Illarion - its current situation and its future

[Siltaris]

Illarion – its current situation and its future
~~ A Report~~

In the last days, there have been many discussions about a various type of things some players don’t like in Illarion. Naturally, we only know about the opinions of the players who attend these discussions – that means at the same time that there are a lot of players, maybe even the majority, who did not tell what they think about the current situation of Illarion, yet. So, all what we are discussing here about only are the opinions of SOME but not all players. However, maybe these players are some of the very core players and are quite concerned about the changes which happen to Illarion. So, when continuing discussion, keep in mind that there are other players, who don’t see the ‘changes’… or maybe you consider the changes as ‘problems’. But what are these problems?

Well, the aim is not mainly to discuss about the single problems in detail. Many comments already have been written about it. This thread wants to summarise and link the issues, which already have been discusses in other threads. By doing so, I try to show my point of view concerning the overall problem Illarion currently seems to suffer from and I try to give proposals of how they may be tackled.

This report will start with dealing with the current situation in Illarion. Afterwards the future of Illarion is in focus of discussion. The main issues are summarised in a conclusion. Some questions and suggestions close this report.



~Current situation~

PLAYERS

One of the most important issue, which is mentioned again and again when writing about Illarion’s current ‘problems’ is the decrease in overall RP.
Apparently, there seems to be some true core in it, otherwise there won’t be so many people complaining about it. There seem to be three (common) factors, which could be responsible for this decrease:

A. Good roleplayers left and by doing so leave newer, not (yet) so good RP in the game
Indeed, lots of players left or make breaks for an uncertain time. Some left due to changes in the game, like the new map, new fighting/skillsystem and the abolishment of the account system. However, one have to keep in mind that players always will come and go. It is only a matter of time how long they will keep on playing. Although there are players around, who stayed here for quite a long time (4 years and more?), even some of these players will be inactive some time or will leave the game. This is change. Change is natural. Nothing is forever. And in the end, real life is the base for being able to play Illarion. And real life changes over time, too, of course.

B. There are a lot of new players joining the game, who are not so good in RP, yet and give the impression that overall RP has decreased, although good roleplayers are still there.
Mainly due to the abolishment of the account system a lot of new players joined the game. Once meant as a ‘test’, now, after months, it is obvious that the test failed. There are a lot of new and inexperienced players, who often have less motivation to really learn how to play Illarion and only want to have a quick look into the game. The older players get annoyed by their behaviour and cannot help all new player: there are too many completely inexperienced players who often lack the very basics of RP; and a lot of them will leave anyway after one day or week or so.
Maybe the consequences or side-effects of the abolishment of the account system were not discussed enough in advance (however, the aim of getting more players was achieved). And maybe the evaluation of the consequences was not appropriate. Now, a lot of the old players are fed up with helping new players; this may be another reason for older players to leave. Fortunately there are now efforts to tackle this problem with the tutorial island– great efforts!

C. The average RP decreased, maybe due to less motivation for good RP
Of course, the RP-skills of the older player did not disappear over night. But maybe the players are less motivated to make long-lasting quests, which go over weeks, because they had similar stuff in past. Maybe they have the feeling that there have been so many wars in past, that a new war won’t be a challenge any more. Maybe they are less motivated because older players left. Maybe they are less motivated because there are so many threads in the forums which say that Roleplay has decreased. Maybe they are fed up with so many new players, who do not react to certain Roleplay situations. Well, in the end, there are a lot of reasons for that and all of them together lessen the motivation to motivate yourself for making good RP.
However, there still IS good roleplay in Illarion taking place. But it is more within small groups. What is missing are the overall roleplay-situations, political or other situations which build the framework for all these ‘small’ RPs. I am not sure, if there is no interest of the players in attending such framework-roleplaystory or if there is nobody who wants to spend the time for creating such a story. So, only when there is enough effort and time spend in creating such a story, it will be successful and fun for others.

So, as already mentioned in other threads: If you are complaining about the decrease of RP, be active by yourself and try to change something! Complaining in the Forum or becoming inactive will not change anything. Try to find a solution for the problem and discuss it. And do it in an appropriate way. Watch your language, don’t flame, don’t be aggressive. Just keep a clear mind and think what you really want: Are you interested in playing this game? Do you want to improve it? Are you fed up with the game? Do you want to spend your free-time for this game, in either playing it or help to improve it? If you do not want to play it any more, fine, then leave. But please, do not destroy the fun of others by flaming etc.


RESPECT

Because in the end, this game, Illarion, still is a free game! It was and still is developed by volunteers. It is played by players who only are able to play it only because of the huge efforts the developers did and still do! You, as player, who pay nothing for it, have no right for anything in this game! All you can do is to try to talk to the developers and make proposals, or maybe offer your help or make suggestions how you could help.
However, the developers are depended on the players, because they give the developer’s efforts a sense. So, the developers should be open minded and listen to the reactions of the players.
Well, in the end of the day, it is all about respect, how Pendar mentioned in another thread. And he is completely right with that. Respect each other!

Why the respect seems to have lessened? Maybe due to the fact that Illarion exists over a long time now, still for free and people start to think it is ‘their’ game. Maybe because new players don’t know who develops this game? Maybe because there is no ‘special’ feeling any more when joining the game, because of the abolishment of the account system (Once I joined I thought: “Yay, finally I am in… it must be a special game, when having such a barrier”). Maybe, because there are many new and often young players who often lack of respect for anything? Maybe, because this is the Internet and people forget about values and good behaviour in the net? I don’t know. But anyway: Respect each other!


STAFF

If there is little respect between the players and between players and the staff, it will lead to the situation some people say we currently have: The staff seems to begin to care less about players.
Well, some days ago I was about to get that feeling, too. But then, the arising discussions showed that they still do care for players a lot. But there are some reasons which should be mentioned in this context:

A. Although the staff reads all important threads in the forums and although they always get feedback when asking players for suggestions how to improve the game, there always was a lack of information what happened to these suggestions. As far as I know, there only have been little things been implemented which came from the players (sorry, if I am wrong with my impression). Especially in matters of changing the punishment for being clouded, there have been a lot of very good proposals, which seem to be better than the current solution.
Of course, there only are a few developers who have the knowledge to program/script the needed things. And of course, they have a lot of other things to do, that many things have to be delayed. However, now there will be a weekly update, so players can read what the staff is working on. More transparency will help to bring players and developers closer together in matters of respect each other, I hope.

B. If there are more players, it is logic that the staff is not able to care for each player the same way they did it before.

C. As we have read from Martin, some of the developers currently have little motivation to keep on working on the game. The reason for that is the little increase of player numbers regarding the huge efforts they put into improving Illarion within the last year(s). Indeed, the game improved a lot! And we can be really proud of their work and have to thank them for doing so.
However, they missed their own objectives of clearly increasing the player numbers and now have little motivation to continue programming, according to Martin’s posting.
I must admit that when I have read his posting, something began to knock in my head. It took a while to become clear what it was and it took even a while to write down what kept me thinking over the last days. Well, and basically this is why I made this posting.




~Illarion’s future~

Basically, what I will try to explain concerns Illarion’s future. How will Illarion be in a half or one year, regarding the fact that everything depends on a few developers who keep on improving this game in their free-time completely voluntarily. Especially in a time, when some developers say they have little motivation to continue working for Illarion and at the same time some players are moaning about decreasing quality of Roleplay and increasing flaming in the Forum. Regarding these circumstances I ask myself how Illarion could develop in the next month.

In my opinion, the ‘problems’ mentioned in the first part, are not to be seen as single or independent ones. Rather, they are strongly related to each other and influence each other. And in worst case they might lead to a situation, nobody of us wants to have – a pause in the development and improvement of Illarion.

How so? Well, I have the impression that there are two different basic expectations beneath these ‘problems’, which could lead in the end to such an unsatisfactory situation.
On the one hand, there are the expectations of the players, who are active in the Forum and are actually talking about the decrease of the quality roleplay and see the rising amount of players more negative than positive. These players seem to have the expectation of a quality in roleplay. They may know the ‘old’ times, when only a small group of players played Illarion, a time where nearly everybody knew each other. Their focus is on good and deep roleplay, on interaction.
On the other hand, there seem to be the expectations of some of the staff, of the developers. They have another relation to Illarion, which is a game they created and which is a game they still are creating. Different than the players, who only see the surface of the game (users), the staff does spend most of their time in creating this surface (developers). Consequently they have other expectations of the game. Martin stated that: Their main objective is to develop a game, which becomes more and more famous by having an increasing number of players.

So, we have two expectations here. Maybe the word ‘vision’ is more appropriate. The decisive question is:

What does Illarion want to be? – which vision should the future development of Illarion follow?
A. Game which emphasises qualitative roleplay?
B. Game for masses with growing amount of players?

At the moment it seems if the game has been programmed and developed like A. (strong focus on RP, no PG, mysterious skill-/ fighting-/ crafting-/ weapon/armor-system). But now, after there are more and more inexperienced new players around in the game, who apparently do not want to have focus on roleplay (but rather on things like skillgaining, getting rich, powerful, strong or to master the game (‘what should I do?’)) people who want to focus on true roleplay get disturbed in their roleplay and slowly but steadily loose their motivation to play Illarion.
If the vision of qualitative roleplay wants to be followed, there must be actions done to support qualitative roleplay and to prevent bad roleplay. Reactivating the (improved) account system is one of the most important steps. People have to know what Illarion is about when they join the game. The tutorial island is another important step in the right direction.
So, altogether, the causes which weaken qualitative roleplay have to be eliminated and the strengths have to be supported.

If B. is wanted, the game itself must change. The current structure of the gameplay is the opposite of being a game for masses. Strong focus on RP, clouding system, nontransparent skill-fightingsystem etc. go against the average gamer, who just wants to enjoy some of their free-time with playing any game. By opening the doors and inviting anybody to have a quick look into Illarion, the deep inner value of Illarion is tackled: qualitative roleplay.
Furthermore, the server is not ready to cope with so many players over a long time. So, even when there should be new players attracted to having a look into the game, but the server is down or will freeze after some time, these people get discouraged and will leave. If Illarion wants to be a game for masses, the gameplay has to be made for masses and the server must be able to cope with more than 50 or 60 players without freezing. These are very basic and very important requirements. Otherwise, Illarion will not benefit from making the game open to anybody.
So, again: An increasing amount of random players will lead to decrease of quality in overall RP. This will go against the current gameplay structure of Illarion and will annoy roleplay-focused players. They first will complain and if nothing changes they will leave. This is exactly what currently is going on:
- Players are complaining about bad RP, little motivation to RP.
- GMs complain about little response to quests, little motivation to make quest.
- Ongoing complaints annoy developers, who worked hard. They have little motivation to continue developing due to these complaints and due to not so much increasing number of players as expected

However, there must be an opportunity to increase the number of players without lessen the quality of roleplay; an opportunity to make both visions come true. I think this is possible. But other means must be chosen than making the game accessible to any random people and by doing so letting current players suffer from it.

First, the quality of the game has to be maintained and improved. Indeed, the game already has very good qualities. Very nice graphics, weather effects, fighting-system, magic-system, crafting-system, a large world, lots of towns etc. Basically, everything what is needed for good roleplay is there. These strengths already existing have to be improved in some cases (balance several things) but basically there exists a certain level of quality in the game, which is attractive enough to new players who set focus on roleplay.
An additional improvement of the features of the game (balance things) will hardly lead to an increasing amount of new players joing the game. New players decide in their first minutes or hours of they like the game or not. The current quality in the game should be good enough to either make them interested in this game or to make them leave.
So, to attract these new players, the focus of improvements has to be laid on issues, which are very obvious and visibly to new players. For example, the NPCs must work fine. The server should not freeze when new players make their first experiences within Illarion. The new players maybe should see some nice effects of the graphic engine. And, yes, the new players should not meet old players who do not care for them or offend them. Well, the current efforts in making the tutorial island go in line with that and will have massive effect on the behaviour of new players joining the game (either they leave on tutorial island or they come to Gobiath by knowing what they expect).

However, by focusing on this stuff, which deals with the development of the ‘first impression’, the other ‘hidden’ development issues (balancing crafting-system or magic-system or fighting-system or whatever) are still important. But they focus on another objective: They improve the competitiveness of Illarion to other roleplay games and they fulfil older player’s wishes. But again: these balancing-issues will hardly lead to an increasing amount of new players.

Regarding the developer’s vision to increase the player numbers, other ways than improving the overall quality of Illarion have to be found; more effective and more efficient ones. Basically, I am talking about advertising and promotion.
Well, if Illarion is a game with focus on roleplay, it is not a product for the masses. Rather, the target group is quite special. So, approaches of promotion have to be found, which highlight the roleplay-focus of Illarion, a free game. Maybe the whole atmosphere or the community can be highlighted, too... well, it is about highlighting the special and unique things Illarion can offer its players.
Then, these ‘special features’ have to be promoted in an adequate way for the special target group. For example: Find Internet pages, where Illarion can be promoted. Contact magazines to write an article about Illarion. Make flyers and pin them on the board in schools or universities or fantasy-shops.
These are just first ideas and I am sure there are more opportunities than these. So, what Illarion might need is a team which deals with the promotion of Illarion. They produce flyers (corporate identity) and co-ordinate the promotion actions.
But before any actions can begin, the very basic visible features (stable server, tutorial island) have to be done. Otherwise a game will be promoted, which does not fulfil what it promises. And this is the worst case which can happen in terms of sustainable promotion.





~Conclusion~~

This account highlighted the most important shortcomings Illarion currently seems to suffer from. I tried to show that there seems to be a fundamental vagueness and unclarity in the vision of Illarion and that this vagueness may lead to a pause in Illarion’s development. I tried to show that the current actions done by developers to fulfil the developer’s vision of increasing the number of players was implemented ‘ad-hoc’ in a too short-sighted way. Even worse than that, it maybe even went against the vision of many old players of having deep qualitative roleplaying. However, although the mean may was not appropriate the vision of the developers still has to be regarded and tried to be fulfilled. Otherwise the developers motivation will get lost and the development of Illarion will stagnate.

The proposal to solve this dilemma is:
- staff/developers have to define their vision of what they expect Illarion should become
- Players have to express their wishes, too, and all together formulate this vision.
- If the result will be that Illarion should remain a free online roleplay game, with strong focus on qualitative roleplay and at the same time wants to attract more players, the following actions should be done:
o Development of tutorial island; reactivation of a sort of account system
o Make server more stable and enable smooth gaming for ~50 players
o After these actions have been done, the promotion of Illarion can begin.
o Then the efforts should be concentrated on bugfixing before programming other scripts, which must be bugfixed afterwards, too.

Due to the latest efforts of the staff to create Tutorial Island and to reactivate the account system, it seems that the vision of qualitative roleplay is wanted. However, now the next efforts should be focuses on making the server more stable to allow the promotion to begin afterwardes. By doing so, we need to find new and innovative ideas to let Illarion grow in a positive and qualitative way and keep the staff motivated to spend their efforts for developing this game by increasing number of players.


Well, and at the end, there are some general issues, yet, which always should be kept in mind:
- Become active, if you think something goes wrong.
- Respect each other.
- Never forget that this is a free game.





~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Well, that’s it. I hope my argumentation is clear and understandable. I hope that I did not offend anyone. Obviously, most of the issues mentioned above already have been discussed in other threads and thus maybe are not very new or inventive. Nevertheless, at least some of the issues may encourage someone to think about certain things. Anyway, in the end this is what I think about the current situation in Illarion. And only by expressing the own opinion and thoughts, something maybe will change.



It may be difficult to find an appropriate answer to my partly confusing thoughts. So, I have some questions or suggestions:
- What is the current vision for the development of Illarion?
- How many developers are currently active? How do you get new ones?
- How many people are ‘the staff’?
- Maybe polls should be made to find out what players currently think about Illarion? (As part of Evaluation)

Suggestions:
- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?

[Lrmy]

I think we have needed a post like this in a while. Something to bring everything together in a non-hostile way. So, thank you for making the post.

I did read the entire thing and agree with just about it all. Though I think the reason we don't have many players is because this is no game that can easily be targeted at the masses. Think about the average gamer. A teenage boy.. I assume over half of all gamers are teenage boys, and lets face it. Teenage boys normally do NOT have the maturity to play such a game. The other problem is that the average gamer has (probably)never seen something like Illarion. Most "RP" games are powergaming. Even the actual games(oblivion and the like) where you take on the role of some hero is far different from Illarion. Because Illarion is so different from what people expect from a game or want from a game, I think it will never have such population near to that of runescape, or other MMORGPS.

[Caranthir the great]

Greetings to all you fellow players out there

I would like to take the time to drop a few lines here. Thank you all for your attention. I feel that this is the right time for me, as a veteran and extremely awesome player who until recently has been on an extended hiatus from the game, to comment on the state of affairs from my point of view.

To put it short: There has always been complaints about the "Level of RP" going down in Illarion, for as long as I have been playing this game. Always. For the most of the time this is complete bogus, simply repeated ad nauseam by a very vocal minority, often players who are not that active or older players not interested in playing with new characters to begin with.

I see fantastic roleplaying around my character constantly, other interesting characters in so plentiful numbers even that it's a pity I can't play with most of them properly. There simply are not enough free hours in a day. This is from someone who came back with the grand total of zero contacts to other players.

I don't believe in long term decrease of Roleplaying. Large influx of new players over short period of time causes some problems on the short run of course. However, instead of bitching about it and pondering if Illarion is going down the drain, we maybe should log in and include them into our roleplaying more than currently. Not only would that erase the displeasing side-effects of the large newbie amount more quickly, but it could also create fun and enjoyable RP moments.

The reason why I chose to shut up about my previous character was, because I was unsure about whether or not I would like the game or stay.
I'm staying, thanks to all the wonderful players who I have played with during the past three months. The RP has not changed dramatically to worse, maybe on the contrary even.
*bows*
After three months of observation, I am not worried at all.

Sorry PO Gryphius. I lied a tiny bit.

PO Caranthir the Great / Edward Cromwell

[Estralis Seborian]

I also say "thank you" for this post for it summarizes most aspects of the current problems we are facing as players of this game. Even though I tend to disagree with single statements here and there, the overall message is what we all should agree with.

What is the current vision for the development of Illarion?

This is one of the key problems of this game: There is and (according to the devs) there will be no master plan or common vision ever. This is sad and leads to some of the chaos we face, and much worse, we faced in the past. The german term "kaputtreparieren" ("break-repair") described a tendency to replace working yet dissatisfying systems with non-working, even more dissatisfying systems by the cost of many manhours of work.

Anyway, I don't want to spam this topic since it has more the character of an "announcement", but I'd like to add that the homepage features a category called "development". This section once acted as some kind of master plan, however, it was not updated nor made reality. Maybe, basing on this, the Illarion community can develope a common vision of the basic aspects of gameplay.

Edit: I agree with Caranthir about the level of RP - in tgod, overall RP was way worse, especially when Tibia was down...

[Rasteel Olin]

Exactly what I tried to say in my bitchin' spree a few weeks ago, just, I guess you said it way better than me, with the right words
Thanks Siltaris..
And I agree the most to the part: "Since you don't pay for that game, you've got no rights. Just enjoy the game" or similar.

[Achae Eanstray]

Suggestions:
- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
Yes, but I'm relatively new (joined Sept 06)


- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
Most of the time, there is the language barrier that is an issue- and some I see on the forum but haven't RP'd with.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
I find quests confusing, too many chars are doing/saying too many things at once and it's hard for me to follow the scrolling, in talking to another char that is relatively new, we both agree it would be nice to be able to scroll back a little further for something we missed.

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
Only those ones that don't seem to want to learn or attack my char. Due to the large numbers of attacks, my chars tend to avoid new ones until sure (possible suggestion-disable attack for 24hr IG, however the tutorial island may help that also)

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
I think there are enough chars now if the language problem could possibly be addressed. The announcements are in both languages, if possible it would be nice to have a function button that would allow scrolling in both languages to be turned off if desired.

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
I don't think I would have ever joined with an account system not knowing RP at all but remain neutral on the issue.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
I'm not quite sure what this question means.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
I wouldn't mind trying it for awhile and seeing what would happen, but I'm not interested in more situations where my chars could be ghosted.

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
No

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
No

[Llama]

Your post highlighted many important points.

Illarion is growing too quickly, and it cannot support its playbase.

Moreover, it isn't worth it to teach a new player, who leaves after a week or a day, because, lets face it, illarion isn't as skill-intensitive as other games.

Many players want skills, very quickly; they want to be something...

You can go at the pig-sty right now, and you can see masses of people fighting the pigs, with no #me's , or words whatsoever.

What needs to be done, is an iron fist for Roleplay.

The account system was a good idea. Any person who used to be ready to spend half an hour on an account, or longer if it failed; would be ready to learn, would be ready to RP, would be WILLING.

Once in the game, he would learn quickly; we didn't used to have as large problems with 'n00bs' in the past. The person would read the manual and bits of moonsilver while s/he waited... and would be ready for it, armed with basic knowledge (including the rules, which no-one seems to read nowadays).

Now, personally, I think the solution is:

I) The creation of an account system, which focuses on illarion's RULES, information about illarion's gods and other items like name rules. It can be automatic, and each person should be given MAX of 3 times.

(Example:

Which god or goddess do lizardfolk worship most commonly?
[] tanora
[] none
[] bragon
[] findari
[] moshran )

II) A zero tolerance rate for proved 'n00bs'. An amount of 'basic' knowledge would be required to be learnt, and anyone with less then that, will get !gmed and kicked out instantly

III) No skill gain for new players for the first X days. This would be a good way to frustrate people who come to illarion just for skill gain, and they would spend their first few days RPing instead. Moreover, new players should be marked with SOMETHING.. so that players will do their best to try to encourage them to RP. "Someoneone 123456 [new] " would be effective

My argument is this:

Not everyone has the dedication to Roleplay, not everyone wants to try. Its useless if we boast that we have 50 players, if only 25 can roleplay. Moreover, most systems in illarion don't work with large masses of players.

An example is the crafting system. Too slow to start learning, and we have too many crafters and not enough crafts. And of course , the server.

My two cents.

[Alytys Lamar]

Before : Thanks Siltaris, thats what we all needed

SUGGESTIONS

- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
Yes at most times, playing a year and a bits now

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
The same as before

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
At times we do all foolish things *gg* especially in quests. but I think in the summary it is fine

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
*sigh* not often, only when I was disturbed 4/5 times in a row in a talk

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
*shrugs*

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
Yes, and I reed the staff report.. this Idea looks good for me

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
NO... its a fairytale game, a fantasy world, its enough i think

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
NO.. the same as I said before

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
Would be helpful, but i think it works fine

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
Great Idea ... but it should be coupled by the Char ( Mage stuff for Mages/ Paladin stuff for Paladins and so on) It must be a difference between a Ranger and a Knight, my thought.

[Llama]

I THINK that those were meant as suggestions to the polls, but since everyone seems to be doing them...

===
- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
RP is found ONLY if you're actively looking for it; if you talk to a player, tell him you're logging in and have an 'rp session'... its not as easy as it used to be.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
Some people yes, new people no.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
N/A

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
Very... you get ctrl+clicked, ignored, watch them powergame on pigs... *sighs*

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
Its not quality, its quantity

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
Very very much

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
Too much actions might cause instability (new laws, new alliances ect..)... thats the only problem I see.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
Yes, nice to see how people react

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
Not right now. but if i knew that wrestling was useless, i wouldn't have taken it

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?

NO.. this is a very bad thing.

[Miklorius]

An awesome posting, Siltaris, which summarize a lot problems and may lead to a needed cooling in the actual hot discussions. (I hope many people will read it.)

The missing masterplan, as Estralis said, could be a big problem, but I think the new press releases will lead to more transparency and you can see (and comment) in which direction Illarion is developing.

Achae Eanstray mentioned a valid point in context of the problem "more players vs. good RP": Quests are quite impossible to manage for GMs and players if a lot of players attend. What could be a solution for that?

The quiz for the background of Illarion like Hadrian suggested is IMO not so good because you do not really need to know all gods for good RP (and you have to learn a whole new game as a newbie).

To Siltaris' questions:
- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
Still "yes"!

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
Jup.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
Besides some players who wants to be "the hero", it is almost always good.

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
As I said somewhere else: It was worse some weeks ago. But sure it is not nice if "n00bs" are walking around, talking nonsense and CTRL+clicking.

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
There are more active players online today = good. Bad: Many old friends or important players left Illa.

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
If the tutorial island will be good, I don't think it is needed.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
You mean big storylines? Hell yeah, I like that. But please no more "your friendly necromancer from the neighborhood (returns)"!

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
Yes, but hard to realize. That is often a problem with political changes in Troll's Bane - no one cares because it does not really affect them ingame.

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works? ... and...
- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
Yes, a bit. But if it is well balanced and the general logic behind it is known, more details are not really necessary.

[Skaalib Drurr]

I agree with Siltaris' post very much, especially about the point about inactive players complaining about decrease of roleplay. Not being the most talented writer myself, I find it really disappointing when people moan at people who make a real effort, but perhaps cannot produce the high-quality emotes, and a flowing dialogue (I myself find dialogues particularly difficult), that perhaps people are used to. To me it smacks of arrogance and it really turns my stomach. Now, for these questions.

- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
Ingame, yes, but in the forums, the attitudes are often very poor, and they lack respect for other players. I myself am not completly absolved, as I have found frustration at others whom my arguements simply do not make any impacts. Perhaps people need to 'agree to differ' a little more. I also think that some players are a little too attached to their characters, and as such get over aggresive or defensive when there is a point that affects them.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
Yes, although as I have said earlier, I myself find it hard to keep a conversation going for any huge length of time.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
I haven't really participated in too many quests, so no comment, but I do feel that there are actually too many gm organised quests, and players should be just left to it a little more often.

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
Only when they ctrl click and say things like THIS IS A smile GAME.

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
Yes

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
Yes

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
No idea what this means

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’
roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
No, actually I think much less is needed.

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
Yes actually, because currently a few players know a lot, and spread it around OOC, so everyone knows, so either less so no-one knows, or more so everyone knows

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
Same as above.

[Nitram]

I hardly can speak for anyone in the staff but myself. So don't take this opinion in general.

- What is the current vision for the development of Illarion?

Basically i want to Illarion to become a game that focusses as good as even possible on roleplay. But in my opinion really good roleplay, requires a overall, political roleplay. Else it will never work. And i think to get such framework roleplay, there is a amount of active playing persons needed. So i basically want a game with many players ( ~ 100 online characters at the peaks would be great ) and good roleplay.

- How many developers are currently active?

Cassandra Fjurin - Sadly inactive at the very moment, but he is really needed, since he is the one who started the work at the server protokoll that will make the server much more stable in future.
Cliu Beothach - Active. If one need a sound effect you get it, what ever it is.
Falk vom Wald - Sadly left the development team of Illarion
Gro'bul - Active. He makes all the new graphics at the moment.
Lennier - Active. I'm sure you know the map changes within the last time
martin - Inactive at the moment, as far as i know.
Nitram - Well... me. Active working at the new Crafting System.
Nop - Active. He does all the client changes, additions and things pretty fast.
Vilarion - Active. Helping me from time to time with the crafting system. Planning the concept of the upcomming priests system and waits for the ideas for the tutorial island, to make it.

So all in all 6 active developers.

How do you get new ones?

Thats a question i ask myself every day. I just and simple don't know it.
Mainly persons with knowledge in programming languages are needed. And with high motivation to spend the free time for this game. Knowledge of Lua for the scripting stuff is not needed, if you know any other programming language, because its really easy to learn. For the server things knowledge of C++ is needed. And school knowledge is not enougth i think, because this is not that would i call easy stuff.

How many people are ‘the staff’?

17 Staff members.

2 Questers
3 Seers
1 Quester / Seer
8 Developers
2 Server Administators
1 GM Abuse

Maybe polls should be made to find out what players currently think about Illarion? (As part of Evaluation)

How would you formulate the question and the answers? Something like this is in the forum in a few moments.

- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?

Not even slightly. The overall atmosphere in the forum is kind of aggressive. And the overall atmophere ingame does not exsist.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?

Hrm. Okay. The reakons on the roleplay of my player characters are all in all really good.
At some really seldom situation I play non-player characters. Dragons, Demons, Rabbits. What ever. I have to say, the bigger the monster, the worser the roleplay. If you have a great mean fire-breathing dragon there, who just grilled two other characters, and your character stands right in front of that dragon, without even the slightly emotion of fear and starts attacking that dragon after this with and dagger, i know something is wrong. And no. This was no new player.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?

Mostly yes. But i have problems with players who allways want to put there characters in core roles of the quests. Sometimes it fits, but not allways.
What i miss pretty often, is the fear. Even at highly dangerous situations, some characters just don't know any form of fear. That lowers the effect of the sentiment some quests try to place alot. I think to many want there character as the mega-strong what ever. Warrior, Craftsman, ...
And while all this they forgett to give their characters visible weaknesses. Thats a problem in the quests mainly i think.

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?

Sometimes yes. Sometimes no. If i meet one or two of them per day i have no problem with them. I try to help them, if that does not work i ban them. But if there are comming more i have to handle, i gets rather annoying.

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?

No. But i't not mad about the number too. I think we have a nice number and a good base. But some more would be good.

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?

Yes. But Estralis said something that is absolutly true. Any form of non-IG Check will scare away players. Good ones and bad ones. So yes, i want a kind of account system. But i want a account system that runs in the game. The so named newbe island.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?

Yes. Much more. And i think there have to be a way, that not only the strong figher characters can lead a town. If someone takes over a town, and is unable to care for this town really, has no ideas and no targets, it just does not work. I think that is a problem we have and had in the last months.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)

Yes. Because i think that is something that makes the roleplay much more interessting.

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?

Useless from my position to answer this question.
But i would like to say, that the current fighting system is all in all balanced and logicial. So there is nothing in you can't find out ingame if you spend some time in.
I'm strongly against giveing out the base details of the system, because that would make characters with perfect attributes needed. The amount of Attributes that is in use of the fighting system, make the design of the perfect character very difficult. And this was one of the ideas of that system too.

Ah. One detail. The single blood drop appears if you cause more then 20% damage.

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?

I'm completly against this. The values are good all in all and fit to the pictures and the names. After the introducing of the crafting system a few values will change. But this will make the whole thing more logicial.

That all for now... took a while.

Nitram

[Kevin Lightdot]

This is likely different for me, since I don't speak german and live in GMT+1.
Dunno.

- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
Not really, to much disrespect(I know, I had my little burst a while back, but I appologised and was told I was forgiven.)
Some people ramble crap, then walk off without leaving time to reply.
A lot ignore me(and others I gues) totaly.


- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
No, a lot don't react at all, just totaly ignore.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
Havn't partaken in much quests lately, and I guess it totaly depends on the kind of quest.
There where a lot of fighter type quests a while back, with horrible rp.

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
It goes, but I don't go to Trollsbane a lot anymore.
I have no problem with newbies, but those people who have no idea what the game is about, and start cursing, that's crap.

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
I guess, but I don't get to rp with most due to timezones and me not speaking german I guess.

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
Yes, though it doesn't really have to be as big and all as before.
Or of course the newbie island.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
Politics, sure, but no to modern shit, keep it somewhat midevil.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
Totaly depends on how it's roleplayed.
I like the ideas, I'd truely like rp around it, though with the way rp seems to go, it just won't work.

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
*shrugs* Not really, but for new players it could be handy perhaps.

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
OOC, yes, ic, people shouldn't all know all of it, everyone'd be taking the perfect weapons and calculating it all.

[Llama]

The quiz for the background of Illarion like Hadrian suggested is IMO not so good because you do not really need to know all gods for good RP (and you have to learn a whole new game as a newbie).

Tanora and lizardfolk is very basic knowledge.

perhaps not ALL the gods... i WAS going to suggest the rules, but i sincerly wonder whether a quiz on the rules can be made, that doesn't just fail people with an iq of less then 50.

Can you kill people in illarion?

YES
NO
RP reason
-
Is.. stupid

[Lennier]

Suggestions:

- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
Reading the Board frustrates very often. I wish there would be an ignore-function.
Ingame there are really good local atmospheres. But they are not linked very well with each other (lack of political issues).

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
In general yes.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
I am not involved in quests since months. I have no informations about it.

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
No. I meet some few, but not enough, so that i can be annoyed. (I am not in Troll's Bane in general)

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
It seems to be the limit, which can not be handled by the server very well *sighs*

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
No, not really. They should not spawn in Troll'Bane, where they can annoy the "experienced" people the whole day. An Tutorial Isle to learn some basics, yes, but nothing more.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
That is and was the role of Lennier... Lost my motivation with the years. There is no really need to make politic with people, who switch their chars too often. And there is no need to make politic with systems, which change every month (Trolls Bane). But in general it needs more politic, yes! It was part of the quintessence of Illarion. But it needs motivated players

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
As long as it is made by the players, yes. I do not like GM-based constructions of systems and longtime End-of-the-World-Quests. They lead to an atmosphere, that players get annoyed and get the feeling, they have to act in one special way.

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
Never. Maybe an ingame book for stupids: "Skeletons should not be attacked with bow arrows, slashing weapons are better"

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
That is the task of the players to explore this knowledge and maybe to teach it to others in ingame way (writing of books).

[Korm Kormsen]

Siltaris,

thank you for the big work, you took on you, and the clear thoughts.

all the others in this thread,

thank you for the civilized way, this thread runs.

--------

i hope, not to break that spell, that keeps everybody civilized....
.... but i am missing one thing (only one) that is not mentioned here.

about half a year ago, i read something about different roleplaying styles here in illa.
somebody wrote, "the germans play a Tolkien type of roleplay".

by my own experience i learned, that it is true. there are differences in the style to play, depending from where the players are.
not only german/english, but i think, i even noticed differences between british and northamerican players.

if i am right, we got only two possibilities:
1) we go on bitching and flaming, when there are missunderstandings.
2) we try to find out the similarities and the differences, to conciently build upon the similarities.

korm

ps: i know, i voiced something to a theme, that is avoided by most.
i hope, i did not wake a dragon, but a unicorn.

[Dariya]

thank you Siltaris for putting a part of my thoughts into understandable words

I don't know if your idea works out, but I hope so. The more players express their thoughts clearly defined, which is made possible with your "suggestions", the more staff and players will be able to see, which is worth or necessary to "work on"


- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
mainly yes, partly not at all. This depends on my own mood, I have to admit. So I decided not to play, if I just "don't know what else to do" or feel bored but not really feel like playing. I decided to only play when I really am in the mood for rping. Of course I also go ig thinking to myself "let's go splashing mummies" or "I should work on my crafting skills", but if my char comes across another char ig also willing to rp, then I definitely prefer rping instead increasing my chars' skills.
This is one point annoying me recently: skill gaining became more and more important and kind of pushed the intense rp into the background ... and I am not only talking of new players. Maybe my opinion about this is too harsh, but for me still Illarion IS about roleplaying, not skillgaining. That's why I joined.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
most of the time yes
partly not at all ... for example chars passing a char who is lying on the floor (or where ever) bleeding, moaning, crying for help ... and being ignored. These are definitely situations where you simply need actions or reaction of other players ... otherwise, well you just can get up on your feet again, ignore your injuries and go on like nothing happened. ... not my idea of good roleplay

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
I have to agree to Achae here: too mayn players on one spot, too many #me's to react propperly and too many "heroes"
though I liked those I joined

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
also this depends on my mood, to be honest
mainly I try to help everyone of them if they approach me ig or I come across obvious new players, even though this might interrupt an rp I am presently in. I help because it feels good to see resp. read a new player really listening to what you are saying, what you suggest, which in my case is: I explain the most important things like emotes, introducing your character and the like, then suggest to ... yes, log out and read the manual *grins*

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
can I answer with a counter-question: could the server bear more active character playing at the same time?
but yes, sometimes I see 30, 40 chars on the online-list, but Bane is deserted. Where the heck are all those chars? They can't all be off in some bushes cybering ?! ... can they ?!

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
on the one hand definitely yes. I had to go through it and it was fun, I liked it. It showed to me: this is what Illarion mainly is about ... and it was what I was looking for
on the other hand: if the tutorial island will be taking care of new players, the account system probably won't be necessary anymore

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
yes, political situations and influences always had to be dealt with, also in medieval times. The citizens sometimes had to "fear" laws and decisions of rulers, cause they directly had influence on their lives and those of their families and beloved ones; on the other hand they also celebrated "good rulers" or "positive decisions" of their rulers ... never came across such things since I've been playing

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
yes, see above

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
no, not really
and if so, there is a way to settle this ig by talking to / rping with an experienced fighter

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
see above


@ korm: the problem/question, imho, is not really if lotr-roleplay or not ... it is more about acting and reacting, regardless of the type of roleplay, and ... in first place, sticking to the char you created. Then you can easily handle different types of roleplay ... at least most of the time.

oh, another thing I would like to add:
I've been playing now for half a year, so I *am* quite new. I don't know the old times, so I can't miss them.
But fact is that every time I go ingame for roleplaying I find roleplay. And in, I would say, at least 90 % even good or better than good roleplay.
This however also depends on my mood. If I don't really feel like rping, my rp sucks for sure. I can't really react in a good way, in a way I would like others to react. So I get more and more annoyed and sickened by my own roleplay. Then I'd probably leave saying "rp gets more and more bad".
When I started to play Illarion, I felt like playing 24/7, otherwise I might have missed something (of course this wasn't possible, cause I got a job, household, cuty ...).
But as I said before: now I only go ingame when I really feel like rping. Then I like my rp and I guess others like it as well. I can react better to others rps and it is fun. ... not, if I only go ingame for just killing time. If you don't really feel like playing Illa there are always better things to do ... in your real life. ...

[jregan91]

in my opinion one of the main problems is the server (the fact that it goes down so much at events or even if there are about 30-40 players my computer laggs so much)

is there a way to fix this?

[Fooser]

- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?

Overall yes, although there has been a sharp decline in people trying to do things, at any level.

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?

If a lot of people are, I'm not sure why they are here?

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?

Yes

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)

Yes, but like others have said, no GMs mucking it up. When its a normal player and a character thats been around, it is more meaningful than some random quest character jumping in.

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?

To say players should be doing this is fine, but how many want to sit around hitting things (or eachother) with one weapon, then another, and another. Repeat with armor and anything else. I wouldn't want to

[Thorvald]

- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
Ingame? Yes and no. It's like it has been said before. If you want to roleplay you have to go and actively seek for it, or unfortunately go to MSN and ask other players to meet somewhere. That's kinda frustrating in my eyes.



- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
Depends. Generally yes.


- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
Small quests are always running smoothly, but as soon as it is a bigger one, there are those who immediately want to play the hero, and especially those who attack without thinking and don't give the plotline a chance.


- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
I just feel annoyed by: "how u fight omg this game suxxs"-newbies. The kind of players that send you such e-mails afterwards:

U KICKED ME U IDIOT ADMIN I HATE THIS GAME ABOUT ROLEPLAYING I HAVE 2 WORDS FOR THE GAME : IT SUCKS !!!!! U IDIOTS THINK OF SOMETHING BETTER THERE ARE MONSTERS AND NO LEVELING IT SUCKS !

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
Yes I am



- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
Yes, or better said: Something *has* to be done. I think the tutorial island would already be very helpful. I'm also for the 'Quiz' that has been discussed on the internal boards. Both would be probably a bit too much.



- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
Yes, yes, yes. Trolls Bane is a shame of a town with no really running government, but it always has been. There have been several tries and they always went under, simply because ...


- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
... chars are ignoring it. I don't know where it comes from but I often had this feeling that simply no one cares. No one cares for what is going on on political basis on Gobaith, nearly no one is 'afraid', nearly no one is sticking to a little bit realistical roleplay. With other words:

yes, political situations and influences always had to be dealt with, also in medieval times. The citizens sometimes had to "fear" laws and decisions of rulers, cause they directly had influence on their lives and those of their families and beloved ones; on the other hand they also celebrated "good rulers" or "positive decisions" of their rulers ... never came across such things since I've been playing

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
No?

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
Well... ;-)

[Gro'bul]

- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
Not really anymore. Theres a overbearing climate of risk just walking around inside the towns.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
Define "good". I think generally people don't think about their chars actions before they do them, just like in real life.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
Sometimes, often no.

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
Yes. My total n00b pk'ers killed is at 5. I helped many people too, and they never came back, probobly due to the lack of people or overt interesting things in the game.

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
No, we need more to create better diversity of groups.

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
Yes, something moderate, in my opinion a consistantly quality community is important to obtaining and keeping players. I would have never stayed without such a environment.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
I think Illarion needs the communities to have some respect and realistic involvement in their own towns, and there will be more political actions to follow.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
Yes and no. I think such things enacted by PC's are great, and if they aren't thats fine with me too. I simply don't find them a requirement but could certainly add some pizzaz.

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
I want all attribute effects published. I think the fighting system can be balanced in such a way to not encourage one attribute set.

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
Not at all, I just think a overall logic in values should reflect each of their apparent characteristics, except for magic ones.

[Korm Kormsen]

well, meanwhile even i got it, that the list was meant to be answered.
so, here we go:

- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
normally yes. the forums - no.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
most do.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
due to lag i have to evade big groups of chars. so no answer.

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
only, if they are aggressive.

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
when i want to RP, i normally find somebody. so yes.

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
i am for a newbie island.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
yes, that is, why i helped, to found a new country.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
yes.

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
YEEESSS! and then i would abuse the knowledge...
so, better let's say No.

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
yes.


about a newbie island. on some UOshards they had them.
and some clever not so new chars came back there, to get rich of "trade" with the new chars.
imho, there should be no way back, once you left the isle.
may be, the staff should give an additional char bound to the island, to some patient players, that they can teach new players on the island.

korm

[Ellaron]

Here goes nothin'.

Suggestions:
- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
Not really. The number of whispering couples, groups, is too high.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
Yes mainly. When it goes well it's great but sometimes it's hard work, on both sides.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
I've not been on a quest for a while, as my characters can't fight, but the last 2 quests I went on I was left outside as the "main" players took over and excluded all others.

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
No. The more new players the more people I can learn from.

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
Quantity seems fine. Though hard to find sometimes.

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
Only if all players, new and old, have to take it.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
That's up to the players. The players need to create the situation, the programmers need to create the ability/ opportunity.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
Again that's up to the players. See above.

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
Nope.

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
Nope.

And the question you missed was:

- Would you like to play a normal person, farmer, tailor, cook, carpenter without being killed every other day or left out of quests (ignoring the hide in the basement of the tavern part).
Yes.

[Salathe]

- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
I dont think there is one in the game, but i dont like the forum atmosphere

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
I usuallyend up wakling around the island looking for things since my char doesnt interact with other chars, but in those rare moments they all seem very good.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
havent really been in any quests lately so i cant say

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
nah, i love it. I run into a few noobs every few days and i give them a simple explanation of how to play, ex. ooc/ic, manner of playing, and whatnot. Of course there are the ignorant players that dont bother learning how to play at all. But since i went inactive there has been a large increase of players, when i came back and saw that 40+ chars were on a day i was thrilled.

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
Sure, but more would be even better

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
No, the account system scares away MANY players. Even for someone who is a great roleplayer, the account system is very tedious, and we dont have the man power to run it efficiently. By the time your set to play the will is lost.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
Would be great, but politics is a very hard thing to pull off... its a tough topic...

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
My absolute favorite time ingame was the lich wars. Though it was VERY unfriendly for noobs, i loved have the town sieged. But i wish that more than the town was sieged. I want a mob attack that is so big everyone is split up all over the island. Or something like a flood... or lava spews in certain parts. People run away from the town and are chased to vanima, then while on vanima the docks break, and all these people are stuck there for a couple of ingame days. Others flee all the way to the north mountains, and they climb up and then a rock slide occurs and they are stuck there for some RL days. Then portals arent working for some rp reason, and everyone is stuck somewhere and through alot of effort one groups reaches another and so on... and you know... i've always dreamt of something like that

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
i think most people know how i feel. There are too many things us players just dont know about the fighting system. And we can never really understand except through a large amount of work in game. RIght now it is simply use what you got, until your beaten by someone who used something different, and adopt there strategy, or wait until someone points out that there is somethin better you can do... i find it sort of silly how little we really know about fighting system.

The devs tell us that attributes play an important part of how your char should fight, yet they dont tell what the attributes do, so in the end, we really dont know.

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
The problem with this now is that not even smiths know what is good. Because it is logical to suspect that the order you learn armos/weapons is the order of there strength/defense, but currently that isnt the case. And items are always changing value, atleast if the smithing list had everything clearly in order from least to greatetst (and was updated when items were changed) there would be no problem. But items were changed without editing smithing. So the last armor i was able to make was lor angur, and it was very good for a while, but after some changes (and players being left in the dark) i didnt know it became worse (or others just became alot better), very few people knew, and i discovered that they were alot weaker than they used to be by another player. And that is why it is unclear what weapon/armors are best now. So if smiths get a clear way of seeing that certain armors are better than others with the crafting update (and i hope they do!) then there will never be any real confusion about this, just ask a smith IG ;D

[Xagul]

i'm new here and my english is not so good, but i try:

Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
yes, except a vew things

Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
the majority yes

Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
never done some, can't say

Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
no, so long they don't attack me

Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
could be more, when the server could handle that

Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
the newbie-island would be fine i think

Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
yes, by the players, not by the GMs

Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
not really

Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
that should be a thing figured out in battle

Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
that should be also figured out in battle, maibe like "player: you notice that the weapon you use is quite effective/not effective against this opponent"

[Lrmy]

Suggestions:
- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?

Half the time roleplay is splended, other half, not at all...

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good
way to your roleplay?

Yes, though my character stay away from Troll's Bane 90% of their in game time.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good

way during quests?
No. People show no fear in quests and always attack anything different from the norm that they see.

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?

I feel annoyed by the ones that constantly use the f word and won't listen. Also the ones that spend most of their time killing pigs and selling leather items.

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?

Yes, though I would rather have 100+ with at lease half of them decent roleplayers.

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?

Yes, and I think newbie island is a great idea.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?

It does without a doubt. Having no guard or authority is boring and lets people do what ever they want in town witch makes roleplay worse in my opinion.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)

I would love this more than anything.

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?

Not really.

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular
armor/weapon?

No, since you can figure out what items work better for you in game.

[Juniper Onyx]

Well, here's my two cents.....

- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
In Illarion, there are small pockets of atmosphere, but you have to have been around a while or meet one of the 'friendly' char's to get within it.

I think the forums become shameless at times and very juvenile. I have always considered the forums as "an extension" (tool) of roleplay, sometimes impossible to do ingame. If everyone adopted this 'respect' for the forums, perhaps it would help RP.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?

Well, my char. dusty has been put in some situations he was never designed to be in. He was just supposed to be a simple craftsman. When he comes up with diplomatic solutions to the problems (probably not what the GM's expected), he is both loved and hated. It's hard to tell. But thats Roleplaying. I just do the best I can with the situation I have to work with, and let the players sort themselves out. I play him as realistically as possible. After all, he is missing a finger, lost his sister, and has many 'issues' he is mentally & morally dealing with. I would call his alignment Lawful Neutral.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?

Hmm, generally no. I must say I am disappointed by people during quests. Everyone wants to have a say, or meet someone they know, or be the hero.......anything but follow someone during the quest. Too many chiefs and not enough followers.

I play Dusty as a 'reluctant' leader. He's one of the few who really can't fight. He would gladly turn over the leadership to someone competant and resume a 'simple' life. He gives the citizens all the power, but no-one has even 'challenged' him.

I think most players in positions of power never want to give it up. That's where conflicts come from. I beleive even the leaders must be followers too or better yet, teachers.

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?

I have always gone out of my way to help, train and even supply new people with info, tools and even a job or two. If we don't get the noobs started off right, we can't ever expand our player base. As some examples
.......I started Taliss Kazaxx when he was new and he is one of our better players, very involved.
.........Mark Armstrong - I helped him as a fighter, then as a page and watched his career with pride. We have had our differences, but there is no-one I trust more.
.........Avalyon el'hatarr, I remember giving him his first wand and set of robes. I remained friends with him, and watched him turn into a powerful wizard. Good or Evil doesn't matter, he has developed as a roleplayer.
.........Recently, Johnny Lant. Now there's a 'noob' that was in trouble a lot. I accepted him and got him started on trading. He earned money and continued to trade. Now he has matured and is forming and leading a tailoring guild. I can say I am proud of his transformation too.

Give me a noob, and I'll give you an active player.
You just can't give up on people.

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?Maybe its just me, but there seems to be 'fewer' players on at the times I am on, rather than more. I have noticed more German players, which is ok, I am practicing my German more, but I think 'english' players have declined slightly.

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated? Yes, but in moderation. You need some type of screening. I know when I was looking for a game to play, I thought Illa was just another MUD. If it wasn't for the account system, and a few days wait, I wouldn't have thought it was any different. After getting thorough the account system, my first character "Juniper Onyx" was actually deneid! I thought "Wow!" so I tried another D&D favorite of mine, Alexander Dullblade. Once I had figured out I wanted to stay in the game, I developed Dusty Bottoms, and what a character he has been!

If it wasn't for that account system, I wouldn't have taken this game seriously.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
Ha! If you mean more wars, no. Come up with some new things. I am kinda tired of all that "Macho" crap. Most towns, baronies and counties couldn't afford a war every year. Only Kings did that, and even then, it usually 'ruined' their country economically. Why do we need more?

I believe the level of political interaction is fine. The player run countries allow for enough variety. Truthfully, we simply don't have enough players to have 'true' governments other than 'one' person the de-facto ruler. I personally would like to see four "Mega-Kingdoms" with Nobility running things at the local level. The Kings would then war one against the other or whatever. I actually had this in mind when we created the "County of Briar", to someday merge and swear fealty to a "King". But the players good enough to be "King" simply don't want the job. I would, but who would take a "King Bottoms" seriously? No, it must be someone else.

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)

There should always be an overlying structure, such as countries, alliances, and other player run things. But....

How do you affect someone's roleplay if they don't care? You almost have to besiege a town or kill people before they react to the situation.

I think most people just want to be left alone, to work toward their goals, or roleplay and thats alright. Politics should be a small part of the game, not most of it. I love the diversity of countries, and have even helped with it, but it can become too much. I mean, how can a village say it is a 'country'? How can Trollsbane pretend to be a 'City', when it is actually very small. Trollsbane should grow and become a true 'urban' center. I think cities should come together to create "Countries or Kingdoms".

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
Honestly, no. The mystery of not knowing your enemy enhances fear. Learning through practice "School of Hard Knocks" is the best way for fighters to truly be the best and not just skill gainers. I know my adreneline is pumping when dusty encounters a Monster. I practically pee my pants, both as a char. and RL. : )

I think more characters should have this fear too.

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?
No. Just make the best be harder to smith, and the worst be easiest to smith. That would make sense.

I love Illarion and I'm sorry I was gone for a few months (I had surgery), but I am back and hope to help the 'atmosphere' as much as I can. It takes a team to do this though, we gotta work together for a common vision for the game.

~PO Dusty Bottoms

EDIT: I have heard some negatives here about people just wanting to skillgain or get rich. I hope no-one thinks this of my character.

I play Dusty the way I do, and he enhances whole 'economies'. With everyone on a building craze lately, he supplies what people need to "enjoy" the game. If only people knew how poor Dusty really is, (I won't tell) because he 'gives' so much away to good causes or to Greenbriar. He may be skilled, but that is not his goal. It was always to provide the players with what they need to 'enjoy' the game. Once character's have what they need materially, then they relax and enjoy Roleplay more. I think master craftsmen like Dusty (if not abused) actually help roleplay.

[AlexRose]

- Are you satisfied with the overall atmosphere in Illarion?
No. We all know it's gone into decline over the past year. There's a whole lot more flaming (which unfortunately I contribute to. I'm working on that though ) and the noobs ingame. Ack. It pains me. You can be dying in the middle of the shop and everyone will carry on dueling and selling serinjah swords. As Adrian said; you have to arrange roleplay, or stay ig for hours. Weekends are basically the only time you can find rp and that's minimal.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way to your roleplay?
Yeah there's some good ones but the most people just ignore you.

- Do you have the feeling that the other characters react in a good way during quests?
No... As Nitram said, it's ridiculous what some people do.

- Do you feel annoyed by too many new and inexperienced players?
I hate it how all the new players TEACH EACH OTHER! Gah! We have all these antiroleplaying idiots ingame! And they'll never get good at rp because they'll never see others do it! I want them to all go away and the good players to come back, so you can actually FIND people ingame ;_;

- Are you satisfied with the current number of active characters?
Oh yes, very satisfied /sarc. What's the point in having 60 noobs ig? I don't want to log in to find everyone's powergaming somewhere and as a consequence we get FREE SERVER LAG! Wow, I loved the way we had 1000000000 people at the festival! Really helped it freeze! Wahey!

- Do you want some kind of account system being reactivated?
YES!

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions on a political level?
Well what do you think I'm doing in Caelum?

- Do you think Illarion needs more actions affecting everyone’s chars’ roleplay? (e.g. wars, political conflicts, forbidden/designated territories, harsh rulers,…)
Mhm... I think Sam said Kallahorn would invade us. Oh and Matt said Retlak was going to invade us. So we're going to be invaded. Woot.

- Do you want to know more details about how the fighting system works?
Nah, I'm a fighter.

- Do you want more details about each single weapon and armor, so you exactly know which weapon/armor is best against particular armor/weapon?

No that sucks.

[Llama]

in my opinion one of the main problems is the server (the fact that it goes down so much at events or even if there are about 30-40 players my computer laggs so much)

is there a way to fix this?

Better programming

And due to the fact that the amount of programmers is... too little.

Time

[martin]

I read this thread with great interest (also noting that my posting was some kind of motivation to start it) and I think I'd like to drop a few lines here.

First off, thanks for thinking about it and writing such a long text. It probably took you quite some time formulating and typing it.

Secondly, the most important thing here appears to be the "vision" of Illarion. What and how should Illarion be?
Illarion was concepted as RP-focused multiuser online game, inspired by games like Tibia and UO. It should have been "better" than these games by simply paying more attention to RP. This was our goal.

Technically, we've already reached the level of Tibia, we are even "better" probably (leaving aside the frequent crashes). Writing this, I think I should better try to figure out what I think went wrong in the past:

First off, there was a badly written server code which we tried to improve. This lead to the situation that we had to change a lot of things and decided that parts should not be used any longer (old scripting language). Therefore we implemented new parts, the largest of which was Lua. While this was a great thing, it lead to the problem that we were overhelmed by new options and possibilities. And instead of having "basic Lua" implemented and fully use it, we started to head towards "advanced Lua" and "graatly improved, advanced Lua with new options" and "Lua and beyond -- everything is possible" and inventing new commands and options in Lua, enabling us to do almost anything in Lua, and totally forgot that we should also USE Lua.
It's like buying a new car and instead of go and drive that car around, we started pimping it all over, spending our time in pimping our ride instead of actually driving it. This was a great mistake, because a lot of scripts we wrote were badly designed and badly written, had bugs and had a lack of concept behind them, making it difficult to use them in game.

Another problem was the old account system. It was too complex, took too much time and scared away much too many people (which was obvious when looking at the statistics and listening to people we knew who, out of interest, wanted to join Illarion but didn't do so because they had to run through the whole long process of creating an account and a char and everything). We wasted a huge percentage of potential players who never made it into the game (even after their account was accepted!).

Meanwhile, a lot of new RP-games (or pseudo-RP games) came into being, like WoW etc., and why would someone prefer Illarion to WoW? I mean, honestly, all the RP and alike...

Another thing is the strange attitude that a large part of our players have: Claiming to be "hard core RPers" on the one hand, requesting features on the other hand; complaining about the hair color of the graphics of some figure on the one hand, claiming that graphics are unimportant on the other hand. Claiming to be "very active" on one day, retireing the next day. Boys and girls, it's really difficult to deal with you. Maybe noone ever told you, well, I do.
A real hardcore RPer doesn't need Illarion. She or he just needs IRC, maybe some dice and some other hardcore RPers. Period. Illarion is a graphical MUD, some kind of, and there's more than just sitting around talking at the campfire. Illarion is a GAME.

What is a game? What makes a game a game?
I think that one characteristic of a game is that there are some things you want to reach (you want to get somewhere, you want to get something, you want to...) and there are things that keep you from reaching it and it is your task to overcome them. It's up to you how to "work around" these difficulties. This is the idea of game that I have. (There are, of course, games that do not have this characteristic; I consider them boring and pointless)

Developing Illarion is such a game for me. And I think I am rather close to giving it up and start playing something else because I see no way to reach the target I thought to be reachable in the beginning. In german, I'd say "der Zug ist vermutlich abgefahren" ("the train probably already departed"). What would be the benefit of spending hours in developing anything for Illarion? You "hardcoreRPers" tell me that you don't need new players, you just need "deeper RP". Well, I can't program deeper RP. I can't create "deeper RP graphics". I can't create a "deeper RP table" in the pSQL-Database. I can't write a "deeper RP script". Deeper RP is something that YOU can do, as players, it is completely independend of the level of underlying software-related things.

This is, up to most of you, the only thing to improve and there's nothing I could do to help you (besides making access to Illa more restrictive again). So all you say is: We don't need technical development. All we want is better RP, and there's no way in technically realize that, it's all up to us. Well, do so, Illarion is finished then (technically spoken).

Martin