One town instead of 3.

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1d20
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by 1d20 »

I now have six years of experience with Steam integration and getting and marketing your game on Steam, I've worked on several project, both Greenlit, released in Early Access and fully launched on Steam. If you guys go that way, don't hesitate to let me know. I'm very convinced it'll increase the game's population largely.

You WILL have to figure out a way to make it 1000000% clear what Illarion is about though. Or maybe have an "RPG" server and a "RP" server, maybe. Although Illarion isn't a great RPG, it's a great RP game.
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AlexSturdee
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by AlexSturdee »

Another idea to add to this - could we maybe update the website? The one we have now is showing its age a bit.
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Estralis Seborian
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by Estralis Seborian »

Thanks for the input!

Concerning Steam integration, it's on our list:

http://illarion.org/mantis/view.php?id=7120

Karl, I'll get back to your offer once we can start the related activities. As it was pointed out, Illarion currently relies too much on the website. Account management and character creation is in progress to be moved to the client, see:

http://illarion.org/mantis/view.php?id=7118

What brings me to the seconds point: The website. It is indeed dated, visually but also technically. The current plan is to switch to Drupal even though I personally prefer Wordpress, see:

http://illarion.org/mantis/view.php?id=10531 and http://illarion.org/community/forums/vi ... 6&p=639956

The main reason for Drupal is that it runs natively with PostgreSQL that is also used for the game database. So if we ever want to be able to make website and game communicate, we cannot use Wordpress. But from my point of view, our current website does many things that are not 100 % mandatory for a website, such as providing a time converter or detailed server statistics. So, for me, a mySQL based CMS would also work. At the same time, vital lore information is missing and the pages that deal with what Illarion is all about are probably difficult to understand. It was raised that the text on the start page also needs an overhaul. If there are concrete proposals how to reword it, please let me know!

Generally, one could say we do not lack ideas and conceptions what to do. There are 850(!) unresolved Mantis tickets, some containing tasks that take hundreds of man hours (e.g. magic, housing, website,...). So if there is one thing we do not have then it is manpower. At the same time, we've to deal with different claims of the community. This thread is a good example, some propose reducing the number of factions, some want to have more. So we need to find a good compromise that is satisfying for current players but also is attractive to new players.

So, if anyone of you is now interested to help the team, any support is appreciated. I usually spend less than 10 % on actual coding, most help we need with can be done with some common sense, creativity and basic math.
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by 1d20 »

Achae Eanstray wrote: *grabs player Karl and gets him to bring his char in game* :D
Ahh I really wish dear :( Whenever I'm home and ready to do some gaming, I check Illa but there are barely five or six players on - I don't know the towns nor the map and wouldn't know where to find people in general, it's just discouraging.


Estralis Seborian wrote: Karl, I'll get back to your offer once we can start the related activities. As it was pointed out, Illarion currently relies too much on the website. Account management and character creation is in progress to be moved to the client
I'll be happy to help you guys out, even if it's just with information to save you the headache of figuring out the quickest and easiest way to get on Steam and more importantly - how to properly create the content for your store page/Greenlight page for a better chance at success - I work at a gamedev studio here in Montreal and I do this on the daily :)
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Achae Eanstray
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by Achae Eanstray »

Karl.. depends on the time of day the number of people.. also of course there are more usually on the weekends. The best bet is look on the online list and go to that town toward the workroom or a good spot the middle of town. Or simply explore a little. :)

It might be better now then waiting for magic.. familiarize yourself with the game, find out the differences. Get on irc to ask questions.
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by 1d20 »

Unfortunately I'm usually at work when everyone is online :(
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Velisai
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by Velisai »

Hello everyone, been a while. Please excuse the wall of text, but I don't think I can express this with fewer words. Please don't feel insulted either as I'm only trying to help. I wouldn't bother writing all this if I didn't still love this game and its community on some level. Its just very hard to for me to get the tone right with text only, especially after not playing Illa for over a year.
Lennier wrote:To create fractions leaded by GMs was the answer at the chaotic situation of the past. Communities depanded on only few players and their chars and chrased regulary with bad effects for the whole game. We tried to get some sets of different but stable community systems, able to survive about time, not in same risk to crash by the leaving of individuals (I hope you get the right intension of my words).
What were the bad effects for the whole game?

We had player run groups that have been stable for one or even several years and did create lots of interesting stories. Bearers of Fire, Temple (which did survive leadership changes), the Dar'krest clan of orcs, Farmer's Union (which did fine without any leadership at all), just to name those that have been active pretty much consistently since I joined, up to the VBU. Other groups had their ups and downs, but there was always something going on. It may have been very chaotic sometimes, but chaos is a lot more exciting than the stability of a granite rock that we have now. This isn't even any GM's fault, they do what they can with their limited time. They simply have way too many (and sometimes conflicting) responsibilities to handle with such a small team.

So after more than 2 years of stability and failure to create, support or even simply let happen one single political storyline I have to ask, what did the GM team achieve here that the community as a whole couldn't? I realize how brutal that sounds, but I'm not aware of any inter faction conflict happening to this day. Again, its not about pointing fingers at anyone, but this question has to be asked and answered.
Jupiter wrote:The town are starting to get a player shaped image. Working against that would now be like hitting those in the face who actually put effort into it. We have seen a lot of improvement and I am sure it will keep heading in the direction. Many problems were found (e.g. that the banning npc do their job a bit too well) and will be dealt with.
You didn't mind hitting all those in the face who worked on shaping Gobaith for a decade, but it doesn't even have to be that way again. We could have two GM controlled towns and one player controlled just to see whether it improves things at all, if the whole gems of power issue wasn't in the way. Of course that would be an easy fix too, if you were just willing to reconsider the magic gem system, which is central to many issues Illa has.
Nitram wrote:What takes long is adapting the content scripts, the database any everything that is tailored to the current map. Forcing the players out of one city is not that much of a problem. But we'd also have to move the NPCs around that are unique to that places, alter the arrival island, redistribute the crafts that are currently limited to the specific towns, alter the NPCs that promote the towns as a place to live. Just to name a few of the tasks such a change would lead to.
Yes, that all those things are so heavily interwoven is a real problem, perhaps the biggest problem of all, because it makes the entire game very, very static and static=boring. The best thing about the VBU in my opinion was that you made this wonderful, easy to use map editor that is available to everyone. Finally, I thought, we don't need to make Lennier work hours for every little map change anymore. Its such a shame it doesn't see much use.
What purpose does the crafts distribution serve anyway? Nobody ever cared to explain that. We can live in one town and craft and sell our stuff in another. Since all towns are open to all other towns it doesn't matter anyway and if for example Cadomyr decides to close their gates to all outsiders, you'll have an ooc riot on your hands cause half the characters in game depend on some NPC merchant there. Not to mention the impossibility to learn alchemy as soon as the status quo is disturbed.

This game needs content that facilitates change, instead of preventing it. Its a similar problem with outlaws. You've said several times that they aren't supported by design, but you never even bothered to explain why. You're trying too much to herd players into roles they never wanted to play to begin with by limiting their access to basic game features. Naturally they find that very frustrating, especially if they don't even understand why you think its necessary. If you don't realize that all those limitations on what you can do and how are hurtful to morale, Illa is already dead and no amount of polishing the exterior (like a new website) is going to change that. You think the steam community is going to be as nice and constructive about feedback as your current community, that actually cares deeply about this game? They'll rip you to shreds in the most hurtful way possible in their reviews, because they'll never even get a glimpse of the potential that we see here. All they'll see is just a very simple, unchallenging, unispired MMO with antiquated graphics and a nerdy population. They'll laugh, mock and go back to EVE, WoW or any of the other big titles out there, that at least offer an overwhelming quantity of content to explore.

Don't fool yourselves that you have an interesting crafting system to keep players here either. It's been a very long time since I did, but I played WoW for a few hours. Their crafting system is not any different from ours. Get resources, click button, wait a few seconds. Simple, easy, boring. You don't need half a brain to do it, nor even watch the screen while its happening so how is it going to keep players happy for more than a few hours especially if the products you make are mass produced, worthless junk nobody wants? Crafting is still Milestone II, right? How can it be more important than immersion in a role playing game? Send the right message and people may be more willing to help.

Illa's only strength is RP and that includes the possibility to be any kind of character, even outlaws. You've asked what devs can do to improve RP occasionally in similar threads. Well, first of all don't try to narrow it down to loyal, lawful, well adjusted citizen by making everything else near unplayable. Then drop everything and implement custom look-ats, before you work on stuff like in-client character creation. If this game is still about RP, make the RP-related features Milestone I, not IV or whatever it is now. What message do you think your order of priority sends? To me it seems like you'd be more happy with any kind of player base as long as it is bigger and don't actually give a damn about this being a haven for roleplayers anymore. That is worded a bit harshly perhaps, but I can't help feeling that way.
Then get rid of OOC stuff like those marker stones or alter them somehow to be explainable IC. Sure, its fun to look for them, but try to explain in game how you get stuff from it out of thin air from some invisible explorers guild that somehow even managed to place these stones in extremely hostile and dangerous places. And they do all this why exactly? Immersion is good for RP. Everything that breaks immersion, must therefore be avoided as far as humanly possible. We all know that most of the newbies we get have never done any RP in their lives. Make it as easy for them as possible to get their brains wrapped around that concept instead of distracting them with stuff every other so called RPG does.
Then get rid of the highscore tables. In my opinion, they are against the game rules, stating "Illarion is based on cooperative playing...". Competing for highscores is not cooperative and only distracts from the game's real purpose. It facilitates a competitive mindset, which we all have to actively suppress here and its hard enough as it is, with all of us living our entire real lives in a very competitive world.

If there would be any hope for all this to change, I'd free up 20 hours a week of my time to work on it starting tomorrow, but as long as the answer to all feedback is "we have a plan and it can't possibly be changed in any way" all I can do is wish you good luck and go back to the futile search for a decent, RP focused game that I might actually enjoy playing. Cause Illa in its current state had me so frustrated and bored out of my mind, that even the very nice people here couldn't keep me logging in anymore and I'm not easily bored.
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Estralis Seborian
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by Estralis Seborian »

Hi,

thanks for the feedback. Do you think it is possible that you summarise your proposals in bullet points? I understood your main point is that we should aim for making Illarion more dynamic. I think I can speak for the whole team that we also want to make Illarion more dynamic. Can you elaborate on how to achieve that from your point of view? I see you want to remove restrictions and limits, can you give details what to remove and what to add instead?

Concerning the milestones, we're in full parallelisation mode. It's a misunderstanding that we only work on Milestone I until it is finished, then start with II and so on. The numbers do not imply a sequence - would you propose to remove the numbers? The Milestones are a general roadmap on what we want to improve in this game. We didn't have such a roadmap in the past. Of course, the aspects that impact the very first hour of playing have a higher priority that aspects you won't even notice before playing 100 hours. Current statistics is that from those players that actually do create a character and start playing (what is already a very small minority compared to those create an account), we lose 72 % during the first hour. In former times, this values was at around 90 % but it is still not satisfying. Still, the more players we have online, the more will stay. So to keep old and new players alike is a reasonable goal.

I fear that the intentions of the team are sometimes not clearly communicated. We don't have that 200 pages master plan we follow step by step to make Illarion the worst game in the world. Every single developer has ideas, has some spare time and works on said ideas. Some developers have certain skills, so they work on other tasks than others. Some are more active than others, so certain things get done in less time than those you (and I) deem more important. This is the natural consequence of a small team of volunteers working in a spare time project. We've agreed on certain design principles and general goals but we don't have a team structure where one tells the rest what to do in their spare time, demanding daily reports of tasks ticked off.

From my point of view, the very best thing you can do to influence the future of Illarion is to support the GMs and developers actively. While we do not have automated sandbox features in the game, the whole Illarion development, technically, lore and ingame events, can be considered a big sandbox. So if you want to see feature XYZ in the game, the best thing you can do is to do it. You can count on the support of the team as we are all (former) players and not some remote entity from outer space. Just keep in mind that if you want to pull a cart out of the mud, the general direction of pulling should be agreed on - otherwise, if everyone pulls into "his" direction, only, we end up stuck in the mud forever.

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Jupiter
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by Jupiter »

Velisai wrote:
Jupiter wrote:The town are starting to get a player shaped image. Working against that would now be like hitting those in the face who actually put effort into it. We have seen a lot of improvement and I am sure it will keep heading in the direction. Many problems were found (e.g. that the banning npc do their job a bit too well) and will be dealt with.
You didn't mind hitting all those in the face who worked on shaping Gobaith for a decade, but it doesn't even have to be that way again. We could have two GM controlled towns and one player controlled just to see whether it improves things at all, if the whole gems of power issue wasn't in the way. Of course that would be an easy fix too, if you were just willing to reconsider the magic gem system, which is central to many issues Illa has.
I wasn't a staff member back then. I don't think we should repeat mistakes of the past. Removing towns would be such a case.
On the idea to have a player controlled town: Effectively, we do have that. In Runewick, Elvaine is happily on his small island. Runewick is basically run by players (yes, mostly, the bearers before everyone jumps on that). Nowadays, also Cadomyr is getting more and more controlled by players. I cannot judge how the situation in Galmair is but I think the issue there is that the council of the chancellors is quite weak compared to the ruling powers in Runewick and Cadomyr (mainly because having to get reelected).
I agree with you that the towns should be more player controlled. We are heading into that direction and I like that. It is a question of time. I don't see a reason to remove the gm faction leader completely (Not that I would have strong objections against it, though). It is true that they were a bit too involved in the daily affairs in the past, but that changes.

On the magic gems: Are you pointing at the lore stuff with that the town leader have that gem of power or to the engine effect the magic gems have? On the lore stuff: It is oddly confusing and I don't get that anyway. :P On the engine effect of magic gems: Many like them. Maybe you can elaborate what you mean with it being an issue.

One the marker stones:
It is one of the best things the vbu brought. It gives entertainment and gives you something to do without. I don't know why you say that they are ooc things. Is it because of those lists on the homepage? Well, I don't like them. BUT we also have these lists accessable ingame. How is that possible? Is it magic? Are there some strange rangers watching us all the time and writing down who found a marker stone? And are those then the guys who put them there? Yes, it is in no explanation how the marker stones got their. I would, however, say that this is a riddle players should try to find out then. Contact a GM that you want to investigate this. Just because there is no explanation accessable now, it does not mean that the only explanation is ooc.
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by Fooser »

On the idea to have a player controlled town: Effectively, we do have that.
To what benefit? The devs, for whatever reason, couldn't stand that Troll's Bane changed a lot, so they went in the completely opposite direction. The GM leaders are permanent and the player leaders are quasi-permanent. Before the VBU, if there was a political fight and you lost, you could have your character lay low for a while knowing the situation would eventually change and you could get a fresh start, it wouldn't be a permanent problem. Now since everyone is basically permanent none of these issues get "flushed" so they just build up. Anyone who takes a stance or takes a conflict oriented action gets a ball and chain attached to their leg. And it lasts forever. And with no outlaw support there's nowhere to lay low. The incentive is towards not doing anything.
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by 1d20 »

Can someone explain what the "gems" stuff has to do with this? I'm curious. I don't know what the gems do in Illarion now, back in my time they just let you make weapons stronger if I recall?
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by rakust dorenstkzul »

Gems make your weapon stronger. Your genitals bigger, and basically, if you don't have gems. you don't deserve life
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Velisai
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by Velisai »

The numbers do not imply a sequence...
That's good to know. I bet I wasn't the only one with a wrong impression here. I don't mind the numbers, as long as it's clear what they are about. And what they are not about in this case. I'm fully aware that you are all volunteers, but I'm very fuzzy on how you reach a decision within the team when something needs to be decided for or against. My impression was that there are actually lead devs for certain aspects, like Nitram being in charge of the client, Estralis in charge of content, Vilarion for server stuff. I don't think it could hurt to clarify that for everyone. If somebody wants to work on something, they'd have a better picture on how to get their ideas approved.

The development process as a whole could be a little more transparent in general, so its easier to jump into. Take that mysterious document on magic for example. Somebody is apparently preparing one, but who is it? What does it look like so far? How will magic tie into combat, crafts, everyday life? In the past, many things have been decided upon within a small team and been kept secret until it was too late to give feedback that could actually change anything. Erasing Gobaith is a prime example for this. Had I known sooner, it would have saved me a lot of frustration even if the outcome were the same in the end. Didn't mean you personally btw, Jupiter. I have no idea whose idea that was and I don't want to know. Let's learn from past mistakes and not drag anyone through the mud, I agree.

Now on to the specifics. Marker stones: As I said, they're fun to look for, no denying that. It's just not enough of an explanation to simply say its magic. Who did the magic and for what reason? The answer doesn't have to obvious, but there has to be one somewhere. Otherwise it looks like a glued on feature that is not really part of the game world. Something you try to ignore instead of incorporating into RP. Of course to tie those things into any kind of background story requires one to have a background story in the first place, which Illa doesn't. Let me stop here for now and get back to it in a bit.

Magic gems: I said they are central to many issues, let me first explain why.
The need to make full sets is an inter faction conflict killer. As long as warrior types are completely dependent on getting gem sets, there will never be any faction conflict that players can enjoy, because everyone loses and nobody gains anything from it. Wars, trade embargoes, etc are already a drain on resources. The gems make such a course of action completely insane under any circumstances. The result is eternal peace. Some may find this desirable and its completely legitimate to make such a game, but I personally don't want to play or develop a game like that. Second Life(tm) already exists. There's a fundamental decision to be made and clearly communicated here. As you say, we can't all pull in different directions and expect things to get better.

Another problem is that the gems are used as a way to herd players into one of the factions. I want to join or not join a town because of the way my character thinks and sees the world, not because I simply must have gems to be able to play a warrior type. Being a town's citizen already gives you enough advantages in the form of easy access to workshops and merchant NPCs. Make it possible to survive in the wilderness and thrive and prosper (financially and socially, nothing else) in a town.

My personal preference would be to make gems a rare find (from maps and gathering actions) again and to give each color specific effects, depending on where you stick them. Those effects can be all kinds of stuff, not limited to combat. I'd remove or severely limit the number of levels you can raise them to by combining. Instead of trying to get stronger and stronger sets in a never ending arms race, we would make meaningful choices. Do I want to be able to run a little faster or perhaps have a chance to deflect a percentage of arrows hitting me? Excess gems can be sold off, used in GM assisted events like ritual magic or used to create more item sets to give you a little more flexibility.
Right now, this is impossible to fully implement, as this would be the icing on the combat cake which has to be baked first. We can however remove any link between towns and gems immediately and work on making them more interesting later.

Background and lore: I think this is a major issue as well. It should not just lure newbies onto the server with well written fluff, but also offer those who are new to RP easy ways to give their characters motives and reasons to be in the playable part of the Illarion world particularly. I'm not the most creative player here by any means, but I'd start with a central conflict of the people vs. monster variety. Perhaps Illarion is the place where the gods fought the decisive battle against the demons and there is still a small portal left open somewhere deep beneath the surface? Perhaps that is the reason there's this huge wall, sealing the area off from the rest of the world? Perhaps magic is particularly strong here too, ancient artifacts more common?
Once this is fleshed out a bit, one can move on to the different factions and answer all the W-questions about them in a way that actually creates a deep, ideological divide between them.

I have to cut this off for the moment, cause I need to see to the survival of this pesky physical body now. I have more ideas, particularly regarding crafts, resources, etc. and I'd like to completely separate the tutorial from the main game (which I could start working on with the skills I already have). There's also a bit about MC, but that'll have to wait until later. Let me know what you think so far please, devs and players alike. Am I wasting my time or is this at least a general direction the community could see itself going?
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by Mephistopheles »

+1^^
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by Jupiter »

I will just give some short answers to a few selected topics, since I am a bit occupied right now:

On gems: As you describe the situation, a simple solution would be to have all gems in all factions. This, however, would remove the need to trade gems with others which also creates interaction. Therefore, I am a bit reluctant to go down that road. I also don't think that the lack of conflict between towns (We had some, though.) is mainly because of this.
I wouldn't mind gems having different effects.

On tutorial: I disagree! The tutorial (the newbie island) is quite seperate from the rest of the game and that is bad. New players should meet other players as soon as possible. Throw them into the towns right away. Instead of thew newbie island, we should have the various traders teach the basics of the crafts. Mind that I am aware that we need to do that ins proper way. It should feel like belonging to the world and not just some tutorial not connected to the rest of the world.

On lore: We currently have a strange text on the homepage talking about "War of the Gems". I have no idea what this is, and I believe no one actually does. I like a rich background but I don't like the idea of any "meta-plot". Illarion shouldn't be THE place of big battles and world changing events. It should be A place. I know that some think differently on this, but I always liked that Gobaith is some random place where some strange people are and where some things happen.
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by Seajiha »

I agree with Jupiter that the tutorial should be even more part of the game instead of even more separated. In it's current state it horribly breaks immersion and this isn't good for a RPG (even if its just the beginning): You start on a harbor in the middle of nowhere get some quests and then you are beamed away to never get back to that island (except you offer another newbie your help).

My proposal: create a "relative" secure 'trans-ocean' harbor (New players are supposed to come from another continent right?) as the starting area. Offer some basic questgiver/crafters there to teach players the basic, create some (also relative secure) routes to the three towns, maybe install some sort of embassy in the harbor so players can get information about the faction in before. New players will then have the chance to: learn the mechanics quickly, directly rp with other players who are at the harbor (secured by some sort of guardians?), allow them to leave whenever the want and come back whenever the want to learn more. With this solution you may also: explain where the new characters come from and give some basic crafters to banned characters (which the really want) without creating another faction/town.

edit: You could also add an office of the explorers guild there, explaining who they are and allow you to get rewards from them in-character.
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by Velisai »

...various traders teach the basics of the crafts.
That's an idea I find well worth keeping in mind.
New players are supposed to come from another continent right?
I don't know about that. There's no world map anymore and I'm not aware of any text that clarifies this. I really like your ideas however and am very glad that you chose to make them known. Personally, I'd even go as far as making this starting settlement the single GM controlled town, that's relatively safe and neutral and leave the rest of the map to players, but I doubt this will approved. I do believe though that having the GM team focus on making one town an interesting place instead of being responsible for controlling the entire game could improve the situation for everyone. This way we could have a rather safe, newbie friendly place that stays out of politics and a more rough and variable environment for the rest of the player base. And here we arrive back at the original topic of a central location for players to gather in when there's not so many online. Sorry for derailing it so much Karl, but some things are difficult to discuss separately as so many of the problems are connected. At least in my crazy mind.

The only obstacle to overcome is explaining the basic controls and that you're actually supposed to speak to NPCs, unlike in many other games which work with dialogue trees. You know, everything that is inherently OOC.
I always liked that Gobaith is some random place where some strange people are and where some things happen.
So did I, but its been said many times that we don't do rollbacks for any reason so I didn't even consider this direction. Like I said, I'm definitely not the person you'd want to work on background stories considering we have some real creative writing geniuses here, but yeah, anything is better than this war of gems bs. If anyone can come up with a really engaging background, I'd be willing to redo the map and NPCs on my own if need be even if it takes me a year to finish.
At least now I feel that we're starting to get a real, productive and friendly discussion going here, instead of everyone being afraid to be brushed off with a one liner or feeling left alone with all the work and all the blame. Keep it coming. Share your dreams, even if they don't offer concrete solutions to particular problems. I don't care how much time and effort it may take to change this game. Let's see what you all want first, then see how much of it we can make reality. Let's get a little enthusiasm and hope for the future in here for a change, instead of hurt feelings on all sides.
As you describe the situation, a simple solution would be to have all gems in all factions. This, however, would remove the need to trade gems with others which also creates interaction.
I don't want to remove trading of gems in general, just remove the need to trade them between factions. I figured if they'd be rare enough (as in the average player finding one every 3-4 months), it wouldn't be prudent to just sit on them until you have found what you want randomly. It would make sense to try trading what you don't really want for the gems you actually desire. I'll give it some more thought.
I also don't think that the lack of conflict between towns (We had some, though.) is mainly because of this.
I don't think its the only reason, but a very important one. I'd love to read your thoughts on this as well as everyone else's. Please explain in more detail when you find the time.

I'd also like to know what purpose(s) the craft distribution was supposed to serve, as in its current form, it accomplishes nothing except being a minor inconvenience and a conflict killer. I'd like to give this topic some serious thought, but I'd need to get that question answered first.
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Estralis Seborian
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by Estralis Seborian »

On the tutorial, before jumping to conclusions, I'd recommend first to establish the requirements you have for a tutorial. So what is the purpose of a tutorial, what should the player learn etc. The idea behind the current implementation was to reduce it to a bare minimum, compared to the odd one we had in the past, see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5oYoKfGs5o. The individual crafts were supposed to be taught by the first quest chain you get when entering the main land. This is supposed to act as some sort of semi-inline tutorial. It is fully acknowledged that those first quests you get are not well polished and might not cover all relevant aspects. An evaluation and completion of the first quest lines needs to be done by "someone". A fully inline tutorial where the client tells you what to do while playing is a good approach, but we are nowhere close to having even a sound concept for this. It's also the complete opposite of having a big tutorial island/city where players will stay for an extended time rather than jumping into the game directly.

On the transparency of development, we indeed do not write e.g. development blogs or issue press releases. But Illarion is open source. So you can review the code of the game as it is and also the development branch on Github. We also have all main activities listed on Mantis, with actionees being nominated you can contact about each aspect that is actually being worked on. On magic, I wrote the concept with the input of the team. As it is quite mature by now, it was sent out to some 75 forum accounts (some being duplicates) for an initial review. It is planned to form a tiger team for final polishing and implementation of the concept. The concept gives enough room for ideas and details as it mainly focusses on the requirements, general constraints and interfaces descriptions.

On the craft distribution, as this was written down elsewhere already, I'll give a summary of the ideas. On Gobaith, just one town supported most crafts while the rest of the settlements offered very limited support for crafting. We wanted to see each craft being supported by at least two out of three towns. I am aware that instead, most players focus on the crafts that are not supported instead of the big increase of support for crafting. The general idea was to stimulate trade and offer opportunities for scenarios such as embargos, large scale item transportation/transfer, customs and to encourage each town to have a distinct profile. The craft distribution mainly affects four fields: NPC stock, NPC quests, static tools and resource distribution on the map. The distribution of resource sources is currently being worked on to become more convenient. I think most players agree that the resource distribution adds an interesting challenge to the game and is helpful for shaping a town's profile. I assume the same holds for NPC quests and NPC stock with the latter assuring that you can trade 2/3 of all items in each town. Most seem to have issues with the distribution of static tools as it feels artificial compared to e.g. no trees growing in the desert. I've added a more liberal approach to static tools to the housing ticket: http://illarion.org/mantis/view.php?id=9829. Also, mind the tickets concerning benefits of player made items: http://illarion.org/mantis/view.php?id=10717 and http://illarion.org/mantis/view.php?id=11351.

On the magic gems, the concept behind them can/could be found here: https://web.archive.org/web/20100617131 ... ncept-v-10. Sadly, the slides are gone but I think one can catch the general idea from the description. We adapted the concept for Illarion but some aspects are not fully implemented.

All in all, I warn against underestimating the effort required for non-incremental changes. Mind that the VBU project took the better part of three years with around a dozen very active developers. We don't have that manpower at this moment. As stated elsewhere, there are many ideas and conceptions how to improve Illarion on Mantis. We have some 850 open tickets. Just add your ideas to existing tickets where applicable. If you want to see something implemented quickly, there is always a way how you can help.
1d20
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by 1d20 »

Can someone please explain the whole gems thing to me? :)
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Velisai
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Re: One town instead of 3.

Post by Velisai »

Tutorial: Nobody proposed a huge tutorial that's separate from the game. It must either be completely a part of it or else, if separated from it, be very short.
The individual crafts were supposed to be taught by the first quest chain you get when entering the main land.
I did those tutorials not long after VBU. At no point during completing those quest chains, did I actually know beforehand which quests earn me points towards increasing town rank and which are simply a waste of time, cause I didn't want to learn crafts. Also, it took days to complete all of those quests because there is a lot of waiting (for grain to grow, for example) and running around the entire map involved. When I do a tutorial in a game new to me, I expect it to be as short as possible (cause I really only do it to learn the controls). If I had to stand there and wait like 10 minutes for the tutorial to continue in any other game, I'd quit and rate it as low as possible for deliberately wasting my time. It's better to have to ask other players than spend this much time to get such a basic thing as baking a bread roll explained to me. I also expect to be able to skip the parts that are obvious to me.

I did the old tutorial in something like 45 minutes (I tend to explore more than most players, even tutorials sometimes) as a complete newbie, learning the far less simple controls we had back then. This could have been shorter, but to be honest, I found the whole idea of RP a little intimidating back then and was glad to be able to get the technical stuff out of the way at my own pace before being dumped in the unknown.
An evaluation and completion of the first quest lines needs to be done by "someone".
I could go through every quest and make detailed notes about every little problem on the way if that helps? It would be only from my point of view of course and not that of a newbie, but that's better than nothing I guess. Is there any material already collected as a base for making a sound concept for a tutorial, like a text dump of newbie feedback I can sift through?

Transparency: There's no need to write blogs, but if you send out a magic concept to 75 accounts, why not simply post it in a public board for everyone to read? How is anyone not on the VIP list supposed to feel about it? This is a prime example of needlessly alienating a part of the community.
Also, mantis tickets concerning player made items (http://illarion.org/mantis/view.php?id=10717 and http://illarion.org/mantis/view.php?id=11351) link back to a part of the forum I have no access to, so all I can gather from them is that they're crafting related.

Craft distribution:
On Gobaith, just one town supported most crafts while the rest of the settlements offered very limited support for crafting.
Varshikar, Vanima, Silverbrand and Greenbriar had most if not all static tools as well as farmland. Silverbrand, Varshikar and Vanima even had their own mines, which TB didn't. Farmer's Union only lacked a gem grinder and oil press, which we didn't buy only because TB wasn't far away and static tools became more expensive the more you already had. If we really wanted to, we could have had any tool in any active settlement. Resources were placed more or less randomly, so TB had a slight advantage there only because of its central location on the map. With a donkey, distance to a resource didn't really matter anyway. So I don't really see how crafts have better support now.

I just don't see any benefit to making playing a blacksmith in Runewick a minor inconvenience. It is artificial and makes no sense IC. The price of an anvil is a small one to pay for independence from your rivals, even if that hunk of iron would cost the unreasonable sum of 1000 gold coins. If we at least had those embargoes or taxes on foreigners, but there isn't anything of the sort. The taxes were abolished due to popular demand and so would an embargo if someone tried it, because let's be honest, nobody wants to have half their game disabled just cause some politicians want to be at each other's throats. Life becoming more difficult and perhaps a little dangerous might find a lot more acceptance than not being able to do one's craft at all because of things beyond the average player's control.

Besides, people choose to settle in a particular town because it either fits their char better than the others ideologically or because they became friends with someone there, not because of something as little defining of character as what craft they do. They do that even though it may be inconvenient, because that's how they want it to be. Hell, even the magical gems aren't relevant enough to keep players in the town that would be most advantageous to their characters in many cases.
large scale item transportation/transfer
There is rarely a need for that, as resources tend to be very close to the tools that are used to work them. When the need does arise, it's a simple matter of teleporting back and forth several times.

Now resource distribution could become interesting if Cadomyr based cooks had to get their meat from a currently hostile Runewick. This can't happen as long as Cadomyr based cooks are unable to cook at all during a time of hostility between the factions. Why bother stealing cows if you don't even have a pot? Of course as long as Galmair is neutral, one could take care of business there, but that's just as true for the craft distribution system we have now. My point is basically, that the current situation is inconvenient, without any benefit to justify it.
I've added a more liberal approach to static tools to the housing ticket
Why wait years until that's implemented, when there's a simple interim remedy for the problem that can be applied almost effortlessly with the next map update?

Can't comment on the other tickets as I'm not able to see what they're about, as mentioned above.
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