Year in Contemplation: 2018

Estarra

If you haven't read my Year in Contemplation, you can do so here.  Feel free to share your thoughts and questions.

Versalean

As you note, the writing's been on the wall awhile. I've posted about that elsewhere, so no need to retread. But you know what? A good deal of it is down to a changing field in gaming, both in terms of demographics and technological-cum-social advances.  In short, gamers ain't gamers like they used to be, and gaming ain't what gaming used to be (Ready Player One says it better). I guess what I'm trying to say is a genuine thanks for all your hard work, @Estarra, alongside a whimsical, old-man's (though not as old as you, TIL!) agreement that all good things come to an end. I genuinely hope you aren't taking this more personally than the situations warrants, and... honestly, whereas I was on my way out the door with a coupla Vs flashing at Lusty... this new development means that I'm probably going to be hanging around in a new skin out of curiosity. I think FTP opens up some interesting possibilities and I'm confident that if you hit it head on with the right attitude you can capitalise on that.

TL;DR: This happened to Lusty quicker than folks might have liked, but it was going to happen, and the point of no return was passed longer ago than I think most people would care to admit. Eventually the entire market will go the same way and there's nowt we old folks can do about that. I expected your post to start "So.... Remember MKO...?" and the fact that it doesn't gives me more hope for the future of this MUD than I had twenty minutes ago.

Estarra

Thanks! I still would like to believe there are players out there who may prefer a text game over a graphical. People still read books and play D&D! Of course, finding them is another matter...

Versalean

I suppose my only question at this stage is: "What does it mean for a game to go 'free to play' that has been free to play for over a decade?" I mean, Lusty is ftp now, isn't it? I'm especially confused as the blog says "At that time, you will still be able to purchase credits and have elite memberships." Surely the only difference isn't that retirement is being frozen?

Estarra

It means you can get credits in game on a daily basis without needing to purchase credits. Details forthcoming!

Shaddus

Just so I understand the basic concept (and because I never really dabbled in Imperian aftet they went ftp), this means that the admin team is spending less time designing things for us to spend money on, and spending more time working on things in Lusternia?

Bairloch

Huh, not sure what I think of this. When it happened to Imperian my first thought was "Glad that's not us", and now it is.
I don't know why I have this automatic dislike. I haven't parsed it yet. I just know I get a vaguely unhappy feeling when I read it.
If I can nail it down, I'll share.

Starfire Q

I have often had to take breaks from Lusternia (I struggle with both too much conflict and getting too involved with my characters), but the reason I keep coming back is the history and lore of the game. I love the history of the Elder Gods, the Vernal Gods, the Soulless, and every time new lore from those days is revealed I eat it up. I hope you will keep telling those stories, because that is why I play. And why I've never been able to play any other IRE mud seriously, because, no lore has ever matched up to Lusternia's.

Stratas

It's hard to know what to make of this. On the one hand, the announcement of Free(er) to Play, and especially the tone of the blog post make it sound like "the dream has died", and that's sad, because I've loved Lusternia for 11 years now and it's been painful watching it get more sickly over the years. On the other hand, the news of the coming dismal changes includes... generating credits for playing the game, fixing the economy, and new systems that will increase activity and competition? Am I supposed to be sad or not? I'm confused. I'll just focus on the positive then. The game is still here, it's still going to be here, and the awesome behind-the-scenes people who make this game great are going to continue to do so.

So, thank you @Estarra for creating this world and letting us play in it for so long. What ever this change means on your end, know that there are people on this side who are on your team, who are willing to take whatever changes this brings, and who will continue to play in some form or another for the foreseeable future.

Shaddus

Pretty much what Stratas said in his first paragraph. I'm not sure I understand what Lusternia will be losing or not doing beyond the retirement part.

My first post on this may have come across a little glib,  but it seems like little is changing for players, and the admin will seemingly have more time to roleplay and flesh out the game.

Minkahmet

Like all things in life, they come to an end and that's just the reality of anything. I am one, that shall remain optimistic that the game I grew up playing since I was 21, will still run, regardless of changes coming up. As sometimes changes are not a bad thing and can be a healthy but hard adaptation to go through as this applies to fantasy as in real life. The FTP ordeal left me with a question mark though. Will it respect retirement in the sense that those who put time, money and other sacrifices into the game, to afford them the option to still retire if they choose, but players that come AFTER the FTP change cannot benefit from it?

Shaddus

I guess another question we should ask is,"what can we do, as players, to help this go more smoothly?"

Xenthos

Minkahmet said:

Like all things in life, they come to an end and that's just the reality of anything. I am one, that shall remain optimistic that the game I grew up playing since I was 21, will still run, regardless of changes coming up. As sometimes changes are not a bad thing and can be a healthy but hard adaptation to go through as this applies to fantasy as in real life. The FTP ordeal left me with a question mark though. Will it respect retirement in the sense that those who put time, money and other sacrifices into the game, to afford them the option to still retire if they choose, but players that come AFTER the FTP change cannot benefit from it?

It says that your retirement will be frozen at whatever value it has at the point of transition, so whatever you earn after that will not count towards your value but what you did before still should.

As for my own take... the post basically seems to be very downcast, but then goes on to discuss still doing changes / producing it, so I am not really sure what the effects even are.  Why such a negative post?  Makes it seem like more is changing / being let go than is actually mentioned.  The tone of it is what is throwing me off, because... well, I have been here mostly since the beginning and I still love it.  I am just left very /confused.

Orael

I'll chip in a bit here.

I'm actually pretty positive about the overall change. I think it'll be something that I would have loved as a player (more chance to build things in the game) and gives Estarra and the rest of the admin team up here a chance to really focus on bringing some long-awaited changes that have been clamored for a while now and not have to worry so much about promotions and other stuff that generally isn't well received (poor makeup/disguise kits )  I think it's actually a better direction overall and with us able to be 100% focused on development, we'll be able to really bring stuff out.

Now it's up to us to deliver. 

Rancoura

Xenthos said:

Minkahmet said:

Like all things in life, they come to an end and that's just the reality of anything. I am one, that shall remain optimistic that the game I grew up playing since I was 21, will still run, regardless of changes coming up. As sometimes changes are not a bad thing and can be a healthy but hard adaptation to go through as this applies to fantasy as in real life. The FTP ordeal left me with a question mark though. Will it respect retirement in the sense that those who put time, money and other sacrifices into the game, to afford them the option to still retire if they choose, but players that come AFTER the FTP change cannot benefit from it?

It says that your retirement will be frozen at whatever value it has at the point of transition, so whatever you earn after that will not count towards your value but what you did before still should.

As for my own take... the post basically seems to be very downcast, but then goes on to discuss still doing changes / producing it, so I am not really sure what the effects even are.  Why such a negative post?  Makes it seem like more is changing / being let go than is actually mentioned.  The tone of it is what is throwing me off, because... well, I have been here mostly since the beginning and I still love it.  I am just left very /confused.

My takeaway from Estarra's post was that it stands as an honest, sobering acknowledgement of the reality of Lusternia's situation as a game (one I haven't been really fond of thinking of, myself), but also as a promise that despite that situation, those who have the power to keep it moving will do so. It's been diminished for reasons x, y and z, but there are still people present who love it far too much to let it go -- admins, players, IRE itself. I'm definitely one, and as someone deeply invested in the game, I'm more grateful than words can express that @Estarra and the team are remaining dedicated to it even if it might not be as lucrative (financially and perhaps even emotionally) as it once was.

I may need to take breaks now and then to deal with life matters, but I don't see myself ever shaking the constant craving for Lusternia's world, in-game culture and immersion (where it can still be found). Nothing I have found elsewhere is able to stand up to what Lusternia offers me, so here's to this beautiful, ground-breaking fantasy living ever on.

All the nerd .

Dys

I love Lusternia. The stories, secrets, writing, world, Divine, designers and everyone are amazing. The more I learn the more I'm awed by each new quest and the layers that are revealed. There are always more things I want to do than I have time to do them.

The first three or four times I tried Achaea and Lusternia I got to level 50-80 learning skills with leveling credits then was put off by the pace of skill gain slowing as those ran out. The time that got me far enough to be hooked was when there were several months of logging in for lessons or credits and that months long IRE promotion that gave you a daily credit for posting on their forum. There've been lots of attention on the leveling credit front to make that more generous as well as the lesson packages and leveling wonder crystals ( ) but I think the prospect of easier in-game credit gain for new players will help keep people motivated.

Malayn

Two questions:

- Will we be correcting retirement values for goop items that used to be dingbats? I had thousands of dingbats in items that are suddenly worth 0 now (because they moved goop). This is hundreds of dollars in cash value lost.

- Will retirement values go up to 100% to ease transitions if that is what people do? I've been a long term force of Lusternia, but I will not sugar coat that as a player, this poses concerns for me. I am hoping FTP will mean growth and a flow in, in order to make things more interesting, but I am also concerned what happens if it goes bad. 


We appreciate all the time, work, and dedication you have shown to this place Estarra. I have spent so many years in Lusternia that it placed a burden on me to feel it may one day not be the dream it held. I was not a producer, but Lusternia has been more than a game for me, it has served as a place we make friends, even those outside the game. There is no end to what a bit of socializing can do and I feel truly lost to thing of what this will mean. I have always told people who tell me "Oh, you are still here" that I am a Force of Lusternia. I am not a player, I am a constant. It's been true.  I have 1122 days of playtime on Malarious alone. I've spent over 3 years of my life staring at a screen, playing Lusty. It's unreal.

I don't know what to do anymore.

Saran

In line with that, will the retirement requirements see the same dip that Imperian did? (minimum requirement going down to 250)

Orael

Malarious said:

Two questions:

- Will we be correcting retirement values for goop items that used to be dingbats? I had thousands of dingbats in items that are suddenly worth 0 now (because they moved goop). This is hundreds of dollars in cash value lost.

- Will retirement values go up to 100% to ease transitions if that is what people do? I've been a long term force of Lusternia, but I will not sugar coat that as a player, this poses concerns for me. I am hoping FTP will mean growth and a flow in, in order to make things more interesting, but I am also concerned what happens if it goes bad. 


We appreciate all the time, work, and dedication you have shown to this place Estarra. I have spent so many years in Lusternia that it placed a burden on me to feel it may one day not be the dream it held. I was not a producer, but Lusternia has been more than a game for me, it has served as a place we make friends, even those outside the game. There is no end to what a bit of socializing can do and I feel truly lost to thing of what this will mean. I have always told people who tell me "Oh, you are still here" that I am a Force of Lusternia. I am not a player, I am a constant. It's been true.  I have 1122 days of playtime on Malarious alone. I've spent over 3 years of my life staring at a screen, playing Lusty. It's unreal.

I don't know what to do anymore.

Dingbats have never counted towards retirement, the changing of aethergoop was to bring that into the same line.

I'm not sure what you mean by 100% retirement values, but what you're seeing now is likely what you will get should you choose to retire. I think it's prudent to be clear here, you'll be able to retire at anytime, the only change is that the value of your retirement will no longer increase after we make the transition. If you wait a month or a year, it'll be the same and you'll still be able to retire.

Malayn

Changes 1524 has a note on dingbat changes:
     - Retirement value fixes due to a deletion of a currency.

Dingbats were valued at 1:1 with credits in most things, it'd have been odd if we ignored them entirely. My retire value changed with dingbat items, and I had previously bugged losing more than it increased by (for instance, dolls). That was fixed, but has returned in goop version now. I'd imagine my bug is (EDIT) still visible (/edit) somewhere on the administration side. 

Offering a specialized currency with value equal to credits (originally 2:1) and not counting the value would kind of irk me given the push for large sums of them to be effective in conflict.

Orael

And as noted, that was a mistake and both dingbat and aethergoop items should not have been counting.  It was certainly our mistake, which is why we're giving coins in compensation.

Thayan

Definitely a sad post to read, but also... more hopeful than I'd expected. It will be hard to see Lusty change so much, and I don't immediately know what to think about/expect from going ftp. That said, there seems to be a lot of potential good to read into it, and for the first time in ... a long time (years?) I feel like I'm looking forward to seeing what's coming up next.

I've been here since the beginning (has it been 14 years??). I've done so much, learned so much, built so much, and made so many friends. I don't want to let it go, and I never, ever want to see it die. It's reassuring to know that IRE is still behind it, and so is our team. 

Thanks for making such a special place, @Estarra. I'm coming up on twenty years playing MUDs and Lusternia still blows the rest of them way out of the water.

Arkh

If Imperian Free is anything to go by, it means the admin team will be free to focus more on the game and less on the money-making. There will still be monthly promos (usually), but these will just be the old ones re-activated rather than a new slew of Shiny Toys. This means newer players can still catch up to the older folks who may or may not have gotten these toys from previous promos, while not requiring too much of the admins's attention to create.

In fact, Lusternia seems to be in a better position than Imperian, going into this free mode. Lusternia has solid lore as its foundation, and lots of conflict systems to refocus upon (villages, wildnodes, domoths, aetherflares, smob raids, shrines). 

Tridemon

Since you're making all the income generators like maps and genies and such produce only goop and goop-related things, will there be a way to earn czigany coins on a regular basis like you're doing with credits?

Deichtine

Orael said:

And as noted, that was a mistake and both dingbat and aethergoop items should not have been counting.  It was certainly our mistake, which is why we're giving coins in compensation.

Thank you for owning up to the mistake on the admins part and recognising the issue but the compensation was fairly weak compared to the negative effect it has had on quite a lot of people.

The retire value thing has left a bit of a sour taste in a lot of peoples mouths for sure. Goop and dingbats mainly coming from real cash purchases and are considered OOC currency according to the help files with no clear point saying they are not part of retire value.

Considering for a good length of time goop items and credit items were identical and it was practical to convert your credits to goop to get credit artifacts. Its been the assumption for many due to unclear help files in the game that various things that used to apply for retire value now don't. 

The HELP RETIRE help files itself  states:

--------------------

RETIRE VALUE

This will display the amount of credits you will receive for retiring this

character. Keep in mind, you will only receive a fraction of the credit value 

you have purchased on your retiring character. This is in the realm of about 50% 

of current character skills, credits, and artifacts. 

-----------------------

"This is in the realm of about 50% of current character skills, credits, and artifacts. "

Goop and Dingbat items show up on the artifact shop and are considered artifacts.

Again thank you for admitting the mistake and owning it but I really feel that the level of compensation given doesn't match up to the level of mistake made or the inconvenience its caused a number of players.

I understand a mistake happened and it has now been fixed but I personally feel that the compensation should be more substantial and in a form of game currency not just a random gamble.

Kistan

Deichtine said:

I understand a mistake happened and it has now been fixed but I personally feel that the compensation should be more substantial and in a form of game currency not just a random gamble.

I can only concur with this.

A mistake has been made but when you are just talking about virtual currency, not real currency, is there really any rationale for not erring on the side of generosity? Why not let them just keep it? It does not cost anything. It was a mistake but why not honour the mistake?

Happy players=players who stay

Deichtine

As a side note, in Imperian promo artis, currency and stuff didn't count for retire value but when they announced that the game was going free to play they changed that and made it so that promo arti's had a retire value which buffed everyone's retire value for the move to free to play.

Ideally I would hope to see the same thing happen in Lusternia if we are following the example of Imperian. Make all dingbat, curios, aethergoop, etc count for retire value before the free to play move freezes in retirement value.

Orael

Deichtine said:

Orael said:

And as noted, that was a mistake and both dingbat and aethergoop items should not have been counting.  It was certainly our mistake, which is why we're giving coins in compensation.

"This is in the realm of about 50% of current character skills, credits, and artifacts. "

I wasn't aware our helpfile stated this number, but that actually opens the door to explain a bit more.

 As mentioned in the newspost, there was more than one incorrect calculation in regards to retirement. Aethergoop was only one of the issues that cropped up. The other issue/bug was that artifacts were counting at 100% of their value when they should have been counted at only 50%. We were told by IRE that we were not supposed to discuss the retirement calculation and figured that wasn't something we could really say but since we apparently already did, here you go. This likely contributed a much greater decrease in the value of your retirement than the aethergoop conversion did.