That's why basing it on like "who's been the most unsuccessful org in the past x years" is a really, really bad move and crazy subjective.
I would have to say that you are wrong on this though I can understand it is emotive
However, that is how you stay in business. You cut the chaff from the wheat.
Any business model that starts with throwing away your more successful lines while doubling down on your least successful lines is going to fail.
Counterpoint: Every org since Falaeron's Ascension has gone through periods of being very quiet and unable to participate in the game. Who are you going to choose if every org has had periods of unsuccessful-ness?
But nobody cares about which orgs were successful before - the cut didn't happen then. The cut is happening (potentially) now, so you look at the changes that will disrupt the least number of players now. Which orgs are most populous at the time of the cut is what matters.
That said, it should be four orgs, not three. Three orgs doesn't work, especially in a game where the player base is so inclined to form lasting cliques.
Actually, three does work as stated by older players around during that time as well as Estarra. Four orgs changes nothing.
That's why basing it on like "who's been the most unsuccessful org in the past x years" is a really, really bad move and crazy subjective.
I would have to say that you are wrong on this though I can understand it is emotive
However, that is how you stay in business. You cut the chaff from the wheat.
Any business model that starts with throwing away your more successful lines while doubling down on your least successful lines is going to fail.
Counterpoint: Every org since Falaeron's Ascension has gone through periods of being very quiet and unable to participate in the game. Who are you going to choose if every org has had periods of unsuccessful-ness?
But nobody cares about which orgs were successful before - the cut didn't happen then. The cut is happening (potentially) now, so you look at the changes that will disrupt the least number of players now. Which orgs are most populous at the time of the cut is what matters.
That said, it should be four orgs, not three. Three orgs doesn't work, especially in a game where the player base is so inclined to form lasting cliques.
Actually, three does work as stated by older players around during that time as well as Estarra. Four orgs changes nothing.
Other older players said three orgs didn't work. So. Now what?
First, I'm writing this in defense of Glomdoring. Well, all three of the organizations mentioned to go dormant surprised me, as they are the most unique city/communal ideas that I've seen in a game. Every other RPG-esque game has the 'good/bad/forest' archetype offered for a starting area. I know that's what's "familiar", but it's also ... been done. And it's been done a lot. That being said, I know that because it's familiar, people tend to flock to either New Celest or Magnagora, because in every RPG there's a good vs evil conflict. ( please don't resent me for that, Celesties/Maggies ; ; y'all are great in your own ways )
Second, I don't think it's a good idea to have only three organizations. Really I'm against destroying ANY OF THEM, but since this is a 'maybe' discussion... I think it'd be too easy for there to be a 2v1 alliance, which might things less fun. Having an alliance with New Celest has been wonderful! It's good to have reason to interact positively with people outside of your own organization, to get an idea of how they live life and how different things matter to them in different ways.
Third - and I need to preface this by saying that I am the type of person who would normally join Serenwilde - I think story-wise, it'd be incredible fun to have the Wyrd spread from Glomdoring and into Serenwilde, effectively merging the two forests. Think of like a ... the Wyrd spreads through EthGlom, into Faethorn, then EthSerene, finally breaking through the planar barrier and into the woods themselves. There's this misconception that Glomdoring is like, the evil forest, but it really is just a 'dark forest'. Not inherently evil. The thing that didn't kill them (i.e. the Taint) didn't kill them, it made them stronger. It might be wonderfully fascinating to bring that 'nature shows no mercy' concept into Serenwilde. ( again, please don't resent me Serenies, y'all are also great. )
Fourth, this could probably all be avoided if we did work on improving the player base. I loved what Ishra mentioned earlier and whole-heartedly agree:
Ishra said: Just spit-balling here, but are we doing anything to capitalize on the staggering resurgence in popularity that D&D is experiencing right now? MUDs appeal to the retro gaming trend and the increasing interest in role-playing. And unlike D&D, you don't have the hassle of finding a DM, scheduling nightmares, and investing hundreds of dollars on books. I feel like this rising tide could lift our boat, if we catch on to it fast enough. Even just banner ads focused around the idea of an always-on fantasy roleplaying experience, positioned in the right places, could make a big difference.
[EDIT] Just want to add that the whole reason I got back into MUDs was because of the stated hassles with D&D. I feel like I might not be the only one who could be won over by easing those paint points.
D&D is so popular right now, and EVERYONE and their dogs are jumping on the band wagon of sharing their stories, their characters, their campaigns. Lusternia could stand to gain a lot from advertising itself in a way that appeals to this growing nerdy-as-hell demographic! There's Podcasts, Twitch streams, Youtube, social media. You've already got some really lovely visuals on the main page that would work great for advertising (if you don't already). Marketing a game that's been around so long can be a lot. Again, because I'm so new I don't know if it's been discussed before, but you have a pretty dedicated player base - maybe we, the players, could somehow help out?
Imma wrap it up, because I've crested delirium and am fast approaching the 'I can't make much more sense if I keep talking' point. I love this game, and I love the people who play this game, and I think it's safe to say that we all want to see it flourish and grow. I don't envy the decisions that you and your team have had to make, @Estarra, because you'd have to be stuck between a rockeater and a hard place to have to broach this topic.
So let's work through this one...
For the first bit, the thing about familiarity and the like is that you also have to consider if it's "been done" because it tends to work. Like, people are liable to make assumptions about good and evil when they sign up, you could go with Halli vs Gaudi and probably see people start to perceive one (likely halli just based off their pictures) as good and the other as evil.
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For the second, it's a thing that's been debated a bunch. The issue with an even number of orgs is that you should expect that you'll end up with equal numbers of orgs in alliances (i.e 2v2 or 3v3) but that isn't necessarily reflective of the actual population spread. What I'd expect to see if you went down to three orgs is also some tweaking around conflict mechanisms and alliances which would aim to encourage the strongest org to refuse allies thereby leaving the smaller orgs to work together to take them down. The big thing here is that you need to point all three orgs directly against each other rather than this pairing off method we currently have.
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Third, I'm going to flag that the suggestion of wyrding Serenwilde is something that hits way too close to home as far as player complaints about the forests representation, it would be so much worse than just the commune being dissolved (but the forest surviving) and I fully expect the fall out would similarly be much greater.
Also, I would highlight that the later part about the "misconception" is really what Glom thinks about itself and reflects that you hold some misconceptions about Serenwilde.
Serenwilde is not light, nor dark, it's both, one of the key themes that resonates through the forest is the dichotomies we have. Seren performs ritual sacrifices and blood magic, the dead speak to the forest reminding them of every crime ever committed against the wilde, Farella Lunseer (one of our more notable historic figures) encouraged the fae to drown innocent refugees when old celest was destroyed, another historic figure created a horrifying weapon to use in a vengeful murder spree and the negativity around that is mostly because he betrayed his family to do that, Serenwilde literally started a war with the empire because of Gaudi's experiments (we'll really we'd consider that the empire started it).
This is all implemented lore, the Farella part goes back to before launch afaik because it's in the taint wars docs. It's not an uncommon for people to react and be like "That's a glom thing" when
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Fourth, the cross over between pen and paper roleplayers and MUD roleplayers is actually not always that great in that direction. Like, there's one other person in the gaming club I'm in that plays muds and we have so like 2-3 roleplay games running every day of the week. Some even directly match up with pretty great MUDs and they still don't tempt the roleplayers when I mention them.
For marketing, there's also an issue of timing when you want people to enter your service. If the campaign was successful you'd want to have the newbies enter the game during a strong point to retain them. So like, if you resolved the equivalence issues discussed in other thread, got melders done, you could then target a campaign at older players to get them to come back while running the DnD focused campaign shortly after so, ideally, the new players come in when experienced players are around and able to help them get into the game.
That's why basing it on like "who's been the most unsuccessful org in the past x years" is a really, really bad move and crazy subjective.
I would have to say that you are wrong on this though I can understand it is emotive
However, that is how you stay in business. You cut the chaff from the wheat.
Any business model that starts with throwing away your more successful lines while doubling down on your least successful lines is going to fail.
Counterpoint: Every org since Falaeron's Ascension has gone through periods of being very quiet and unable to participate in the game. Who are you going to choose if every org has had periods of unsuccessful-ness?
But nobody cares about which orgs were successful before - the cut didn't happen then. The cut is happening (potentially) now, so you look at the changes that will disrupt the least number of players now. Which orgs are most populous at the time of the cut is what matters.
That said, it should be four orgs, not three. Three orgs doesn't work, especially in a game where the player base is so inclined to form lasting cliques.
Actually, three does work as stated by older players around during that time as well as Estarra. Four orgs changes nothing.
Other older players said three orgs didn't work. So. Now what?
You look at the reasons for why people think it doesn't work and see how you can address those.
Then you look at the well known issues for why an even number doesn't work and what you would have to do to make that work in a healthy way.
I'm not seeing how three orgs works. Let's say we go down to Glom/Mag/Seren. Glom and Mag are allied and doing their Glom-Mag owns the world thing. Why would anyone in Glom or Mag suddenly step out of that alliance to help Seren when they're winning?
And, if that is the case, then why haven't we seen alliances change in the current meta?
It's almost like players in this community are strongly inclined towards their cliques and refuse to break things up unless an admin literally starts to shrub them.
Again, I'm not talking about what's in the past. I don't know why people are so obsessed with how things were 15 years ago. FIFTEEN years ago. What is the community like -now-? How do players act -now-?
That's why basing it on like "who's been the most unsuccessful org in the past x years" is a really, really bad move and crazy subjective.
I would have to say that you are wrong on this though I can understand it is emotive
However, that is how you stay in business. You cut the chaff from the wheat.
Any business model that starts with throwing away your more successful lines while doubling down on your least successful lines is going to fail.
Counterpoint: Every org since Falaeron's Ascension has gone through periods of being very quiet and unable to participate in the game. Who are you going to choose if every org has had periods of unsuccessful-ness?
But nobody cares about which orgs were successful before - the cut didn't happen then. The cut is happening (potentially) now, so you look at the changes that will disrupt the least number of players now. Which orgs are most populous at the time of the cut is what matters.
That said, it should be four orgs, not three. Three orgs doesn't work, especially in a game where the player base is so inclined to form lasting cliques.
Actually, three does work as stated by older players around during that time as well as Estarra. Four orgs changes nothing.
Three didn't work out that well. It turned into Serenwilde and Celest vs Magnagora. There was no such thing as a 1v1v1, it was a 2v1. Dropping back to three probally would result in the same thing.
EDIT: I just want to note that the reason why it wasn't a wash at the start of Lusternia is that Magnagora has the biggest population by a mile, mags population was big enough that they could happily fight 2orgs vs 1 org and do alright.
Dropping to a 2v1 situation would be ok as long as the one org was big enough population wise to fight the two other orgs.
That's why basing it on like "who's been the most unsuccessful org in the past x years" is a really, really bad move and crazy subjective.
I would have to say that you are wrong on this though I can understand it is emotive
However, that is how you stay in business. You cut the chaff from the wheat.
Any business model that starts with throwing away your more successful lines while doubling down on your least successful lines is going to fail.
Counterpoint: Every org since Falaeron's Ascension has gone through periods of being very quiet and unable to participate in the game. Who are you going to choose if every org has had periods of unsuccessful-ness?
But nobody cares about which orgs were successful before - the cut didn't happen then. The cut is happening (potentially) now, so you look at the changes that will disrupt the least number of players now. Which orgs are most populous at the time of the cut is what matters.
That said, it should be four orgs, not three. Three orgs doesn't work, especially in a game where the player base is so inclined to form lasting cliques.
Actually, three does work as stated by older players around during that time as well as Estarra. Four orgs changes nothing.
Three didn't work out that well. It turned into Serenwilde and Celest vs Magnagora. There was no such thing as a 1v1v1, it was a 2v1. Dropping back to three probally would result in the same thing.
EDIT: I just want to note that the reason why it wasn't a wash at the start of Lusternia is that Magnagora has the biggest population by a mile, mags population was big enough that they could happily fight 2orgs vs 1 org and do alright.
Dropping to a 2v1 situation would be ok as long as the one org was big enough population wise to fight the two other orgs.
First hand experience or second hand knowledge? I did play a little prior to Glom launch, but I was a MUD newb at the time. I am not reliable.
I'm not seeing how three orgs works. Let's say we go down to Glom/Mag/Seren. Glom and Mag are allied and doing their Glom-Mag owns the world thing. Why would anyone in Glom or Mag suddenly step out of that alliance to help Seren when they're winning?
And, if that is the case, then why haven't we seen alliances change in the current meta?
It's almost like players in this community are strongly inclined towards their cliques and refuse to break things up unless an admin literally starts to shrub them.
Again, I'm not talking about what's in the past. I don't know why people are so obsessed with how things were 15 years ago. FIFTEEN years ago. What is the community like -now-? How do players act -now-?
For me the reason why 3 is better isn't really focused on the past, it's based more on experiences in modern games such as FFXIV where you have three groups in conflict encounters.
In those scenarios there's a winner and the other two groups have lost, they might get a consolation prize, but you've ultimately lost and winning outweighs the consolation. The behaviour I've seen and talked about with others is that you tend to see regular shifting in strength often because grouping up against the winner is the only way to actually have a chance at winning.
The current set up of conflict isn't conducive to this, domoths are a prime example because they encourage the strong to group up and split the potential wins between themselves. But if you look at the spread of conflict mechanisms does anything really encourage the stronger orgs to stand alone and the weaker ones to focus them?
At the end of the day, while simple to say and harder to do, all that needs to be done is to rework the mechanisms of the game in a way that promotes the desired behaviours. If you had 3 orgs, make it more rewarding to go solo as an org than to ally, encourage the orgs that aren't winning to work together to go after the other one, eventually if one of the allies gets strong enough they might then stand alone forcing the then former winner to group up with the discarded ally.
@Saran Lusternia's community wouldn't allow for a 1v1v1. There is no way that if (this an example only, it would apply to any org setup) Glom attacked Mag that Seren wouldn't go in to defend if needed. Given that they know that would tip the scale.
In earnest. No one believe a 3 org setup would work in Lusternia knowing the current dynamics. If this is not going to be looked at from a social perspective it will never work. Because you aren't just working with logistics. You are working with people.
Three didn't work out that well. It turned into Serenwilde and Celest vs Magnagora. There was no such thing as a 1v1v1, it was a 2v1. Dropping back to three probally would result in the same thing.
EDIT: I just want to note that the reason why it wasn't a wash at the start of Lusternia is that Magnagora has the biggest population by a mile, mags population was big enough that they could happily fight 2orgs vs 1 org and do alright.
Dropping to a 2v1 situation would be ok as long as the one org was big enough population wise to fight the two other orgs.
I mean, it sounds like it did work out though? Realistically, the actually bad situation would have been if Serenwilde had allied with Magnagora (or Celest could have i guess) because then the biggest org would have the additional support of a smaller org and they would only ever be targeting the other smaller org.
Saran said:For me the reason why 3 is better isn't really focused on the past, it's based more on experiences in modern games such as FFXIV where you have three groups in conflict encounters.
In those scenarios there's a winner and the other two groups have lost, they might get a consolation prize, but you've ultimately lost and winning outweighs the consolation. The behaviour I've seen and talked about with others is that you tend to see regular shifting in strength often because grouping up against the winner is the only way to actually have a chance at winning.
The current set up of conflict isn't conducive to this, domoths are a prime example because they encourage the strong to group up and split the potential wins between themselves. But if you look at the spread of conflict mechanisms does anything really encourage the stronger orgs to stand alone and the weaker ones to focus them?
At the end of the day, while simple to say and harder to do, all that needs to be done is to rework the mechanisms of the game in a way that promotes the desired behaviours. If you had 3 orgs, make it more rewarding to go solo as an org than to ally, encourage the orgs that aren't winning to work together to go after the other one, eventually if one of the allies gets strong enough they might then stand alone forcing the then former winner to group up with the discarded ally.
Ok, so I feel there is a leap in logic being made here. Let me try and hash it out.
1. In 3 org scenarios, if A wins, then B and C have lost. Even if A and B are allied, B didn't actually receive anything in that conflict. 2. This will prompt B to look to ally with C so that they can take down A. 3. Now that B has won the conflict, C still feels like they lost because they didn't receive anything. So now they will ally with A, Etc.
This seems to be the hope/what you've seen in FF14. Is this a fair summation of your position?
Alright, now here's why I feel where the gap is.
1. If A and B are allied, A wins. B feels like they have lost EXCEPT NOT REALLY because A will give them the next wild nodes/domoth/village. So now you have A and B just rotating exactly like they currently do, and C can go wallow in misery.
FF14 is a bad comparison to a game with a population of like 50 people who have formed their own private friend groups for real-life years.
The only way 1v1v1 works is if everytime Glom is allied with Mag for too long, Viravain shrubs Deichtine or Fain shrubs whoever the Mag leader is and goes 'No, bad, change things!'
Which is a way it could work, sure. But players have to be on board with heavy interference from the divine and not complain about it afterwards. So yea, if that's a thing, let's gooooo.
@Saran Lusternia's community wouldn't allow for a 1v1v1. There is no way that if (this an example only, it would apply to any org setup) Glom attacked Mag that Seren wouldn't go in to defend if needed. Given that they know that would tip the scale.
In earnest. No one believe a 3 org setup would work in Lusternia knowing the current dynamics. If this is not going to be looked at from a social perspective it will never work. Because you aren't just working with logistics. You are working with people.
You seem to misunderstand me, my expectation is that it would be 1v2. The ideal set up would be the "strongest" on their own while the other two orgs group up to compete against them.
Your example is where 3 works, the strongest org is attacking the weaker ones and they're grouping together this is not a bad thing. It is a bad thing, when you have 3, Glom attacks Mag and Seren goes in to help Glom.
And to be blunt, a hefty aspect of game design is the devs manipulating the players to engage in the behaviour they want for the game.
Three didn't work out that well. It turned into Serenwilde and Celest vs Magnagora. There was no such thing as a 1v1v1, it was a 2v1. Dropping back to three probally would result in the same thing.
EDIT: I just want to note that the reason why it wasn't a wash at the start of Lusternia is that Magnagora has the biggest population by a mile, mags population was big enough that they could happily fight 2orgs vs 1 org and do alright.
Dropping to a 2v1 situation would be ok as long as the one org was big enough population wise to fight the two other orgs.
I mean, it sounds like it did work out though? Realistically, the actually bad situation would have been if Serenwilde had allied with Magnagora (or Celest could have i guess) because then the biggest org would have the additional support of a smaller org and they would only ever be targeting the other smaller org.
I am hearing from players who played back then that it didn't work. But I am seeing second hand information from others that it did work or responses defying the first hand information. I only started playing 5 years ago so I have no idea what it was like back then. But having met some old players recently who refuse to come back, they are definitely not a fan of the 3 org situation they experienced. I don't see reducing orgs as a viable solution. Even if you kept Glom in tact. If they are hellbent on destroying the game they will go through with this. But I can't believe people are so stupid as to think this won't dislodge some of our most loyal and longlasting players causing a flow on effect. This is just an all round bad idea. I haven't said I told you so for a long time though. So...there is always that joy if they go ahead.
That's why basing it on like "who's been the most unsuccessful org in the past x years" is a really, really bad move and crazy subjective.
I would have to say that you are wrong on this though I can understand it is emotive
However, that is how you stay in business. You cut the chaff from the wheat.
Any business model that starts with throwing away your more successful lines while doubling down on your least successful lines is going to fail.
Counterpoint: Every org since Falaeron's Ascension has gone through periods of being very quiet and unable to participate in the game. Who are you going to choose if every org has had periods of unsuccessful-ness?
But nobody cares about which orgs were successful before - the cut didn't happen then. The cut is happening (potentially) now, so you look at the changes that will disrupt the least number of players now. Which orgs are most populous at the time of the cut is what matters.
That said, it should be four orgs, not three. Three orgs doesn't work, especially in a game where the player base is so inclined to form lasting cliques.
Actually, three does work as stated by older players around during that time as well as Estarra. Four orgs changes nothing.
Three didn't work out that well. It turned into Serenwilde and Celest vs Magnagora. There was no such thing as a 1v1v1, it was a 2v1. Dropping back to three probally would result in the same thing.
EDIT: I just want to note that the reason why it wasn't a wash at the start of Lusternia is that Magnagora has the biggest population by a mile, mags population was big enough that they could happily fight 2orgs vs 1 org and do alright.
Dropping to a 2v1 situation would be ok as long as the one org was big enough population wise to fight the two other orgs.
First hand experience or second hand knowledge? I did play a little prior to Glom launch, but I was a MUD newb at the time. I am not reliable.
@Saran Lusternia's community wouldn't allow for a 1v1v1. There is no way that if (this an example only, it would apply to any org setup) Glom attacked Mag that Seren wouldn't go in to defend if needed. Given that they know that would tip the scale.
In earnest. No one believe a 3 org setup would work in Lusternia knowing the current dynamics. If this is not going to be looked at from a social perspective it will never work. Because you aren't just working with logistics. You are working with people.
You seem to misunderstand me, my expectation is that it would be 1v2. The ideal set up would be the "strongest" on their own while the other two orgs group up to compete against them.
Your example is where 3 works, the strongest org is attacking the weaker ones and they're grouping together this is not a bad thing. It is a bad thing, when you have 3, Glom attacks Mag and Seren goes in to help Glom.
And to be blunt, a hefty aspect of game design is the devs manipulating the players to engage in the behaviour they want for the game.
Small issue with that concept is that the alliances are roleplay based, not strength based.
Just speaking on release date roleplay not as it is now but:
Early day Serenwilde and Celest never would have dreamed of allying with mag no matter what. It was totally against their roleplay. Celest and Seren were close enough roleplay wise that they would generally be friends and always be against Magnagora. If Celest had of had the draw to get the biggest number of players in it during release we'd have seen Celest/Seren allied and dominating mag to the point of mag never winning anything.
I get your concept in that in a fluid situation where the three orgs have no roleplay reason to hate or like each other more than the next then I could see more shifting of alliances but that isn't how lusternia is set up, roleplay is a big big factor behind any of the old alliances.
If you want a fluid 1v1v1 your going to have to rework the orgs backgrounds and roleplay to make them more neutal.
EDIT:
Quick point is that the original seren and celest vs mag worked yes. But it only worked because mag had a population equal to Seren and Celest combined. That's not something you can be sure will happen if you get a fixed 2v1 situation going.
Once again, please be respectful and productive in your conversations on this thread. I will either start deleting posts or close the thread if this devolves into bitterness and snark.
As I said before, 3 orgs did not exist in Lusternia long enough (4-5 months tops?) to really base any sort of conclusions. For those 4-5 months, the first few months were really players getting their feet on the ground because we had just opened, and the last month revolved around a lot of roleplay regarding the opening of Glomdoring. I have a feeling some people just keep thinking it was a lot longer time period before Glom opened than had actually passed (you can just look at event posts). Personally I don't think that's enough time to extrapolate any sort of conclusion.
@Saran Lusternia's community wouldn't allow for a 1v1v1. There is no way that if (this an example only, it would apply to any org setup) Glom attacked Mag that Seren wouldn't go in to defend if needed. Given that they know that would tip the scale.
In earnest. No one believe a 3 org setup would work in Lusternia knowing the current dynamics. If this is not going to be looked at from a social perspective it will never work. Because you aren't just working with logistics. You are working with people.
You seem to misunderstand me, my expectation is that it would be 1v2. The ideal set up would be the "strongest" on their own while the other two orgs group up to compete against them.
Your example is where 3 works, the strongest org is attacking the weaker ones and they're grouping together this is not a bad thing. It is a bad thing, when you have 3, Glom attacks Mag and Seren goes in to help Glom.
And to be blunt, a hefty aspect of game design is the devs manipulating the players to engage in the behaviour they want for the game.
I think one of the main complaints I have heard over the years is where players are 'manipulated' to engage in the kind of storyline they want. The rift between the community is too wide for that to resolve. And quite frankly I don't see how anyone can read through forums over the last few months and blame anyone of Glomdoring for not wanting to play with anyone of Halli/Mag. A lot of our young have recently been exposed to these forums because of this subject. And I have yet to hear any one of them say anything about how lovely and delightful it was to read the forums. And no one is going to believe that anyone of those people are suddenly going to extend an olive branch in earnest. I certainly wouldn't trust it.
I have a question. What happens if you delete Glomdoring (note: I do not expect this to happen, because deleting one of the more populous orgs is just a bad idea, but for the sake of conversation)?
Some will quit. The bulk of the rest will probably move en masse to Serenwilde.
There will likely be an immediate election; after all, if we wanted to play in Serenwilde as it currently exists, we would be there already.
The Sacred Leaves would likely be burned up shortly thereafter in favour of rules that the new majority find more appealing.
More would likely happen past that, but I really can't see the current Serenwilde playerbase enjoying / sticking around when their org is taken out from under their feet and overhauled despite their wishes.
I don't think that's a particularly appealing outcome from anyone's standpoint, either, above and beyond the "population" issue. Players are going to want to make the organization something they enjoy playing in in order to have enjoyment playing the game (this has been true of every org in Lusternia's history). Glomdoring players and Serenwilde players have differing ideas of what is an enjoyable playing experience, and I am rather skeptical that it will merge well.
Saran said:For me the reason why 3 is better isn't really focused on the past, it's based more on experiences in modern games such as FFXIV where you have three groups in conflict encounters.
In those scenarios there's a winner and the other two groups have lost, they might get a consolation prize, but you've ultimately lost and winning outweighs the consolation. The behaviour I've seen and talked about with others is that you tend to see regular shifting in strength often because grouping up against the winner is the only way to actually have a chance at winning.
The current set up of conflict isn't conducive to this, domoths are a prime example because they encourage the strong to group up and split the potential wins between themselves. But if you look at the spread of conflict mechanisms does anything really encourage the stronger orgs to stand alone and the weaker ones to focus them?
At the end of the day, while simple to say and harder to do, all that needs to be done is to rework the mechanisms of the game in a way that promotes the desired behaviours. If you had 3 orgs, make it more rewarding to go solo as an org than to ally, encourage the orgs that aren't winning to work together to go after the other one, eventually if one of the allies gets strong enough they might then stand alone forcing the then former winner to group up with the discarded ally.
Ok, so I feel there is a leap in logic being made here. Let me try and hash it out.
1. In 3 org scenarios, if A wins, then B and C have lost. Even if A and B are allied, B didn't actually receive anything in that conflict. 2. This will prompt B to look to ally with C so that they can take down A. 3. Now that B has won the conflict, C still feels like they lost because they didn't receive anything. So now they will ally with A, Etc.
This seems to be the hope/what you've seen in FF14. Is this a fair summation of your position?
Alright, now here's why I feel where the gap is.
1. If A and B are allied, A wins. B feels like they have lost EXCEPT NOT REALLY because A will give them the next wild nodes/domoth/village. So now you have A and B just rotating exactly like they currently do, and C can go wallow in misery.
FF14 is a bad comparison to a game with a population of like 50 people who have formed their own private friend groups for real-life years.
The only way 1v1v1 works is if everytime Glom is allied with Mag for too long, Viravain shrubs Deichtine or Fain shrubs whoever the Mag leader is and goes 'No, bad, change things!'
Which is a way it could work, sure. But players have to be on board with heavy interference from the divine and not complain about it afterwards. So yea, if that's a thing, let's gooooo.
So you got the summary accurate but lost it at the "gap"
You've described the systems as they are and yes that's an issue. This is why, per the underlined part in the quote of my post, I said you need to rework the mechanisms you're talking about.
The strongest org should be incentivised to stand alone, for quick example, rework the village system so that if you're strong enough you don't want to share because ultimately, you don't need to. If you just had Rockholm and Southgard revolting together for example, you want A (the strongest org) to want both enough that they would risk splitting their party at which point B and C can fight a portion of their forces in each village.
Maybe within the context of Lusternia two orgs do group up for a while, but you'd want the systems in place to reward players for shifting those when they're strong enough to not need an ally, rather than just grouping together forever.
I'd also point out that isn't all of your "gap" basically a description of the current state of the game with an even number of orgs? It's not an inherent issue to the 3 but instead an issue with the reward mechanisms in place that enable behaviour that is negative for the game and so would still happen with an even number of orgs we know this because it has been happening.
Is there a way to conduct an OOC poll ICly like a referendum on a basin wide scale? So that every single player has a chance to weigh in on how they would respond. So that we can get an overview of if this will see too many players leave. Also keeping in mind the flow on effect of even just one person leaving. Because I appreciate that anyone can come to forums and read. But I am aware of a few people who refuse to engage here and I think their voices should be heard too. You are going to lose so much more than you believe and I just don't think that is something any one wants.
You've described the systems as they are and yes that's an issue. This is why, per the underlined part in the quote of my post, I said you need to rework the mechanisms you're talking about.
The strongest org should be incentivised to stand alone, for quick example, rework the village system so that if you're strong enough you don't want to share because ultimately, you don't need to. If you just had Rockholm and Southgard revolting together for example, you want A (the strongest org) to want both enough that they would risk splitting their party at which point B and C can fight a portion of their forces in each village.
Maybe within the context of Lusternia two orgs do group up for a while, but you'd want the systems in place to reward players for shifting those when they're strong enough to not need an ally, rather than just grouping together forever.
I'd also point out that isn't all of your "gap" basically a description of the current state of the game with an even number of orgs? It's not an inherent issue to the 3 but instead an issue with the reward mechanisms in place that enable behaviour that is negative for the game and so would still happen with an even number of orgs we know this because it has been happening.
You already want 2 villages instead of 1 village. The reason you settle on Rockholm and give Southgard to your ally is because it lets you both win some instead of risking winning none. Game theory. You'd have to introduce a system where holding both Rockholm and Southguard somehow convinces people to betray their OOC friends.
Yea. Ok.
Yea, I mostly did it for illustrative purposes to show why shifting alliances won't work in Lusternia except with admin interference. And again, if that is the case, then people need to be much more supportive of it than they have in the past. Because us, as players, telling the admins to check and balance our player politics now is not fair if we're going to have a forum thread vilifying the volunteers in six months.
Once again, please be respectful and productive in your conversations on this thread. I will either start deleting posts or close the thread if this devolves into bitterness and snark.
As I said before, 3 orgs did not exist in Lusternia long enough (4-5 months tops?) to really base any sort of conclusions. For those 4-5 months, the first few months were really players getting their feet on the ground because we had just opened, and the last month revolved around a lot of roleplay regarding the opening of Glomdoring. I have a feeling some people just keep thinking it was a lot longer time period before Glom opened than had actually passed (you can just look at event posts). Personally I don't think that's enough time to extrapolate any sort of conclusion.
As I understand it, Glomdoring wasn't really an active part of conflict when it was first released for some time, and it essentially had to sit out on its own for an extended period. During that time, it was just the original three with the occasional Glom hiccup, politics wise. Perhaps this might be skewing perceptions of the game's past?
@Saran Lusternia's community wouldn't allow for a 1v1v1. There is no way that if (this an example only, it would apply to any org setup) Glom attacked Mag that Seren wouldn't go in to defend if needed. Given that they know that would tip the scale.
In earnest. No one believe a 3 org setup would work in Lusternia knowing the current dynamics. If this is not going to be looked at from a social perspective it will never work. Because you aren't just working with logistics. You are working with people.
You seem to misunderstand me, my expectation is that it would be 1v2. The ideal set up would be the "strongest" on their own while the other two orgs group up to compete against them.
Your example is where 3 works, the strongest org is attacking the weaker ones and they're grouping together this is not a bad thing. It is a bad thing, when you have 3, Glom attacks Mag and Seren goes in to help Glom.
And to be blunt, a hefty aspect of game design is the devs manipulating the players to engage in the behaviour they want for the game.
Small issue with that concept is that the alliances are roleplay based, not strength based.
Just speaking on release date roleplay not as it is now but:
Early day Serenwilde and Celest never would have dreamed of allying with mag no matter what. It was totally against their roleplay. Celest and Seren were close enough roleplay wise that they would generally be friends and always be against Magnagora. If Celest had of had the draw to get the biggest number of players in it during release we'd have seen Celest/Seren allied and dominating mag to the point of mag never winning anything.
I get your concept in that in a fluid situation where the three orgs have no roleplay reason to hate or like each other more than the next then I could see more shifting of alliances but that isn't how lusternia is set up, roleplay is a big big factor behind any of the old alliances.
If you want a fluid 1v1v1 your going to have to rework the orgs backgrounds and roleplay to make them more neutal.
EDIT:
Quick point is that the original seren and celest vs mag worked yes. But it only worked because mag had a population equal to Seren and Celest combined. That's not something you can be sure will happen if you get a fixed 2v1 situation going.
So... to be clear, after going through Seren lore at least...
Serenwilde has a pretty significant stack of reasons already to hate absolutely everyone. One of the common threads about why they even ally with any other orgs is mostly utilitarian, we can't protect what we need to if we don't work with people we hate. When the switch between mag and celest happened it was brought up again that Celest is as bad as Mag as far as Serenwilde is concerned (if not worse because sometimes we forget just how bad the light is)
Your better example would actually be Celest, if you went down to three orgs you need to actually make sure that all three are willing to work together when needed.
I have a question. What happens if you delete Glomdoring (note: I do not expect this to happen, because deleting one of the more populous orgs is just a bad idea, but for the sake of conversation)?
Some will quit. The bulk of the rest will probably move en masse to Serenwilde.
There will likely be an immediate election; after all, if we wanted to play in Serenwilde as it currently exists, we would be there already.
The Sacred Leaves would likely be burned up shortly thereafter in favour of rules that the new majority find more appealing.
More would likely happen past that, but I really can't see the current Serenwilde playerbase enjoying / sticking around when their org is taken out from under their feet and overhauled despite their wishes.
I don't think that's a particularly appealing outcome from anyone's standpoint, either, above and beyond the "population" issue. Players are going to want to make the organization something they enjoy playing in in order to have enjoyment playing the game (this has been true of every org in Lusternia's history). Glomdoring players and Serenwilde players have differing ideas of what is an enjoyable playing experience, and I am rather skeptical that it will merge well.
I believe then shrubbings start happening, but also potentially a lot of face palming when Gloms start coming in "changing" Serenwilde while ignoring that, honestly, the more quieter Gloms talk about what they like/want from Glom, the more is appears Serenwilde already actually offers that.
One of the reasons the deletion, rather than merger, option is bad is because if the admin go down that road they've indicated which organisations would be staying and would need to step in if say Glom turned up and tried to erase the identity of the org the admin decided to keep.
Is there a way to conduct an OOC poll ICly like a referendum on a basin wide scale? So that every single player has a chance to weigh in on how they would respond. So that we can get an overview of if this will see too many players leave. Also keeping in mind the flow on effect of even just one person leaving. Because I appreciate that anyone can come to forums and read. But I am aware of a few people who refuse to engage here and I think their voices should be heard too. You are going to lose so much more than you believe and I just don't think that is something any one wants.
There's actually a few ways to do this sort of polling on a wide scale for free based on accounts with the ability to tie things back to player demographics (this sort of thing is part of my rl job).
Something in-game would be ineffective because it's reach would be too limited and referendums aren't great because of how terrible they are at vote splitting, something outside the game would extend the reach to people that have left as well which can be informative and the tools are more useful for gathering data (it's easy to see like... x retirees say they would return for y solution but z active players don't like y)
I meant specifically IG because we have players who aren't being heard. It doesn't have to be the same setup as a referendum, even just a short survey with user experience friendly options. I am not sure having input from people who do not play is helpful. It would be like asking a parent's perspective on a child's schooling experience. Wtf would they know? They don't live it/play it. There is no validity to it from where I stand. But the people who do actually play, they matter.
Edit: I just think it is more important to have user information from people who use the product. You wouldn't ask a Mac user to give feedback on the latest Windows products...non-players don't know the current dynamics, the game play, alliances or how they got there. While their history is appreciated in some regards. In this, it would likely do more damage.
Comments
Actually, three does work as stated by older players around during that time as well as Estarra. Four orgs changes nothing.
And on that note I shall bow out of this.
For the first bit, the thing about familiarity and the like is that you also have to consider if it's "been done" because it tends to work. Like, people are liable to make assumptions about good and evil when they sign up, you could go with Halli vs Gaudi and probably see people start to perceive one (likely halli just based off their pictures) as good and the other as evil.
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For the second, it's a thing that's been debated a bunch. The issue with an even number of orgs is that you should expect that you'll end up with equal numbers of orgs in alliances (i.e 2v2 or 3v3) but that isn't necessarily reflective of the actual population spread. What I'd expect to see if you went down to three orgs is also some tweaking around conflict mechanisms and alliances which would aim to encourage the strongest org to refuse allies thereby leaving the smaller orgs to work together to take them down. The big thing here is that you need to point all three orgs directly against each other rather than this pairing off method we currently have.
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Third, I'm going to flag that the suggestion of wyrding Serenwilde is something that hits way too close to home as far as player complaints about the forests representation, it would be so much worse than just the commune being dissolved (but the forest surviving) and I fully expect the fall out would similarly be much greater.
Also, I would highlight that the later part about the "misconception" is really what Glom thinks about itself and reflects that you hold some misconceptions about Serenwilde.
Serenwilde is not light, nor dark, it's both, one of the key themes that resonates through the forest is the dichotomies we have. Seren performs ritual sacrifices and blood magic, the dead speak to the forest reminding them of every crime ever committed against the wilde, Farella Lunseer (one of our more notable historic figures) encouraged the fae to drown innocent refugees when old celest was destroyed, another historic figure created a horrifying weapon to use in a vengeful murder spree and the negativity around that is mostly because he betrayed his family to do that, Serenwilde literally started a war with the empire because of Gaudi's experiments (we'll really we'd consider that the empire started it).
This is all implemented lore, the Farella part goes back to before launch afaik because it's in the taint wars docs. It's not an uncommon for people to react and be like "That's a glom thing" when
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Fourth, the cross over between pen and paper roleplayers and MUD roleplayers is actually not always that great in that direction. Like, there's one other person in the gaming club I'm in that plays muds and we have so like 2-3 roleplay games running every day of the week. Some even directly match up with pretty great MUDs and they still don't tempt the roleplayers when I mention them.
For marketing, there's also an issue of timing when you want people to enter your service. If the campaign was successful you'd want to have the newbies enter the game during a strong point to retain them. So like, if you resolved the equivalence issues discussed in other thread, got melders done, you could then target a campaign at older players to get them to come back while running the DnD focused campaign shortly after so, ideally, the new players come in when experienced players are around and able to help them get into the game.
Then you look at the well known issues for why an even number doesn't work and what you would have to do to make that work in a healthy way.
Then you compare.
And, if that is the case, then why haven't we seen alliances change in the current meta?
It's almost like players in this community are strongly inclined towards their cliques and refuse to break things up unless an admin literally starts to shrub them.
Again, I'm not talking about what's in the past. I don't know why people are so obsessed with how things were 15 years ago. FIFTEEN years ago. What is the community like -now-? How do players act -now-?
First hand experience or second hand knowledge? I did play a little prior to Glom launch, but I was a MUD newb at the time. I am not reliable.
The current set up of conflict isn't conducive to this, domoths are a prime example because they encourage the strong to group up and split the potential wins between themselves. But if you look at the spread of conflict mechanisms does anything really encourage the stronger orgs to stand alone and the weaker ones to focus them?
At the end of the day, while simple to say and harder to do, all that needs to be done is to rework the mechanisms of the game in a way that promotes the desired behaviours.
If you had 3 orgs, make it more rewarding to go solo as an org than to ally, encourage the orgs that aren't winning to work together to go after the other one, eventually if one of the allies gets strong enough they might then stand alone forcing the then former winner to group up with the discarded ally.
I mean, it sounds like it did work out though? Realistically, the actually bad situation would have been if Serenwilde had allied with Magnagora (or Celest could have i guess) because then the biggest org would have the additional support of a smaller org and they would only ever be targeting the other smaller org.
1. In 3 org scenarios, if A wins, then B and C have lost. Even if A and B are allied, B didn't actually receive anything in that conflict.
2. This will prompt B to look to ally with C so that they can take down A.
3. Now that B has won the conflict, C still feels like they lost because they didn't receive anything. So now they will ally with A, Etc.
This seems to be the hope/what you've seen in FF14. Is this a fair summation of your position?
Alright, now here's why I feel where the gap is.
1. If A and B are allied, A wins. B feels like they have lost EXCEPT NOT REALLY because A will give them the next wild nodes/domoth/village. So now you have A and B just rotating exactly like they currently do, and C can go wallow in misery.
FF14 is a bad comparison to a game with a population of like 50 people who have formed their own private friend groups for real-life years.
The only way 1v1v1 works is if everytime Glom is allied with Mag for too long, Viravain shrubs Deichtine or Fain shrubs whoever the Mag leader is and goes 'No, bad, change things!'
Which is a way it could work, sure. But players have to be on board with heavy interference from the divine and not complain about it afterwards. So yea, if that's a thing, let's gooooo.
Your example is where 3 works, the strongest org is attacking the weaker ones and they're grouping together this is not a bad thing.
It is a bad thing, when you have 3, Glom attacks Mag and Seren goes in to help Glom.
And to be blunt, a hefty aspect of game design is the devs manipulating the players to engage in the behaviour they want for the game.
You've described the systems as they are and yes that's an issue. This is why, per the underlined part in the quote of my post, I said you need to rework the mechanisms you're talking about.
The strongest org should be incentivised to stand alone, for quick example, rework the village system so that if you're strong enough you don't want to share because ultimately, you don't need to. If you just had Rockholm and Southgard revolting together for example, you want A (the strongest org) to want both enough that they would risk splitting their party at which point B and C can fight a portion of their forces in each village.
Maybe within the context of Lusternia two orgs do group up for a while, but you'd want the systems in place to reward players for shifting those when they're strong enough to not need an ally, rather than just grouping together forever.
I'd also point out that isn't all of your "gap" basically a description of the current state of the game with an even number of orgs? It's not an inherent issue to the 3 but instead an issue with the reward mechanisms in place that enable behaviour that is negative for the game and so would still happen with an even number of orgs we know this because it has been happening.
Yea. Ok.
Yea, I mostly did it for illustrative purposes to show why shifting alliances won't work in Lusternia except with admin interference. And again, if that is the case, then people need to be much more supportive of it than they have in the past. Because us, as players, telling the admins to check and balance our player politics now is not fair if we're going to have a forum thread vilifying the volunteers in six months.
As I understand it, Glomdoring wasn't really an active part of conflict when it was first released for some time, and it essentially had to sit out on its own for an extended period. During that time, it was just the original three with the occasional Glom hiccup, politics wise. Perhaps this might be skewing perceptions of the game's past?
Serenwilde has a pretty significant stack of reasons already to hate absolutely everyone. One of the common threads about why they even ally with any other orgs is mostly utilitarian, we can't protect what we need to if we don't work with people we hate. When the switch between mag and celest happened it was brought up again that Celest is as bad as Mag as far as Serenwilde is concerned (if not worse because sometimes we forget just how bad the light is)
Your better example would actually be Celest, if you went down to three orgs you need to actually make sure that all three are willing to work together when needed.
One of the reasons the deletion, rather than merger, option is bad is because if the admin go down that road they've indicated which organisations would be staying and would need to step in if say Glom turned up and tried to erase the identity of the org the admin decided to keep.
Something in-game would be ineffective because it's reach would be too limited and referendums aren't great because of how terrible they are at vote splitting, something outside the game would extend the reach to people that have left as well which can be informative and the tools are more useful for gathering data (it's easy to see like... x retirees say they would return for y solution but z active players don't like y)
Edit: I just think it is more important to have user information from people who use the product. You wouldn't ask a Mac user to give feedback on the latest Windows products...non-players don't know the current dynamics, the game play, alliances or how they got there. While their history is appreciated in some regards. In this, it would likely do more damage.