrote:

beren de la tour wrote:

Personnally, I think this game here on Amia is very addictive and for some of us, it as becomed a second life, almost. People here, marry, have kids and so...

Some of us may quit because they try to do other things because this is time consuming much... For some it take all the free space of their life.

I've only played here a few months and have been absent of late simply because I have other things in real life that demand my time (taking up a new hobby is one example). I for one definitely haven't left. :p

As for advertising, maybe have a word with GOG and get them to publish a server list alongside the game details for people to check out. This is by far the best PW I've ever played on and there are some great people around.

Explain how that would work out? Contact GOG how and why would they do so?

Muspelkvist wrote:

Explain how that would work out? Contact GOG how and why would they do so?

GOG are pretty decent people. It's probably worth a try getting them to mention one of the NWN Server Lists. They already mention the multiplayer key issue so it wouldn't be a stretch to include a link to one of the "master lists" on top of that.

I might try mailing them myself actually seeing as I bought the game from there. Even if they say no, it's worth trying and it might persuade people into buying the game off the back of the fact that there are still active communities. I know I did research into whether there were still servers running before I bought it. Anything that might mean more sales may be looked upon favourably by them.

Aeqvinox wrote:

I'm somehow reluctant to approach with my Serious Evil aligned character and strike any interaction with people there, who are engaged in activities such as these:

Playing Harold, who is very new to Amia, I would like to point out Harolds response was serious and completely in character. He was quite incredulous and quite angry moments later when the dominate ended and the beastman started to attack npc's.

I am not sure I like Harold being highlighted as a comic relief character.

People, don't bring up specific examples like this here. It will only cause anger and the topic to be locked as its aim and mean is lost.

Hudson wrote:

I am not sure I like Harold being highlighted as a comic relief character.

He's not. In the context of this screenshot, he is just an observer.

If this screenshot offends anyone please let me know, and i will remove it. It was not my intent to ridicule anyone, on the contrary - i wanted to share what i consider to be a rather hilarious scene, i laughed myself when i first saw it. In my mind there is nothing wrong in this isolated situation, except the unfortunate frequency of such, that may, or may not be the underlining reason for issues that we discuss.

I would happily come back to play a character for a few one-off stories. I won't come to aimlessly wander in search of the mythical adventure.

Let me re-iterate a bit. I love developing stories and characters, but my grasp of the setting is somewhat hazy. I've missed out on a lot of events and opportunities to get involved. I've had false starts with characters and I've had great RP that subsequently flatlined. And everywhere I go I never really see what I want to see, which is the classic adventuring party, held together somehow with duct tape and rubber bands. It's that odd mix of personalities (both in and out of character) driving things along that makes it fun, not the next level or that piece of epic loot.

Now you can say I'm disillusioned or whatever but actually I just think that I have a particular focus, a specific idea that I want to see played out, and not seeing it is frustrating. And while I can explore adventuring in my writing, the fact that I'm pulling all the strings of all the characters tends to make it a rather slow and laborious process.

So yes, put me down for an adventure - one in which the stakes are high, the chances of coming back alive are slim, and the merry band have to work together or they all perish and the world is doomed.

Guardian wrote:

I just want to say that Aeq nailed it. Especially...

Aeqvinox wrote:

The lack of conflict in those areas is leading people to create silly, comic relief RP, and that is actually the primary reason i don't visit these places anymore.

... this deserve a lot of attention. Well said, sir, it seems things haven't changed as much as I would think, as this issue's been here for some time now. Mind you that this direction of conversation would bring back good ol' painful topics like PvP Rules and such, which is something I would not want to participate much. Twice is more than enough. Just sayin... although I believe... no, I actually KNOW that some people, and very solid rpers left because of that.

Adding another to that... The level of silly, and oh-so-common bizarre makes it difficult to play engaging characters. Not saying comedy doesn't have a place, but I find it to be limiting after a certain degree. Not sure what even could be done (without getting into debates of things that are almost certainly not going to happen), but I've definitely already abandoned a few characters because of it.

Thank god it's called role-play and not everyone-should-play-how-I-want-them-to.. That's a mouthful and a half.

666WaysToHell wrote:

Thank god it's called role-play and not everyone-should-play-how-I-want-them-to.. That's a mouthful and a half.

ಠ_ಠ

'Comedic relief' RP can be tiresome, though. Some people take it to extremes, which is the point.

666WaysToHell wrote:

Thank god it's called role-play and not everyone-should-play-how-I-want-them-to.. That's a mouthful and a half.

That's a glib, dismissive response to a genuine sentiment. It doesn't deserve to be trivialized, and it's one I've felt more than once, myself. Nobody's telling anyone they should or shouldn't play their characters in certain ways. It's more like, when I see some of the frivolous, nonsensical shenanigans that Aeqvinox referred to, I kind of have to wonder to myself whether those players have any interest in playing the same game that I'm interested in playing. The more prevalent it becomes, the more I wonder whether Amia is likely to provide me with the experience I look for, or whether it's really just Sinfar with delusions of grandeur. Please don't dismiss our concerns so easily. I can think of at least four longtime, respected, productive players who have jumped the Amia ship for this very reason.

From my perspective as a DM, I just want to encourage the people who are saying everything relies on a DM to ask for less NPC possessions when it comes to things that can be done with PCs. Healers, clerics, redemptions, and so on. It'll make the server more player-run, which is what I think most of you want. You just need to be prepared for the PCs to say "No" and realize it's not because of any OoC issues, and it's IC conflict that is keeping you from getting what you want. If the playerbase is mature enough to realize they can't always get what they want from other PCs, Players, NPCs, and DMs, or what happens may not always be their idea, or something they want, it'll be a better place and become what you all want. Healthy.

Okay, I think the flippant remark was unwarranted, but he's not exactly wrong? I get that some people don't enjoy this or that while others people do, and that it varies from time-to-time. Sometimes my doom-and-gloom PC prefers a little levity, other times it makes him dial the murder setting up to 11/makes me rather log out. Okay. But what do we do about it? It's either a problem with an easy solution (leave the area with silly PCs) or no solution at all (getting people to play differently). It's nice to air out your concerns but to talk about this problem and not mention how to solve it is really just venting. Oh, or for solidarity I guess, that's okay too. But solutions would be awesome.

Yeah, you're totally right, serbiris: there's no quick fix. Or even probably any slow fix. But the thread is called "Why Are People Leaving," and that's at least a partial answer. I'm not entirely convinced by the theory voiced above that goof RP is spurred by the stagnation of Good vs Evil, leaving people without an avenue to channel their desire for serious RP. There's always been all kinds of RP, regardless of whether the "server plot" is swinging or not.

I would kiss you if it wasn't for the fact that you would enjoy it too much, BoB <3

Levity is good, but it's the way it's done. Like I said, it can be way over the top and I've seen players 'do the funny' for the sake of doing it. And it makes me sigh because at that point it can be immersion breaking depending on what they are doing for said comedic relief. That's the only time I have a problem with it.

Re: Bendir

Behavior as described isn't what we are shooting for IMO, speaking only for myself. Sorry if that was off putting. You can manage to hang around quite a lot if you behave wisely and don't flaunt yourself. Hanging an "I kill puppies" sign round your neck makes your lack of RP your problem.

I'm not sure why its become a hub. Obviously it used to be Cordor but I would say based on my experience that other than the Market Hall, Cordor is quieter despite being 10 times the size(or perhaps because of).

Getting banned isn't the end of RP by any means as players have successfully gotten bans reversed in multiple cases.

Both Hin and Gnomes have a penchant for jesting and gods promoting it so it comes with the territory in a way. Extreme and unrelenting silliness is also overkill for me so hopefully it rarely comes to that.

I would like to add that if any DMs want to help encourage player interaction then a good way is that if you have a plot try to include players in more than just the straight DM controlled NPCs vs PC way.

Giving different groups of characters seperate interactions and knowledge so that they are encouraged to work together, finding players that are up for filling the role that you might have had an NPC fill, and especilly things like allowing evil characters to interact with and even help the bad guys if it is possible.

Plots/Events that occur over days and really are mostly just *fight the bad guy and eventually win with nothing really changed (Minor destuction that will be fixed in a week don't really count)* always seemed like a waste to me. Sure they are fun at the time but after they are over the interest they created very quickly falls out.

Casvenx wrote:

Adding another to that... The level of silly, and oh-so-common bizarre makes it difficult to play engaging characters. Not saying comedy doesn't have a place, but I find it to be limiting after a certain degree. Not sure what even could be done (without getting into debates of things that are almost certainly not going to happen), but I've definitely already abandoned a few characters because of it.

This doesn't make me want to leave. However, it does flat out irritate the crap out of me and make me not want to be around the players that rely on this as the majority of their "RP".

Yes, I said players.

I've given this some long, hard thought. I'm still not entirely sure how to voice it accurately - how to get my point across without being unnecessarily brusque. I've written and rewritten, and originally I pointed fingers. But that's not constructive.

In my eyes, Amia is suffering from "status quo clinginess". Things are kept the way they are because that's the way things are familiar and comfortable.

NWN is a brilliant medium for creating a sandbox. But instead we're given a wood-carved playhouse. Nothing truly matters, because our castle isn't made of sand. It isn't fragile. It's rigid and unchanging. And utterly dull. Nothing moves, nothing changes, nothing challenges anymore.

So what to do? What is wrong, and how could it be fixed?

In my opinion, the current problem lies in the foundation of Amia. It isn't the persistent world it could be. But it can be, and I think it wouldn't be that much of a leap either. But it needs three things.

1. Fluff.
Lore. Background. Whatever you want to call it. There's not enough of it. In fact, it's blatantly missing. Or it's so far hidden it might as well be. I'm not talking about obscure lore, I'm talking about the blatantly obvious. The things that any PC would be able to find out just by spending some time in the respective areas.

I'm going to give examples for Cordor because I'm most familiar with it, but the same applies for all major regions. How does Cordor survive? What does it import? What does it export? What are the major factions and guilds? What is their relationship? Their histories? Their rivalries? Their agenda's? Why does Cordor have an arena? Does it have a tradition for gladiatorial combat? Why? Why is Waukeen the state religion? Why is there a chapel of Lathander? What sort of things does Father Redweth preach, day to day? What is its relation with major realms such Tethyr, Amn and Calimshan? Does it struggle to maintain its independence? Does it have a strong relation with these realms? Why? What are the local culinary specialties? What is the local dialect based on? What sort of fashions are "in"?

These things may or may not always be important to characters, but these details (especially the details) most often make the world come to life. These things don't need to be put up on a forum for exposition. But they could and should be known. To put it bluntly, it is unacceptable that my Guard officer character has no information on exactly who commands the Guard day to day. What its general organization is. What its particular traditions and histories are. This is not obscure knowledge that requires my character to delve into the depths of archives and libraries. This should be common knowledge, especially to my guard officer character. And no, a desire to keep things "open" as to remain "flexible" is no excuse. Established lore does not constrict possibilities, it supports it.

I know there's currently a lot of background that's missing. I know there's efforts to piece things together while keeping things consistent - and not every area or character is as well documented as it should be. But you can't keep trying to solve this puzzle when you're missing a quarter of all the pieces. Rebuild it from the ground up. Dareto affect change. Keep the general concept of Cordor intact, but dare to fill in the details on a new, fresh and strong foundation. Speaking for myself, I would fully accept certain details to be "retconnected" in favor of a more complete and plausible background.
Sound like a lot of work? It probably is. But you're not alone in this, DM's. Fluff creation doesn't need to be a one-way street, DM's. There's a several players around (*cough*) who have a vested interest in Cordor and want to see it flourish. There's several of us who have a good idea of Cordor's background. I know we'd jump at the chance to contribute and write up this sort of fluff. And you don't need to go trough great lengths to explain the new lore if it's properly formatted, in the sense that it is plausible for things to always "have been this way". It takes thought and effort, but it doesn't need to be the challenge it is.

And all of the above of course applies to other regions and towns as well.

2. The Pond.
Rather than the sandbox, I want to call this idea "the pond". Because while it's important to try and create an open world that anyone can affect, it must be driven by causality. There must be consequences to even minor acts. However, I'm well aware that this can quickly lead to information overload. Ideally DM's would have enough information to know exactly which PC said what to which NPC, and vice versa. But it just can't reasonably done to create that kind of immersion.

What -is- possible however is to create an environment where the actions of PC's affect the world more broadly. Dare to let the actions of PC's (and NPC's) have (unexpected) consequences in a broad sense, not only in the context of plots. In this I'm mainly talking about characters in position of governance. Dare to allow PC's in positions of governance, and dare to allow genuine consequences.
This all stands and falls on how much fluff is around to build on, but politics should be tricky. Full of difficult choices with genuine consequences. Dare for these consequences to potentially destroy even a major settlement. Dare to punish PC's with consequences if these PC's make a mistake, but similarly dare to reward PC's appropriately if they really play "the game" well. Encourage initiative and interaction with the greater world. Minimize the need for NPC's, but recognize they will always be needed and players will always want to interact with them. Don't enforce a notion of PC's only interacting with PC's.

3. The Living World
The simplest way to keep things from getting dull and static is to prevent things from getting dull and static. Don't just focus on the major plots, focus on the small things. You're not just telling the story of epic heroism or villainy, you're breathing life into the world. Small scale, single events or even forum posts can do just that. These don't need to have major consequences, but they make the world feel so much richer. For Cordor, the recorder is majorly underused.

A bad wheat harvest pushes up the price of bread. A minor thief is put on trial and found guilty. Two minor nobles announce their wedding. Father Redweth holds a though-provoking sermon. A caravan is ambushed by a group of goblins and arrives with a few wounded. A new tavern is opened. Taxes are raised on the sales of weaponry. Puffy pants become the latest fashion. Due to a shortage of cherries, Bendir Dale's cherry pie becomes a favored delicatesse in Cordor.

These sort of things make the world come to life. They don't need to affect PC's, though PC's might choose to interact with them somehow. It becomes -especially- interesting if you throw in interaction with plain, regular commoners with PC's now and then. Not just when they're souls to be saved, but just when they need a hand. An aspiring minstrel approaches a PC bard for a few tips and tricks. A farmer approaches a PC cleric because his daughter isn't feeling well. A bumpkin throws a tomato at a PC wizard for being a witch. A peasant accuses Ser Robert of repression.

That's the brief of it. I can elaborate on request.

The Great Equalizer wrote:

I would like to add that if any DMs want to help encourage player interaction then a good way is that if you have a plot try to include players in more than just the straight DM controlled NPCs vs PC way.

Giving different groups of characters seperate interactions and knowledge so that they are encouraged to work together, finding players that are up for filling the role that you might have had an NPC fill, and especilly things like allowing evil characters to interact with and even help the bad guys if it is possible.

Plots/Events that occur over days and really are mostly just *fight the bad guy and eventually win with nothing really changed (Minor destuction that will be fixed in a week don't really count)* always seemed like a waste to me. Sure they are fun at the time but after they are over the interest they created very quickly falls out.

Understandable, yes. However, I remember a couple of times where I tried to find the PC's for the task and no responses. When I contacted a DM, I was give advice "Try IC", to which I responded I already did. In some cases involving other players is not an option. The mindset of involving other players will get it more likely done is very good for encouraging interaction, but when there is a character with potent reasons to do it by themselves rather than with help of others , ones that the IC interaction with others have created, they are the ones paying the price in my opinion by having harder time getting the thing they worked for IC. And I do personally dislike to depend on other players for getting matters done and it is ony because of the past experiences of having the players disappear suddenly or them changing charaters and not bothering to show up.

To the previous post, about the fluff. That is certainly you can find information on, for example I contacted a certain DM about the fashion of Cordor and I was given very specific answer. And in some cases having larger amount of lore to go through, just to be able to play a certain type of character, can actually prevent creation of that character due to the amount of work it requires to have the background.

Secondly what comes to the pond, I can as well say that some of my characters have paid the price for even minor acts or for not doing anything else but having rumours going on of them, not by DM supervision but by the interaction of player characters who saw/felt/heard of this things or rumours. Also there is quite an amount of people in politically influentical positions, and even those who are not, can influence the world around them. Therefore, I disagree with the message given that Dm's don't allow such, when they do. (I assume the message is this because of the bolded words where you put emphasis on.) And even without DM's politics on Amia are tricky, I know it very well having had a character being target of them and having messed in it myself as well.

Thirdly with the recent events occuring all around, I hardly would say the world in Amia isn't stagnant. Shekats takind down the Shrine, Beastment taking on Kohlingers and Winyans, Ostahvn and Wiltun.. Certain kind of rumours being spread by PC of other PC's.. Just of the few examples of many. Also I personally have seen the fact that Cordor square has become very silent in comparison to what it was before. Due to some changes taking in there, part of a major plot I believe, but a small change that changed opinion of many characters not wanting to go there anymore.

As conclusion I disagree in many parts of what you said, but then again I agree on some. And this kind of disagreeing and agreeing only helps to develop matters better I believe.

IntheCoconut wrote:

A lot of people convene in Bendir Dale, but many of the interactions I have observed are toxic, and conflict is not meaningful. People are so deprived of anything engaging that the moment an opportunity arises, most react so quickly and with such hostility that they end up snuffing out roleplay without even realizing it. I observed a character passing through Bendir who was opening the door to more potential roleplay down the road, but instead of people taking advantage of this opportunity, literally everyone there jumped in and gave the character an ultimatum to leave and never come back. This was their first and only response to what was happening. There was, in my opinion, no attempt to even interact with the character. I was astonished and overwhelmed by how quickly everyone joined in unison and acted like a mob to kick the character out the door before he even had a chance to explain himself. A character counted to three, and then the mob of players began initiating pvp. The player was not even allowed time to type out responses before he was ushered outside by a volley of arrows.

This is just one example, but I see it all the time. I am not suggesting that these players change the way their characters behave if it is contrary to how they are meant to be roleplayed, but in these instances, roleplay isn't what I am seeing. All I am seeing are a mob of players so eager to get in on the action that they inadvertently destroy the roleplay, or conflict, before it even has a chance to develop into anything.

This. I didn't believe it. I thought it would be different if I tried it.

There's one thought of mine on what the topic states.

Magiros wrote:

Understandable, yes. However, I remember a couple of times where I tried to find the PC's for the task and no responses. When I contacted a DM, I was give advice "Try IC", to which I responded I already did. In some cases involving other players is not an option. The mindset of involving other players will get it more likely done is very good for encouraging interaction, but when there is a character with potent reasons to do it by themselves rather than with help of others , ones that the IC interaction with others have created, they are the ones paying the price in my opinion by having harder time getting the thing they worked for IC. And I do personally dislike to depend on other players for getting matters done and it is ony because of the past experiences of having the players disappear suddenly or them changing charaters and not bothering to show up.

It can be a pain and sometimes just not a plausible thing to do, but really just doing stuff for yourself by yourself is a lot less requarding than it is when you get others involved since that way you can expand and have longer lasting RP. Not to say that you shouldn't be able to do things by yourself, or that DMs shouldn't let you if you can, but rather that things that expand and encourage engaging long lasting RP should be encouraged.

On a side note though I do always like DMs just spontaniously running quick small events, they make things feel less static... Which can be a serious issue on amia sometimes.

Elorathall wrote:

3. The Living World

Sounds like a good opening for a motivated character. A reporter type character actually sounds kinda fun, once it got rolling. Maybe this is because I'm still new, but I don't think anyone would disagree with a player/character coming up with 'living fluff' like this either. Especially IC, since then it could just be IC character error, or straight out lies

.

I do agree the minor off-the-cuff interactions go far to establish a living world. And it does happen, but of course a DM has to catch the moment, which can be hard with just one or two DMs and 40+ players running around. But it's easy to get into the habit of forgetting the NPCs are there without them doing something different every once in awhile.

The two things I would suggest towards a living world are:
1. The forums are great, and a useful addition to the game world, but they are far away when you are actually in game. Of course it is possible to scan the forums while you have the game open, but I certainly don't do this (windowed mode bothers me), and I am sure I'm not alone in that. Things like auctions, notices, posters, newspapers, and whatever else gets 'posted' should (at least sometimes) be actual things in game. Kudos to the ones that I have seen in game. As often as I do check the forums, I still don't ever seem to find things out in a timely manner, and there are plenty of people that don't check them at all.

2. Actually, let me pull my thoughts together on the second a bit more.

Elorathall wrote:

You, good sir, have been snipped!

There is a lot written here, but I just have to say, I agree with all of it.

I have only been here for 3+ months, and so maybe its just my lack of experience on the server, but I am confused about what approach the DMs are taking toward overseeing the server. I get the impression that the server is primarily player-driven, and DMs take a back seat to supervise, support, and help provide direction when its needed. Unfortunately, and this is just my opinion, I feel the players are too restrained to truly accomplish this, whether its a lack of lore, or DMs being too afraid to hand the reigns over to the players.

And I don't want to just make it sound like there isn't any lore, because there is! The amount of information and lore available in-game is impressive! I am always amazed at how immersed some characters are, all thanks to the lore already provided that allows them to roleplay the day-to-day activities of their characters. The problem is, that players are still going to hit walls often when they aren't allowed to govern themselves and call the shots. They will constantly require the assistance of a DM to provide them with the necessary lore, or to possess an NPC who has the in-game "authority" to do things for them. I agree that anything game-changing should be scrutinized and looked closely by the DM team, otherwise the module would likely change every time you log in. As it stands right now, however, I feel characters are beating against invisible barriers that constrain them.

I might just be speaking from inexperience, though. As I said I'm new, and so maybe I haven't played enough to see the full weight and consequences of players actions.

The thing is, nothing said here is new. I've only been around for a short time, and these same things have all been said during my time here. I think they must've been said before that too. I didn't say it is all speculation, it just promotes it.

I'm somewhat curious myself what Amia might look like if more DM's were trained in area building, or if we encouraged personal player area building, given the achievement of a certain handful of IC objectives (Like the collection of raw materials [Yay, job system], the acquisition of land, workers, and a steady rate of building).

It seems like one of the big pushes from the playerbase is that they want to be more involved in a more rapidly changing world. The issue, DM-side, is that even with the gifted builders that we have, our rate of actual server world change is slower than desired. I'm just kind of openly pondering solutions.

Edit: Hrm. Perhaps even, by creating a sort of stock-standard formula to building/faction/city growth, players could perform more without the direct oversight of a Dm as well.

*shrugs*

I don't see much of a problem, I have fun with my main, and my alt.
Sometimes the RP stagnates, but there's always something around the next corner, waiting to happen, and it usually does.

You want to break the rules in Bendir, forest, or anywhere else...then expect to have conflict RP tossed your way, and stop crying about the fact that an NPC can't do shit without a DM behind it, and accept the fact that PC's will do something. If a DM is available, they usually help out.

I see no affect of players leaving, and hurting the server, most of them were newer anyway, and had little affect on major events. There are plenty of new ones to the server, and I've seen many more older players coming back. The RP here is very fluid and constant, and there are some very good roleplayers, which helps me to strive to better myself. Get off your goddamned high horses, and start having fun, leave the ooc crap out of it, and just do what your character would do.

The DM team is better now, than ever before, with availability, major events, random events, requests, updates, scripting, shall I continue...?

The biggest problem I have, is people typing too damn fast for me to answer, and have the conversation shift. I make more typos trying to keep up, and I hate that. (even though my typing skills suck).
So slow down a bit, and enjoy the ride.
Damn, don't make me force you hit this bowl, I barely have enough for myself, let alone the whole uptight server.

:P

Kudark wrote:

Damn, don't make me force you hit this bowl, I barely have enough for myself, let alone the whole uptight server.

And there's your new forum signature.

Elorathall wrote:

The simplest way to keep things from getting dull and static is to prevent things from getting dull and static. Don't just focus on the major plots, focus on the small things. You're not just telling the story of epic heroism or villainy, you're breathing life into the world. Small scale, single events or even forum posts can do just that. These don't need to have major consequences, but they make the world feel so much richer. For Cordor, the recorder is majorly underused.

A bad wheat harvest pushes up the price of bread. A minor thief is put on trial and found guilty. Two minor nobles announce their wedding. Father Redweth holds a though-provoking sermon. A caravan is ambushed by a group of goblins and arrives with a few wounded. A new tavern is opened. Taxes are raised on the sales of weaponry. Puffy pants become the latest fashion. Due to a shortage of cherries, Bendir Dale's cherry pie becomes a favored delicatesse in Cordor.

These sort of things make the world come to life. They don't need to affect PC's, though PC's might choose to interact with them somehow. It becomes -especially- interesting if you throw in interaction with plain, regular commoners with PC's now and then. Not just when they're souls to be saved, but just when they need a hand. An aspiring minstrel approaches a PC bard for a few tips and tricks. A farmer approaches a PC cleric because his daughter isn't feeling well. A bumpkin throws a tomato at a PC wizard for being a witch. A peasant accuses Ser Robert of repression.

I especially agree with this part. My most enjoyable NPC interactions have been with 'insignificant' people, like commoners and guardsmen... With the exceptions of a white slaad by the name of Texgenz and the ogre bouncer of Kampo's. But those were Silent2001's stuff, so no surprise there!

Silence, Tex is wonderful.

You misunderstand. Tex and the bouncer weren't insignificant NPCs, whilst their encounters were some of the most enjoyable ones I've had on Amia.

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