Can you give me examples of "stuff to do"? Keep in mind we've got a lot of blowback when you "have" to do something (then it's a big grind and we get complaints that the quest or whatnot is 'griefing' a city or commune). Also note @Tambador's warning of what can happen if there's any possibility that someone or group of someones can monopolize a resource.
What do you guys think of the ideas of @Luce? Obviously, we'd shut down all development for months to implement everything but maybe some of the more simple things as baby steps?
I think you need to bring back Bardics and Artisanals asap too. Don't tie them to character (but you can tie them to OOC account, per the Registration, so it's bound to the game). Treat the rewards like membership credits, you can distribute to any of the characters on your account. Creative people got so invested in their submissions and kept enriching the game with their input, and felt rewarded for doing so.
That was a non-PvP thing that was really cool to see (I didn't read a lot of the stories personally, but I liked glancing at the art).
Can you give me examples of "stuff to do"? Keep in mind we've got a lot of blowback when you "have" to do something (then it's a big grind and we get complaints that the quest or whatnot is 'griefing' a city or commune). Also note @Tambador's warning of what can happen if there's any possibility that someone or group of someones can monopolize a resource.
What do you guys think of the ideas of @Luce? Obviously, we'd shut down all development for months to implement everything but maybe some of the more simple things as baby steps?
The general solution to monopolising is basing gathering nodes on a player rather than the world. GW2 and FFXIV have locations where nodes spawn but another player gathering those doesn't prevent me from gathering there too.
Spreading out material gathering across the world seems like it also would hamper attempts to monopolise because all that time you're trying to grab that one thing, someone else is grabbing a different one you probably need more.
Put simply, the time and money investments in the game are high for me.
To briefly elaborate on money: I have never cared about combat. Enticing me with new items/cosmetics is not really that possible. My money is better spent getting basically any game on Steam for $10, play it with my friends for hundreds of hours, move onto the next for another $10, no investment in time preparing, can insert light RP in almost any multiplayer game. When I buy Don't Starve Together, I know what I'm getting. My money to Lusternia goes into a void and is not guaranteed to result in a return that will enhance my experience in the game.
So I stick to free parts of the game that I enjoy, questing and RPing. Honours quests are amazing and I still love discovering the world and its lore, but most of the non-village ones take at least 2-3 hours to do. I don't have that kind of time anymore to quest and put in work for the guild. Why I stuck with Lusternia after moving from Achaea was the more RP-intensive environment backed by a rich lore and distinct cultural identities of each org. Arkh mentioned this previously, but there's basically no RP justification for half the promos (wonderitems, I'm looking at you; also 'gnome technology' being the deus ex machina explanation for 50% of the stuff that comes out).
The current event does not involve the players and their actions one bit. Yeah, sure the weather gets better, but having the goal be returning to a reasonable quality of life when walking around -- that's...not really compelling honestly. The carrot being dangled for involvement in the current event? A new curio. Again. My eyes are rolling out of my head. How many people really give a damn about new curios? Contrast that with the most interesting event for me: Wheel of the Goloths -- though maybe I'm biased in that since Xenthos and Glom were heavily involved. No player involvement means no player investment means low player activity.
Part of it is Lusternia, part of it is me. I'm hoping to stick with Lusternia as I still love the lore and the lore that the Auguries is building is amazing. The worldbuilding and storytelling, that is worth my time. There's not too much that I would consider worth my money any longer, so that ship has probably sailed.
Something to always keep in the back of your mind is that you're looking for ways to make us -want- to log in. Not reasons to -have- to log in.
Logging in because you have to do your daily ritual of slaughtering a mob/doing a quest to keep the status quo, get a small shiny or keep your org from imploding? Not all that fun.
Logging in because theres this super peachy keen event going on that you want to take part in and maybe have a hand in guiding along? Much more fun.
The difference between these two things isn't always easy to see.
Everiine said: The reason population is low isn't because there are too many orgs. It's because so many facets of the game are outright broken and protected by those who benefit from it being that way. An overabundance of gimmicks (including game-breaking ones), artifacts that destroy any concept of balance, blatant pay-to-win features, and an obsession with convenience that makes few things actually worthwhile all contribute to the game's sad decline.
What do you guys think of the ideas of @Luce? Obviously, we'd shut down all development for months to implement everything but maybe some of the more simple things as baby steps?
All of @Luce's post is fascinating and contains some fab ideas!
I'd love for some random drops to come from bashing/influencing/aetherhunting too (since they are the main PvE activities it would be good to replace the direct gold generation with some sort of tradeskill/economy tie-in).
The only part I'm slightly hesitant about is expanding to a 24 hour window for village influence - that seems like a hell of a grind to win, if I'm understanding the suggestion properly. Otherwise, all of this focus on improving the background economy/world engagement stuff would be fantastic.
Right, I meant more mechanical things we can set up (like fishing or whatever). There won't always be admin around to run "events" and often admin are dissuaded from running roleplay-type events (an admin sent me some thoughts on this after reading this thread which I've been debating sharing). Anyway, I forget who but someone here said there's a "list" of things he can do in another game which I doubt were a list of admin triggered events.
Can you give me examples of "stuff to do"? Keep in mind we've got a lot of blowback when you "have" to do something (then it's a big grind and we get complaints that the quest or whatnot is 'griefing' a city or commune). Also note @Tambador's warning of what can happen if there's any possibility that someone or group of someones can monopolize a resource.
What do you guys think of the ideas of @Luce? Obviously, we'd shut down all development for months to implement everything but maybe some of the more simple things as baby steps?
Deichtine gave some examples that could be good starting points:
* For me, it's missing those economic features found elsewhere which breathe throughout the game, might have just been missed. (generation through bashing, conflict, etc)
* Having materials generated through questing is good (falls into the previous point)
* I'd shift villages towards "org level" comm generation rather than centering the processing tier around them as you could move conflict mechanics towards the model of success generates comms which the org turns into benefits.
* Tier two comms from non-village zones reads similar to the questing thing so it works, i'd aim for one per denizen faction with extras depending on other factors (Something snow related could potentially turn up in both snow valley and icewynd). That or honours questing could provide access to stuff (workbench/mats) required for special refinements either permanently or temporarily as well as either just for the player or for everyone (like a public vendor opens up)
* Regarding the concept of doing different things in the villages, it works for me as a "gathering"/"tier one" method for acquiring basic comms because it's basically questing for comms but for the refinement stage I'd make that a more standardised minigame that's harder or easier based on the comms you're working with. (Which then enables the creation of items that reduce said difficulty)
* Special materials, I'm not super sold on them being necessary for abilities or to take advantage of org level rewards because I imagine there would just be a dedicated effort to grind out a bunch and put them in a shop so people can grab them as necessary, in comparison to stuff like modifying damage types where there's a reward for the extra effort.
* Again, not 100% with the focus on villages just because again, the economy should spread throughout all systems. Similarly, I think your more general comms (like lumber from wood) should be something that you can just do with the right skills.
- Expanding on that, I expect something like converting wheat comms to flour comms would be a simple thing not being able to do that because an org didn't do well enough in the right villages could make that feel more difficult.
- I'd save that sort of thing for materials that are intended to be rarer and the like, for example, maybe delport offers the necessary stuff to make a special cake flower which provides a seduction buff when used in cakes. (not super serious, but just a throw out example)
I guess, for me comms should vary along a line from trivial to difficult with each step towards difficult increasing the benefits for using those comms.
The balance that needs to be struck is that a player should feel relevant not necessary. Wanted, not needed.Like they have something valuable to contribute (otherwise why bother) but not like things will fall apart if they don't (otherwise it's too much stress). Actually being able to meaningfully impact things (and being told that up front) helps. Fundamentally, Lusternia is a shared world universe with a great storyline that people want to be a part of not just watch. If I just wanted to do puzzles, I'd google brain teasers. If I just wanted to tell stories, I'd work on my book on wattpad. I play Lusternia because I like being a part of something big, where I improve other people's day by showing up in a tangible, mechanic way.
On a more relevant note, I really liked being a part of Elostian's Order and interacting with people from different organizations who shared a certain set of ideals. I was sad when that got taken away for the sake of pushing a more restrictive narrative.
Being logged in now feels mostly like killing time. When I'm logged in, most of the time I'm working in another window with Lusternia up on my second monitor. Even though I'm not AFK, the game is functionally a screensaver unless there's a god around or someone asks me a question, or someone decides it's time for domoths or wildnodes or whatever and I go tag along to a group event that requires almost no interaction. At best, I'm influencing (hardly exciting), or I'm working on a story for Lusternia in another tab, or I don't have four hours to invest in an honours quest (basically ever).
I can do the daily but... why? It's apparently tied to the weather, but there's not much guidance on that (and this is the first I've heard of the weather being impacted by killing things, and even if people guessed it would and figured out that this quest line is going in that direction, they'd have to trust that it would be a mechanical influence and not an admin-controlled toggle, Lusternia's track record with "do this thing and then the gods will toggle the event to change" is pretty terrible (lookin' at you, rat plague)).
I was gone a long time because of a change in job circumstances, but now that I'm back, a lot of the lustre that I remember isn't here, maybe because I'm not a newbie anymore and overawed by people of rank interacting with me (though it's super nice to chat with old friends!), but more likely because I don't have any meaningful goals. Way back when I used to think that I could earn enough credits to do useful stuff by spending petty cash and achieving things in-game, maybe earn enough gold to open a shop and that would be fun, climb the ladder of scholarly achievements and Make A Name For Myself, but now I know there's no universe I'll ever be competitive in PK as a leader, I can be "useful enough" without a big investment, there's no point in owning a shop, I can't get ahold of anyone who could induct me into a RP-relevant Order,
I'm playing because I have a couple of friends who play and they have goals, and a couple of things I can do that make people I like happy, but that's a very tenuous connection and once they meet their goal, then what?
Holding the vengance games like some admin did today is one thing.
Simple things like that @Estarra can go a long way.
Having the divine pop in and just do something/anything is a good start. Sometimes I don't see any admin do anything for weeks at a time. Not saying they are not doing stuff in the back ground just that simple it isn't visable and if it isn't visable it means it isn't effecting the players play time. Spending thirty seconds popping in and going "Hey folks anyone want to do vengance?" Is a small but important showing. Or taking over a mob or talking in org chat or whatever.
When I mean stuff I mean literally anything. What I mean is that people should be able to log on and know --hey no matter what I'm sure something is going to happen in my playtime--. That could be a revolt, or aetherflare(perhaps make them more common they are really infrequent) or a bit of divine roleplay or a divine hosted vengance game or free for all tournament or anything you can come up with.
Beyond that make new events or repurpose old ones. The world is your oyster you can get as complicated as you want with it or as simple.
Right, I meant more mechanical things we can set up (like fishing or whatever). There won't always be admin around to run "events" and often admin are dissuaded from running roleplay-type events (an admin sent me some thoughts on this after reading this thread which I've been debating sharing). Anyway, I forget who but someone here said there's a "list" of things he can do in another game which I doubt were a list of admin triggered events.
Can you give me examples of "stuff to do"? Keep in mind we've got a lot of blowback when you "have" to do something (then it's a big grind and we get complaints that the quest or whatnot is 'griefing' a city or commune). Also note @Tambador's warning of what can happen if there's any possibility that someone or group of someones can monopolize a resource.
What do you guys think of the ideas of @Luce? Obviously, we'd shut down all development for months to implement everything but maybe some of the more simple things as baby steps?
Deichtine gave some examples that could be good starting points:
Make more events, More hunts, More pvp events(tournaments, faster domoths), more roleplay events.
As a quick compare.
Imperian has spontaneous shardfalls and caravans which are potential
pvp events which happen roughly once every five hours. Lusternia has
revolts/aetherflares once every 7-14ish days and Wildnodes once every
2 weeks.
You can see the issue
in terms of “stuff to do” when one had events that happen a few
times a day where as the other game has stuff that happens maybe
twice a week if you are lucky.
something of a brain dump based on various things I've seen
Please not fishing, unless it's not something to generate gold but rather something to compete at trying to catch the largest of various species. Fishing created so many botting issues on MKO it's not even funny, people even got around gold caps by fishing and then giving the fish to people that didn't fish or didn't like to so they turned them in and then split the gold with the people who did the fishing.
@Versalean I actually did enjoy the initial MKO comms system with stats and what not until it became an issue with a select few botting or spending full time gathering all the available comms and locking everyone, who didn't have all day to spend gather, out of the opportunity.
I still advocate for a quests that build on each other short smaller ones that can take 30mins-1 hour to complete and advance you to the next stage, letting each player have their own status in the quest series unlike the Epic quests that only one can complete at a time. This way it's not interminable to do a quest having to set aside 2-3-4 hours to do one.
Can we please get chocolate in cooking :P do you know how many reciepes would be submitted just for chocolate items
I think when it does come to comm stats rather than impacting combat let them impact prestige for influencing cheap comms for truly ratty clothes, higher comms for better items, make crappy comms just as rare as high quality comms, eliminate influencing naked to make it necessary to have ratty clothes. Also let them impact how long items last, stop letting runes non-decay items or have any items that are non-decay dune to runes not impact prestige. If comms start impacting weapon stats you'll run into people crying foul for magic users who don't need weapons for attacks thus less upkeep.
Can we simplify defup? I know it's been looked at but seriously so long and convoluted to put defenses up, let people have a don't deflist for those they may not want all the time or config defup to let people define those defenses they want single error message for each one that couldn't apply and poof you're def'd up
Can we please stop restricting number or runes or enchanments on items? Why have 10 brooches, let me have one let enchanters charge more for brooches with more enchanments or to add more to one also why have multiple rings etc... just to hold runes. Let the recent brooches for the cities be combined similar to the mastery crowns so you don't have 12 brooches sitting in your inventory and to hide or unhide, add simple command to choose which one is active do you don't have to start dropping and picking them up to get them right. Things like this make our invetories and the database of object larger than they should be. Also would be nice if we could combine bixes into a single master bix. So we don't have tons of those laying around.
Skill creep - we seem to have tons skills from classes that are available as curios or artifacts and this tends to hit more of the magic users than the nonmagic users and there seems to be more of some cities skills available than others. Roll these back or balance them out so every class has an equal number of skills available and skill sof the same perceived value
The defup thing is the defense overhaul that is not looking like it's ever going to get done (unless a mortal coder is brought on specifically to do that). One of the "plethora of projects" things that has been brought up, and I suspect it's a lower priority than a bunch of other things.
Edit: But I think the biggest thing about the def overhaul has just been loading all the stuff into a database, it's partially done (I know envoys were asked to help crowdsource some of that). I'm not sure where it's at in terms of completion, but players are definitely willing to provide input to help get some of this stuff done when it's needed.
2
EveriineWise Old Swordsbird / BrontaurIndianapolis, IN, USA
My real, quality play time has been very limited of late, mostly due to depression and taking care of a rambunctious 15-month old. But when I do log in, these are the things that keep me from staying long and doing much:
1) Wonderitems. Yes, again. IRE needs to understand that they can't get money out of a game if they kill the game. Wonderitems are killing combat, which kills the game. I'm not even in combat and this affects me.
2) Unfinished guilds. As I've expressed before, I loved being a part of the process of building the new guilds. There was lots of discussion, lots of conversation, lots of interaction. It was a lot of work, but super rewarding. But then, pretty much as soon as the new guilds were released... nothing. I feel like we've been abandoned. When the game was first released there was a lot of admin interaction with the "new" guilds and orgs that literally set the tone for the orgs for years and years to come. That hasn't been the case here (at least in my guild). Frankly, we're lost. And because we're lost, and there's no help, player retention in the guild sucks.
3) The marriage of monthly promos and the year's major questline. I have absolutely zero motivation to participate in a quest that I know for a fact won't change a thing until the next month when suddenly all the work we've done "magically" takes effect. I thought it was stupid from month one, and I think I've been proven right. It could have been a neat idea, but it tanked. Please don't do this again.
4) Lack of interaction. Tied to point 2. My greatest memories in Lusternia are tied to two things: those super mega ultra quests that affect the whole world, are deep, and so satisfying to be a part of; AND the totally mundane, but special interactions. Yeah, I remember Ev accidentally setting off a world war between the cities and communes that ended up with him enemied to Hart, Moon, Moondancers, Hartstone, and Lisaera. But you know what else I remember? Playing tag with Toma. Talking with Tokota. Reminiscing with Adasser (and the vision quests with him--OMG). The lonely cry of Eagle circling overhead. One or two unusual emotes or ambients here or there that you know immediately were crafted right in that moment for your benefit. Those momets are INCREDIBLE. They mean so, so very much. And they're gone.
Because I'm not involved in combat, economy, family system, etc., I can't comment on that. These are just the things that keep me from enjoying the game like I used to.
Everiine is a man, and is very manly. This MAN before you is so manly you might as well just gender bend right now, cause he's the manliest man that you ever did see. His manly shape has spurned many women and girlyer men to boughs of fainting. He stands before you in a manly manerific typical man-like outfit which is covered in his manly motto: "I am a man!"
Daraius said: You gotta risk it for the biscuit.
Pony power all the way, yo. The more Brontaurs the better.
It's hard for me to articulate my apathy. I don't have meaningful solutions. But mayhap it will help?
Time: I don't have the time I used to, plain and simple, to devote to endless grinding and writing and hugely long quests. Too many interruptions so it's easier to not begin.
Bored: I'm boooored. I have oodles of essence I can never ever use. Bashing or influencing is pointless beyond offerings, and just quietly I don't need those either, especially given favours are not tied to them (which I like from my god, not a complaint). Quests are often really lengthy and I can't dedicate the hours to sit and focus on it. I've been there done that on most things (leadership, avatar, order head, even VA) and so I'm not inspired to achieve anything. There's no catching the top essence, for example, which while boring is at least a goal I could have.
Lack of RP: The onus is on me too. But I get bored without roleplay. Conversation and intrigue and ritual and interaction. I crave it. Currently I have been playing another admittedly crappy mud - it's unpolished and the mechanics are kinda lame but there is SO MUCH RP. It is lifeblood of a text game. Combat is great but it's shallow and hollow without the rp. Lusternia has the greatest lore of any game I have played but it feels like it's faded into the background of shinies and pk and how combat is everything.
Wonder Items: I've sunk a lot into Lusternia. I'm probably a little whale among the pod, but I've got a lot of shiny things. And I am still nowhere near close to being able to catch up to the wonder items, even with elite and cornucopia. Being unable to play with the cool kids without spending a fortune is horrible. I can justify little transactions but hundreds of dollars at a time is balls.
So basically, I barely even log in now despite only recently returning, because nothing catches me. I know I should be the change I Want to see blah blah and creating RP for others but I am old and tired and I've done it all. I've written so many advancements and rituals, I've helped so many novices, I've sung the praises of my god for an eternity but now I'm wanting someone to engage -me- for once, I guess. Give me a reason to want to log in again, please! (As a side note, @Maylea I actually feel bad because you have given me a lot of interaction in the time since my return and I just haven't been motivated enough to give you back the attention you justly deserve. Seriously Serens, she is awesome, give her some love.)
Unfinished stuff in Mag sucks. I came back after a year hiatus and my guild which had just opened still has no paths, no advancement, no lore, nada. I know a bunch of that is on players. And now on me as I volunteered to help on my return (And I do still want to, I love the religious RP of mag and lived and breathed it for about 10 years now, I just need motivation.) Things in limbo suck. The head of the cogs in the smog is still in jail I think? Clock tower had a meeting and nothing happened. I know these things are a two-way street. Players and divine work together to pull off stuff. We need to find how to find the balance again. I'm tired. Things like the Bloodfaire - RL years ago now - so many people were enthusiastic and had ideas but all the work fell to Dro (mostly) with me as a mortal helping out as much as I could with designs to try and ease the burden with all the other enthusiastic volunteers doing nothing.
Talk about burnout. If we don't pitch in too, no wonder our divine find it a hard slog. They are people with commitments and creative fatigue just like us. I don't know what the solution is. But it's not wonder items or changing warriors yet again. I think we just need more engagement, period.
* For me, it's missing those economic features found elsewhere which breathe throughout the game, might have just been missed. (generation through bashing, conflict, etc)
* I'd shift villages towards "org level" comm generation rather than centering the processing tier around them as you could move conflict mechanics towards the model of success generates comms which the org turns into benefits.
* Tier two comms from non-village zones reads similar to the questing thing so it works, i'd aim for one per denizen faction with extras depending on other factors (Something snow related could potentially turn up in both snow valley and icewynd). That or honours questing could provide access to stuff (workbench/mats) required for special refinements either permanently or temporarily as well as either just for the player or for everyone (like a public vendor opens up)
* Regarding the concept of doing different things in the villages, it works for me as a "gathering"/"tier one" method for acquiring basic comms because it's basically questing for comms but for the refinement stage I'd make that a more standardised minigame that's harder or easier based on the comms you're working with. (Which then enables the creation of items that reduce said difficulty)
* Special materials, I'm not super sold on them being necessary for abilities or to take advantage of org level rewards because I imagine there would just be a dedicated effort to grind out a bunch and put them in a shop so people can grab them as necessary, in comparison to stuff like modifying damage types where there's a reward for the extra effort.
* Again, not 100% with the focus on villages just because again, the economy should spread throughout all systems. Similarly, I think your more general comms (like lumber from wood) should be something that you can just do with the right skills.
- Expanding on that, I expect something like converting wheat comms to flour comms would be a simple thing not being able to do that because an org didn't do well enough in the right villages could make that feel more difficult.
- I'd save that sort of thing for materials that are intended to be rarer and the like, for example, maybe delport offers the necessary stuff to make a special cake flower which provides a seduction buff when used in cakes. (not super serious, but just a throw out example)
I guess, for me comms should vary along a line from trivial to difficult with each step towards difficult increasing the benefits for using those comms.
So now that I've slept, technically, let me expand a little on what I think I meant.
Not so much trying to focus on villages as a mechanic for this as make
sure that the whole system is integrated into the game in a way that
makes each task and step in the process feel important, but doesn't
force any one person to participate in every step.
General idea overall is for villages to still matter, for the economy stuff to still impact PvP in a meaningful way that doesn't have us needing to chuck the whole thing out and start over, again, and to make it so that anyone can generate raw comms in a steady amount with enough effort, but that in order for traders to really do well the pvp team or the diplomatic groups need to do well, and in order for those teams to squeeze out that last 2%, the traders have to do well. Ultimately the aim for what I was proposing is to make it so that each sphere of the game interacts with and supports each other (though obv how one rewards roleplay is beyond me).
I was aiming for the butchery skill to be a bashing-generation route, able to create meat, hides, and other things based on killing the creature that produces them (or rather, using critters you're killing anyway), harvesting to be plant-centric and requiring a lot of running around to get the most out of it, while the mineral based one is mostly about convincing miners to give up the stuff they're digging out. The hope is that concentrated efforts on doing nothing but commodity generation and refinement can easily garner those comms, but otherwise you need to rely on those who have that kind of focus or to take gold out of the game by buying them from NPCs. Tying refinement to villages rather than raw comm generation also means that it's not possible to lock an org completely out of participation, but it is possible to cause damage and make life tougher for them by consistently winning in villages they need, mostly as added incentive for working on villages.
In that skein, revolts would be more about resetting the field than snapping up points, and would be more a team effort to position leaders in the village who are more sympathetic to your org's causes than a dogpile to get all of the NPCs yes-manning your omninfluencers before the other person who happens to be online at the time gets there. Expanding the time frame it's active would hopefully mean more people can participate, but as with all of the proposal it's meant more as a springboard or seed of an idea than as a Vision of What Is To Be.
Just as an example. Tully has a lot of time and feels like making money, so he goes out and uses harvesting skills to find/generate a dozen units of hemp. He knows that he'll be making a new broom later, and for that he'll need some quality twine, so he takes that hemp to Estelbar, where the hemp station is. He could also go to Acknor or Nyalia, but he thinks the orcs smell funny, and Nyalia can only make crude or passable rope. He needs good rope to make a good broom, so Estelbar it is. Inside the hemp barn, he's tasked with following instructions given to him by the overseer. First the overseer calls out spin, flatten, or dry, in this case dry, so Tully drops the hemp he's collected and PULLs a nearby chain to open the drying kiln. Next the overseer calls out flatten, so Tully needs to PULL the chain, then PUSH a lever to cause a press to descend on the rope. This goes on for several rounds, with Tully adding steps each time, until he fails. Depending on how well he did, he could have gotten crude, passable, or good rope, but he did very well and instead walks out with ten good rope and two units of fine Estelbar twine. He uses the good rope for his broom, and sells the Estelbar twine to Malicia for a profit. Malicia needed Estelbar twine to wrap the tang for her new weapon. She could have had the smith use good rope as well, but she had money to burn. The Estelbar twine wrapping gives her a surer grip, which translates into a balance recovery bonus in her case.
If instead Tully had collected minerals, he could have gotten coral from the deep sea and taken it to Nyalia to refine Bay coral shards, which Neos could have used to augment his Aquamancy staff with a damage buff, or grant his Aquachemantic chalice extra capacity. Both Malicia and Neos were far too busy murdering their way through Magnagora's forces to refine the materials themselves, so they need to buy them instead.
For clarity though, basic outline is:
o Raw materials gathered by tier 1 professions.
o Anywhere can refine any commodity up to the basic level required for crafting.
o Villages, orgs, and some specific spots have refining workbenches for materials to turn the raw material into better versions.
o Village workstations depend on the village's feelings toward your org. One org at a time can refine specialised materials and top-quality commodities, one can refine top quality commodities but not the special commodity for that village, and one is only able to make basic commodities because their opposed org has the village enthralled.
o Org members can always use their own org's refineries to make top-quality materials, but not every org can make every material to encourage trading.
o Commodities themselves give bonuses the higher their quality when used in crafting things. The higher the quality the better, and the more of that commodity used the longer the benefit lasts.
o Special materials are used to do unique things relating to the material in question. These are all case-by-case and outside the effects the normal versions of that commodity might give (ie: Estelbar twine does the gripping effect on weapons, but good rope just lengthens the decay time.)
o Org special materials are or should be turned in immediately for org-level benefits, but reward the person refining the material as if they had completed a quest, with gold, karma, and essence/experience, plus possibly either ikons or curios.
o Beyond their specialised uses, commodities can also be turned in for gold to villages, or for karma/xp to orgs.
o Orgs/villages can trade with each other, org to org, village to village, or village to org, but those trades take time to arrive, and can be intercepted by bandits, mercenaries, or org armies.
All of that said, if better commodities were only burned by orgs for org-wide, org-specific, or org-level benefits I'd be okay with that too if it can be worked out.
@Estarra - Just a thought, but you should add something like bardics for RP logs that get posted publicly. Once a month people can win a credit prize for partaking in the most epic RP session, logging it, and publishing. This could incentivize more RP interaction and further give people an avenue to grow their character through RP. It would further create a public database of RP logs that people could read through to get a good idea of what kind of RP opportunities the lore and community of Lusternia creates.
Honestly the lore and community are the strengths of Lusternia, not so much the PvP and competitions. So I'd try to polish your strength first.
I do not like the idea of roleplay contests ("best gets prize") because there is so much variety in RP... prizes will end up encouraging people to "game the system" by doing what the voters/choosers like.
But otherwise incentivizing the posting of RP logs somehow? Yes, by all means. More logs shows more activity, shows more people engaged with the game, shows more reason to log on and find / interact with those people, etc. Do you have ideas for that which is not a contest?
Also, what if Lusternia had an internal "log" mode that could be activated for a room, catches all says / emotes / world emotes, but ignores everything else (ambients like curios, clan conversations, etc)? "Cleaning up" logs is a hassle too; can probably try writing something for a client to do it but that doesn't help everyone.
Basically, you would enable it, it captures just specific types of input. When disabled (either manually or when the person who activated it leaves the room) it dumps to a file that can be read / copied from in-game. The file is purged after 24 hours (for storage purposes).
If people like / use it, could adjust it a bit (maybe instead of being room based it is centered on a person, or other improvements / enhancements for ease of use).
Heck, maybe you could even have a command that uploads the file somewhere and pings a Lusternian admin; if they like it they could share a link to it on the twitter feed / other places. "Look what these people were up to, isn't that cool? Come and join in!"
Oh boy, one of these threads. I think at this point I am probably retiring Wobou at some point in the near future so I feel like I can contribute to this in a different way than I have in the past.
For me as a primarily PvP-focused player the beginning of this problem was the combat overhaul, most specifically the affliction overhaul. In my opinion the overhaul gambled something very important to the game for a lot of folks (the complexity of combat) in the hopes that it would bring new players in with the new simplicity. I obviously don't have stats in front of me but from a player's perspective this gamble appears to have failed.
The reason why complexity was an asset for me personally was it allowed some depth. There was a difference between someone who studied their logs meticulously, modified/created their own systems, and someone who casually joined fights and didn't do those things. For example pre-SSC someone using a poorly tuned system would be
massively vulnerable to certain strategies and someone who had invested a
lot in tweaking their system could in some cases become totally immune
to them (which wasn't necessarily good either). The affliction overhaul particularly contributed to this because it removed almost all strategy to curing, with the exception of ice you could essentially spam all the cures on balance and not be too suboptimal. This meant that the work
put in to your system could actually make a life or death difference in a fight. Now with SSC (which is one of the most successful projects overall) allows everyone to run around with sane enough defaults that the difference between optimized curing and suboptimal is minimal. There still is a difference between large time investment and small but the gulf has been massively narrowed,
which makes sense since the stated goal of the overhaul was to simplify
things, a goal I personally think was misguided. Now I'll grant that the depth that did exist was probably not a good depth, while I enjoyed coding and being able to use my system to become stronger to the extent that I could, it probably would've been more ideal for the gap to be more about player skill than coding skill. Unfortunately what we have now is a gap that is mostly made up of differences in artifacts instead, specifically wonder items.
I took a 2ish year break at some point after the first overhaul was announced, when I came back warriors had just been completed and monks were still in limbo and would continue to be in limbo for over a year. I think all total it took over 3 years, possibly 4, for the overhaul to be declared complete for all the classes. In fairness during this time the first overhaul had been tried and (I presume) failed, the race overhaul was done, affliction overhaul, etc. so I don't want to suggest that nothing was going on, but I do think it was a project that was too big to chew relative to the coding resources available. This is related to similar issues pointed out by others in this thread where too many projects are selected and too few are completed.
The overhaul and special reports in general also caused a chilling effect on the envoy process. I think for example that the announcement of a special report on Aeonics and Loralaria is what really killed progress for Hallifax. Once that happened it seemed pointless to try to envoy anything related to those skillsets because in all likelihood the administration would fail the report in favor for waiting until the SR. When you combine that with the announcement of a mage/druid SR there was effectively a freeze on 4 out of 5 Hallifaxian classes. Monks were similarly frozen for over a year due to their SR. I think in hindsight it would've been better to task envoys with iterative changes rather than announcing large projects. For example envoys could've been asked to write reports to remove unneeded afflictions from their skills, or combine afflictions that did similar things (like pacifism vs. peace back in the day). We could've even paired down the number of cures needed over time without scrapping the whole system.
Engaging combat I think also served as the predominant form of end game activity for many people. As others have pointed out past a certain point there isn't a reason to hunt or influence, Many of the recurring activities are PvP events (non peaced village revolts, domoths, nodes, etc.) so if combat starts to become lackluster these events start to lose their appeal. I think some folks left because there isn't really another endgame system to take the place of these PvP events and most people who are serious about the game are demigods. As folks leave there's also a domino effect which can take its toll on the friends of those folks who have left.
I've held this novel's worth of opinions for quite a while but I hesitated to share them because I don't have good solutions for any of these issues that takes into account my understanding of the game's coding resources and how the IRE business model works. Assuming anyone agrees with my assessment of this particular issue with the game, maybe someone else can see a glimmer of actionable material in here.
@Estarra would it help if I made a separate thread containing a comprehensive list of events/frequently-occurring things we'd like to see more often? To grow with player suggestions for yourself and other admin to pick ideas out of?
Tonight amidst the mountaintops And endless starless night Singing how the wind was lost Before an earthly flight
@Estarra would it help if I made a separate thread containing a comprehensive list of events/frequently-occurring things we'd like to see more often? To grow with player suggestions for yourself and other admin to pick ideas out of?
@Estarra would it help if I made a separate thread containing a comprehensive list of events/frequently-occurring things we'd like to see more often? To grow with player suggestions for yourself and other admin to pick ideas out of?
My big sticking point is that the game is overall not an interactive storytelling experience, something I want from any role playing game. A lot of roleplaying has eroded over the years, I think as more roleplayers come to realize that their role doesn't engage with the game world on a fundamental level.
One factor in that for me are the year long story arcs mentioned a few pages back as a feature. Hoooooo boy that's a major BUG for me, not a feature. I really really hate big year long event chains, because they pretty clearly are premeditated and planned way in advance... meaning that the outcomes don't engage with player roles. This is borne out for me in the way that these plots tend to move forwards: 1) NPC causes (plague). 2) Players frisk NPCs for help. 3) NPC explains framing device for event, provides busy work (gather essence). 4) NPC progresses the plot and resets back to step 1 until event resolves setting up for the next event to start at step 1.
Notice that NPCs drive that entire cycle. It makes me feel like no matter what I do to participate in an event, it's mostly standing around doing busy work waiting for an npc to come along and progress the plot so that we can check an obstacle off a list and progress to the next plotpoint. This invalidates a LOT of the other systems in the game. Why bother being high guild rank, when the NPCs will drive the game story? Why bother being guild leader, or amassing millions of gold, or winning every village. Do those things give you a role in the story of Lusternia during world *or even small* events? Hell no! It makes achievements really empty. The one different situation IMO are order events, *because they hook onto admin agency with your character as a favored side player*. Too bad there are loads of obstacles that make only very specific sorts of characters open to that Order RP. Outside of that, it's a lot like watching someone else play a table top game: sometimes they invite you to the table to play a bit part.
Of COURSE in a game like Lusternia not every character is going to be star of the show. However, I do think that fundamentally this problem of Having a real economic system gives players a way to engage with the game world and make an (economic) impact. Having PvP systems that work gives players a way to fight and impact the world. So on and so forth. Then events happen and none of that really matters. Some players will get mentioned in the events post perhaps with one thing they said or did, but which characters fill those slots doesn't appear to matter. The events posts feel like they could have been prewritten 90% and fluffed out slightly after all of the scenes are checked off.
That's what turns me off. I like playing a role, I play in umpteen "RL" table top games, and have DM'd many a game. I just cannot summon the effort to be interesting in a game world that fundamentally does not care.
In short, there's plenty to do in an absolute sense: you can always go bash a new area or bang your head against a totally oblique quest "puzzle" if that's your thing. There's just nothing to do that causes your character to matter.
Has Lusternia pondered doing a mass email to people who no longer play and offering them a "return bonus" of some kind to come back? Maybe a "you've been gone for five years, heres what's happened since you've been gone! Come back and check us out, we miss you!" Sort of thing.
Everiine said: The reason population is low isn't because there are too many orgs. It's because so many facets of the game are outright broken and protected by those who benefit from it being that way. An overabundance of gimmicks (including game-breaking ones), artifacts that destroy any concept of balance, blatant pay-to-win features, and an obsession with convenience that makes few things actually worthwhile all contribute to the game's sad decline.
Has Lusternia pondered doing a mass email to people who no longer play and offering them a "return bonus" of some kind to come back? Maybe a "you've been gone for five years, heres what's happened since you've been gone! Come back and check us out, we miss you!" Sort of thing.
Someone mentioned sending out a survey to retired players as well asking them what could have been done better, etc. Could tack this on or pair the campaigns up.
Tonight amidst the mountaintops And endless starless night Singing how the wind was lost Before an earthly flight
Not a bad idea! Would have to check how feasible such an email would be and would probably want to wait until we have something to announce (like maybe a new newbie tour?).
I play a game which has a roleplay bonus - every player can give one every so often which is (in that game currency) gold and xp, nothing giant but a little "hey I enjoyed your RP have a little something in recognition" and it also has admin bonuses which are often given in the same way during group rp sessions like rituals or even just a bunch of people together actively RPing, to encourage more of the same.
Comments
Spreading out material gathering across the world seems like it also would hamper attempts to monopolise because all that time you're trying to grab that one thing, someone else is grabbing a different one you probably need more.
To briefly elaborate on money: I have never cared about combat. Enticing me with new items/cosmetics is not really that possible. My money is better spent getting basically any game on Steam for $10, play it with my friends for hundreds of hours, move onto the next for another $10, no investment in time preparing, can insert light RP in almost any multiplayer game. When I buy Don't Starve Together, I know what I'm getting. My money to Lusternia goes into a void and is not guaranteed to result in a return that will enhance my experience in the game.
So I stick to free parts of the game that I enjoy, questing and RPing. Honours quests are amazing and I still love discovering the world and its lore, but most of the non-village ones take at least 2-3 hours to do. I don't have that kind of time anymore to quest and put in work for the guild. Why I stuck with Lusternia after moving from Achaea was the more RP-intensive environment backed by a rich lore and distinct cultural identities of each org. Arkh mentioned this previously, but there's basically no RP justification for half the promos (wonderitems, I'm looking at you; also 'gnome technology' being the deus ex machina explanation for 50% of the stuff that comes out).
The current event does not involve the players and their actions one bit. Yeah, sure the weather gets better, but having the goal be returning to a reasonable quality of life when walking around -- that's...not really compelling honestly. The carrot being dangled for involvement in the current event? A new curio. Again. My eyes are rolling out of my head. How many people really give a damn about new curios? Contrast that with the most interesting event for me: Wheel of the Goloths -- though maybe I'm biased in that since Xenthos and Glom were heavily involved. No player involvement means no player investment means low player activity.
Part of it is Lusternia, part of it is me. I'm hoping to stick with Lusternia as I still love the lore and the lore that the Auguries is building is amazing. The worldbuilding and storytelling, that is worth my time. There's not too much that I would consider worth my money any longer, so that ship has probably sailed.
Something to always keep in the back of your mind is that you're looking for ways to make us -want- to log in. Not reasons to -have- to log in.
Logging in because you have to do your daily ritual of slaughtering a mob/doing a quest to keep the status quo, get a small shiny or keep your org from imploding? Not all that fun.
Logging in because theres this super peachy keen event going on that you want to take part in and maybe have a hand in guiding along? Much more fun.
The difference between these two things isn't always easy to see.
I'd love for some random drops to come from bashing/influencing/aetherhunting too (since they are the main PvE activities it would be good to replace the direct gold generation with some sort of tradeskill/economy tie-in).
The only part I'm slightly hesitant about is expanding to a 24 hour window for village influence - that seems like a hell of a grind to win, if I'm understanding the suggestion properly. Otherwise, all of this focus on improving the background economy/world engagement stuff would be fantastic.
I guess, for me comms should vary along a line from trivial to difficult with each step towards difficult increasing the benefits for using those comms.
On a more relevant note, I really liked being a part of Elostian's Order and interacting with people from different organizations who shared a certain set of ideals. I was sad when that got taken away for the sake of pushing a more restrictive narrative.
Being logged in now feels mostly like killing time. When I'm logged in, most of the time I'm working in another window with Lusternia up on my second monitor. Even though I'm not AFK, the game is functionally a screensaver unless there's a god around or someone asks me a question, or someone decides it's time for domoths or wildnodes or whatever and I go tag along to a group event that requires almost no interaction. At best, I'm influencing (hardly exciting), or I'm working on a story for Lusternia in another tab, or I don't have four hours to invest in an honours quest (basically ever).
I can do the daily but... why? It's apparently tied to the weather, but there's not much guidance on that (and this is the first I've heard of the weather being impacted by killing things, and even if people guessed it would and figured out that this quest line is going in that direction, they'd have to trust that it would be a mechanical influence and not an admin-controlled toggle, Lusternia's track record with "do this thing and then the gods will toggle the event to change" is pretty terrible (lookin' at you, rat plague)).
I was gone a long time because of a change in job circumstances, but now that I'm back, a lot of the lustre that I remember isn't here, maybe because I'm not a newbie anymore and overawed by people of rank interacting with me (though it's super nice to chat with old friends!), but more likely because I don't have any meaningful goals. Way back when I used to think that I could earn enough credits to do useful stuff by spending petty cash and achieving things in-game, maybe earn enough gold to open a shop and that would be fun, climb the ladder of scholarly achievements and Make A Name For Myself, but now I know there's no universe I'll ever be competitive in PK as a leader, I can be "useful enough" without a big investment, there's no point in owning a shop, I can't get ahold of anyone who could induct me into a RP-relevant Order,
I'm playing because I have a couple of friends who play and they have goals, and a couple of things I can do that make people I like happy, but that's a very tenuous connection and once they meet their goal, then what?
As a quick compare. Imperian has spontaneous shardfalls and caravans which are potential pvp events which happen roughly once every five hours. Lusternia has revolts/aetherflares once every 7-14ish days and Wildnodes once every 2 weeks.
You can see the issue in terms of “stuff to do” when one had events that happen a few times a day where as the other game has stuff that happens maybe twice a week if you are lucky.
Time: I don't have the time I used to, plain and simple, to devote to endless grinding and writing and hugely long quests. Too many interruptions so it's easier to not begin.
Bored: I'm boooored. I have oodles of essence I can never ever use. Bashing or influencing is pointless beyond offerings, and just quietly I don't need those either, especially given favours are not tied to them (which I like from my god, not a complaint). Quests are often really lengthy and I can't dedicate the hours to sit and focus on it. I've been there done that on most things (leadership, avatar, order head, even VA) and so I'm not inspired to achieve anything. There's no catching the top essence, for example, which while boring is at least a goal I could have.
Lack of RP: The onus is on me too. But I get bored without roleplay. Conversation and intrigue and ritual and interaction. I crave it. Currently I have been playing another admittedly crappy mud - it's unpolished and the mechanics are kinda lame but there is SO MUCH RP. It is lifeblood of a text game. Combat is great but it's shallow and hollow without the rp. Lusternia has the greatest lore of any game I have played but it feels like it's faded into the background of shinies and pk and how combat is everything.
Wonder Items: I've sunk a lot into Lusternia. I'm probably a little whale among the pod, but I've got a lot of shiny things. And I am still nowhere near close to being able to catch up to the wonder items, even with elite and cornucopia. Being unable to play with the cool kids without spending a fortune is horrible. I can justify little transactions but hundreds of dollars at a time is balls.
So basically, I barely even log in now despite only recently returning, because nothing catches me. I know I should be the change I Want to see blah blah and creating RP for others but I am old and tired and I've done it all. I've written so many advancements and rituals, I've helped so many novices, I've sung the praises of my god for an eternity but now I'm wanting someone to engage -me- for once, I guess. Give me a reason to want to log in again, please! (As a side note, @Maylea I actually feel bad because you have given me a lot of interaction in the time since my return and I just haven't been motivated enough to give you back the attention you justly deserve. Seriously Serens, she is awesome, give her some love.)
There's a few of my thoughts.
Unfinished stuff in Mag sucks. I came back after a year hiatus and my guild which had just opened still has no paths, no advancement, no lore, nada. I know a bunch of that is on players. And now on me as I volunteered to help on my return (And I do still want to, I love the religious RP of mag and lived and breathed it for about 10 years now, I just need motivation.) Things in limbo suck. The head of the cogs in the smog is still in jail I think? Clock tower had a meeting and nothing happened. I know these things are a two-way street. Players and divine work together to pull off stuff. We need to find how to find the balance again. I'm tired. Things like the Bloodfaire - RL years ago now - so many people were enthusiastic and had ideas but all the work fell to Dro (mostly) with me as a mortal helping out as much as I could with designs to try and ease the burden with all the other enthusiastic volunteers doing nothing.
Talk about burnout. If we don't pitch in too, no wonder our divine find it a hard slog. They are people with commitments and creative fatigue just like us. I don't know what the solution is. But it's not wonder items or changing warriors yet again. I think we just need more engagement, period.
Honestly the lore and community are the strengths of Lusternia, not so much the PvP and competitions. So I'd try to polish your strength first.
Tonight amidst the mountaintops
And endless starless night
Singing how the wind was lost
Before an earthly flight
Tonight amidst the mountaintops
And endless starless night
Singing how the wind was lost
Before an earthly flight
Tonight amidst the mountaintops
And endless starless night
Singing how the wind was lost
Before an earthly flight