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Best Of
Agriculture and Commodities
Alright I'm not even going to beat around the bush about this. Farming as a means of commodity production is a big failure in its current state, and I have very little hope that Mining and ??? will deviate from this.
There are a few of reasons for this and they're all a bit interrelated:
1) It has taken way too long to get all of these skills out there.
2) Farming is tedious and there is little room for it to be rewarding, and there is no reason to expect the other skills to not be similar.
3) There is a huge bottleneck in the time it takes to produce items in the production facilities.
4) There is a hard cap on the number of people who can actually participate in this system.
There are also peripheral problems, such as market orders and provisioning that only allows a very small number of people to take part (despite the Provisioning skill costing 100 credits to even buy), but I'm not going to focus too much on that here. Instead, I'll go over the four points I made above.
1) It has taken way too long to get all of these skills out there.
With the time it seems to have taken Farming to come out, and then now for Mining, and whatever the ??? third skill will be, commodity stockpiles have been dwindling overall. Beyond the trickle of comms that you can buy from villages, there is just no way to produce all but 4 of the comms right now.
2) Farming is tedious and there is little room for it to be rewarding, and there is no reason to expect the other skills to not be similar.
Growing crops/calves is an incredibly tedious exercise and it can become a daily chore for some people. Given the time investment, you would expect the reward to be fairly high, but that just isn't the case. The problem here is that there are gold sinks (in the form of seeds, maintenance etc.) here with absolutely no "faucets" other than the production of commodities. This is not a bad thing except the burden is on cities to provide the reward for the farmers. Once the gold sinks are taken out of the equation, it is a zero-sum situation. For every gold of profit the farmer receives, the city is paying one gold. Cities can adjust taxes and prices, but all they really do is shift how much gold the farmer receives/city pays. This means cities are limited in how much reward they can offer the farmer, not just because their own gold is a finite resource, but because if they tried to pay too much they'd have to price their own comms for sale even higher, leading to a surge in prices for final products that we all use.
3) There is a huge bottleneck in the time it takes to produce items in the production facilities.
Production facilities take time to produce goods and this becomes one of the biggest reasons why this whole system is currently a failure. Take rope as an example. I won't explain the maths in this post (I can walk through it later if people want me to), but it takes 45k rope (as well as 22.5 mil gold, 60k leather, 35k iron, and 22.5k coal) to buy and fully upgrade a clothier. With a level 3 clothier and 3 apprentices, assuming the production facility is used with 100% uptime to produce rope, every RL year the facility would still only be able to produce around 32k rope. This means that just to produce enough rope to cover the initial rope cost of the facilities would take a city close to 1.5 RL years of full time rope production.
4) There is a hard cap on the number of people who can actually participate in this system.
Very closely related to point 3, the number of people who can actually participate in ridiculously low. Again not going to go into the maths here, but if we continue to use hemp/rope as an example, 2 farmers could potentially produce more hemp each year than a single fully upgraded clothier can handle. This is a hard cap, which means even if you have 50 people who want to get into farming, they cannot actually make use of the raw resources they generate because there will just be an indefinite backlog in the production facilities with just those 2 farmers.
Points 3 and 4 actually lead to another issue, which is that these caps are static. It doesn't matter if we have 10 players or 1000 players playing the game and using up comms. The rate at which we can generate them remains static and we will find ourselves with more and more shortages if the system remains this way.
I really want to be hopeful for Mining and ??? to fix our commodity issues but given how far off we are with Farming, and to a somewhat lesser extent Provisioning, I just don't see why we wouldn't have similar issues there unless there is a fundamental shift in design goals. I know a lot of people are excited about Mining, but I can't help but feel that many of them will just end up being disappointed after they find out all their efforts will be for naught.
There are a few of reasons for this and they're all a bit interrelated:
1) It has taken way too long to get all of these skills out there.
2) Farming is tedious and there is little room for it to be rewarding, and there is no reason to expect the other skills to not be similar.
3) There is a huge bottleneck in the time it takes to produce items in the production facilities.
4) There is a hard cap on the number of people who can actually participate in this system.
There are also peripheral problems, such as market orders and provisioning that only allows a very small number of people to take part (despite the Provisioning skill costing 100 credits to even buy), but I'm not going to focus too much on that here. Instead, I'll go over the four points I made above.
1) It has taken way too long to get all of these skills out there.
With the time it seems to have taken Farming to come out, and then now for Mining, and whatever the ??? third skill will be, commodity stockpiles have been dwindling overall. Beyond the trickle of comms that you can buy from villages, there is just no way to produce all but 4 of the comms right now.
2) Farming is tedious and there is little room for it to be rewarding, and there is no reason to expect the other skills to not be similar.
Growing crops/calves is an incredibly tedious exercise and it can become a daily chore for some people. Given the time investment, you would expect the reward to be fairly high, but that just isn't the case. The problem here is that there are gold sinks (in the form of seeds, maintenance etc.) here with absolutely no "faucets" other than the production of commodities. This is not a bad thing except the burden is on cities to provide the reward for the farmers. Once the gold sinks are taken out of the equation, it is a zero-sum situation. For every gold of profit the farmer receives, the city is paying one gold. Cities can adjust taxes and prices, but all they really do is shift how much gold the farmer receives/city pays. This means cities are limited in how much reward they can offer the farmer, not just because their own gold is a finite resource, but because if they tried to pay too much they'd have to price their own comms for sale even higher, leading to a surge in prices for final products that we all use.
3) There is a huge bottleneck in the time it takes to produce items in the production facilities.
Production facilities take time to produce goods and this becomes one of the biggest reasons why this whole system is currently a failure. Take rope as an example. I won't explain the maths in this post (I can walk through it later if people want me to), but it takes 45k rope (as well as 22.5 mil gold, 60k leather, 35k iron, and 22.5k coal) to buy and fully upgrade a clothier. With a level 3 clothier and 3 apprentices, assuming the production facility is used with 100% uptime to produce rope, every RL year the facility would still only be able to produce around 32k rope. This means that just to produce enough rope to cover the initial rope cost of the facilities would take a city close to 1.5 RL years of full time rope production.
4) There is a hard cap on the number of people who can actually participate in this system.
Very closely related to point 3, the number of people who can actually participate in ridiculously low. Again not going to go into the maths here, but if we continue to use hemp/rope as an example, 2 farmers could potentially produce more hemp each year than a single fully upgraded clothier can handle. This is a hard cap, which means even if you have 50 people who want to get into farming, they cannot actually make use of the raw resources they generate because there will just be an indefinite backlog in the production facilities with just those 2 farmers.
Points 3 and 4 actually lead to another issue, which is that these caps are static. It doesn't matter if we have 10 players or 1000 players playing the game and using up comms. The rate at which we can generate them remains static and we will find ourselves with more and more shortages if the system remains this way.
I really want to be hopeful for Mining and ??? to fix our commodity issues but given how far off we are with Farming, and to a somewhat lesser extent Provisioning, I just don't see why we wouldn't have similar issues there unless there is a fundamental shift in design goals. I know a lot of people are excited about Mining, but I can't help but feel that many of them will just end up being disappointed after they find out all their efforts will be for naught.
Czcienn
8
Re: Small Ideas - AIN'T NO COMBAT THREAD
I am not sure how I feel about that idea. I worry that it would mostly punish more casual players than benefit the regulars. Maybe a 48/72 hour period from first-login after your character went dormant? That feels like a more reasonable wait to me. It stops knee-jerk alt-hop-posts (which i think is what the point of this idea is) but doesn't seriously impact any genuinely playability
Zaila
0
Re: Aban at a Lesser!
I disagree. A mechanical advantage is a mechanical advantage. If you don't agree, try fighting without your artifacts. It might not make a difference in every fight, but I guarantee you will feel it in many cases. That is what going into fights into a group of enemies all rocking 3 blessings when you have none is like.
comparing the two otherwise as bare mechanical advantages is like comparing apples and oranges and, while not your intention, is a little disingenuous.
I'm not trying to justify Aban's involvement. I already stated that I am against it. I'm just pointing out that there is a good reason why many Spirit fighters might not be as sympathetic to the complaints about a mechanical advantage (admittedly in this case a large one) being given via divine means. This was one fight. The mechanical advantages Shadow gets through their blessings is almost every day.
Czcienn
2
Re: Aban at a Lesser!
I'd like to note a few things about this as well that I haven't seen been talked about. Facts...in fact!
1.) There were three battles at this lesser. The first battle we lost. The second battle, we won, because Aban came. Then Aban intentionally left, and told us he had to leave. Then the third battle happened, and we lost again. We lost 2-1 at this lesser, despite this 'insane advantage' we had.
2.) Each side in this discussion is going to be inherently biased in one extreme or the other. There probably isn't much to be gleaned from this discussion, as such. I am 100% sure if this was flipped the other way in both sides cases it would produce the same sentiments on each side.
3.) A lot of people who were 'inspired' to come to this lesser by the actions of Aban that wouldn't normally probably thought it was some event they wanted to attend. That's -typically- what NPCs are used for. We have no problem in most cases on Spirit side getting people 'inspired' to come to lessers.
Really, I think losing 1 battle out of 3 at a lesser due to an admin played NPC and then saying that it will be the end of everything and cause people to 'depend on admin to fight their battles' is an incredibly exaggerated response, particularly when you take the history of anything like this happening in the past into account.
1.) There were three battles at this lesser. The first battle we lost. The second battle, we won, because Aban came. Then Aban intentionally left, and told us he had to leave. Then the third battle happened, and we lost again. We lost 2-1 at this lesser, despite this 'insane advantage' we had.
2.) Each side in this discussion is going to be inherently biased in one extreme or the other. There probably isn't much to be gleaned from this discussion, as such. I am 100% sure if this was flipped the other way in both sides cases it would produce the same sentiments on each side.
3.) A lot of people who were 'inspired' to come to this lesser by the actions of Aban that wouldn't normally probably thought it was some event they wanted to attend. That's -typically- what NPCs are used for. We have no problem in most cases on Spirit side getting people 'inspired' to come to lessers.
Really, I think losing 1 battle out of 3 at a lesser due to an admin played NPC and then saying that it will be the end of everything and cause people to 'depend on admin to fight their battles' is an incredibly exaggerated response, particularly when you take the history of anything like this happening in the past into account.
Aeryx
0
Re: Aban at a Lesser!
So speaking historically, there has been a lesser back around 2013-14 time frame where Abhorash showed up and shadow side won by a hefty amount because of a godmob NPC that couldn't be killed. Spirit showed up with their A-team... Valingar, Aishia, Bene, Trager, Dato, Haven and some random people who weren't whales.... back then, Spirit tether griped and whined just as much then that it happened to them, that Shadow side is saying now "That was garbage, you have an admin helping you."
If you are having trouble with getting players to rally to you and fight, that means there's more that you (as leaders) can and should be doing to get people interested to do so. You shouldn't need admin intervention to push you to do something. That's called an excuse and a crutch.
While I understand that everyone plays a different game than everyone else, at the end of the day, you can't force people to go. No matter how awesome Benedicto is at leading his team of Spirit players, he's going to burn out and someone else will need to be as charismatic, convincing, and enabling as he is. I could say the same thing about Mazzion, Mjoll, Iazamat, and Bulrok on Shadow side. All of these people have ideas and get people to actually WANT to fight with you.
Ultimately, I do not think that you need admins fighting your fight at any sort of PVP event because it will ALWAYS generate a bias. That perception of bias is clearly seen in multiple threads where Iesid claims that Shadow side gets more god love than Spirit side (despite the fact that this is only recent), but Tiur says that Spirit needed a pick-me-up. Our perceptions are everything. And ultimately, if the admins get involved, at some point there WILL be a bias because its in human nature to want to support the people you're closer to. Everyone likes to win. Our celani are part of our community, and as such, are privy to the fallacy of human nature.
That said, my vote will be to not allow admins or admin NPCs to be involved in any form of PVP conflict, player generated, event generated, or otherwise.
Edit:
Re: Blessings
Correct me if Im wrong, but I'm pretty sure that players that have the right order privs can give a boon to their order/city. So I mean, if people are running around without boons/blessings... That could also be seen as a player solved problem vs an admin problem.
Edit Edit:
Since someone decided to explain the difference between boon and blessing... if blessings really are that much of a complaint about not having them, perhaps figure out a way to allow the Order Head to give a blessing to their city or something. This would resolve any form of possible complaints about not having them.
If you are having trouble with getting players to rally to you and fight, that means there's more that you (as leaders) can and should be doing to get people interested to do so. You shouldn't need admin intervention to push you to do something. That's called an excuse and a crutch.
While I understand that everyone plays a different game than everyone else, at the end of the day, you can't force people to go. No matter how awesome Benedicto is at leading his team of Spirit players, he's going to burn out and someone else will need to be as charismatic, convincing, and enabling as he is. I could say the same thing about Mazzion, Mjoll, Iazamat, and Bulrok on Shadow side. All of these people have ideas and get people to actually WANT to fight with you.
Ultimately, I do not think that you need admins fighting your fight at any sort of PVP event because it will ALWAYS generate a bias. That perception of bias is clearly seen in multiple threads where Iesid claims that Shadow side gets more god love than Spirit side (despite the fact that this is only recent), but Tiur says that Spirit needed a pick-me-up. Our perceptions are everything. And ultimately, if the admins get involved, at some point there WILL be a bias because its in human nature to want to support the people you're closer to. Everyone likes to win. Our celani are part of our community, and as such, are privy to the fallacy of human nature.
That said, my vote will be to not allow admins or admin NPCs to be involved in any form of PVP conflict, player generated, event generated, or otherwise.
Edit:
Re: Blessings
Correct me if Im wrong, but I'm pretty sure that players that have the right order privs can give a boon to their order/city. So I mean, if people are running around without boons/blessings... That could also be seen as a player solved problem vs an admin problem.
Edit Edit:
Since someone decided to explain the difference between boon and blessing... if blessings really are that much of a complaint about not having them, perhaps figure out a way to allow the Order Head to give a blessing to their city or something. This would resolve any form of possible complaints about not having them.
Rhyot
1
Re: Aban at a Lesser!
I want to withdraw my support for this idea. Iazamat is right. It's Player vs. Player anyways. This will build into an unhealthy reliance on the administration for struggling orgs(tether?) when there are better avenues for the admin to take to assist. The first time this goes wrong one side will be filled with nothing but vitriol and hate for the admin and the other side. I wanted to be supportive for the sake of being supportive, but Iazamat provided a voice of reason I needed to hear.
Bulrok
1
Re: Aban at a Lesser!
I simply can't agree to admin-controlled characters showing up to ylem conflict, no matter how inconsequential some find them. As lessers/majors remain our only form of regular world conflict with any stakes (orrery is scheduled, pointless, and largely despised as a conflict system), I don't want admin interference in one of the few things we have available for duking it out. Even more so when one considers it's the only outlet for PK some have. It doesn't matter how fair or balanced the admin-driven shells might be.
If we had any other regular means of world, player versus player conflict, I might relent to these shells showing up to lessers during the odd blue moon. I'm also perfectly fine with people wanting to go 1v1 with the shells, but Aetolia is not currently in any state to handle what was attempted here, especially not after multiple scenarios of perceived bias (that never found resolution, had players lied to, and are still clearly being felt now by both tethers). I'm glad that people think it's cool, but it doesn't change the fact that it's wildly inappropriate and only engenders hurt feelings from the side that doesn't get the advantage, nor does it teach a side to improve, only rely on the admin to bail them out. Emir used to claim that we had a problem of the playerbase waiting on the admin for everything, this only further reinforces that notion.
I'm trying to be fair here, I'm trying to convey why I see this as a negative experience, and to see my reactions called incendiary and knee-jerk while people proudly flaunt their tether tribalism is both hypocritical and upsetting to say the least. If the shoe had been on the other foot last night, I would have felt the same way and been extremely sympathetic of people's negative experience. The current dismissive reaction from some doesn't encourage people being heard, and in a game with with sub-100 regular, active players, we can't afford not to listen. We're not an MMO with a vocal minority that can be safely ignored.
To answer the thread's questions:
If we had any other regular means of world, player versus player conflict, I might relent to these shells showing up to lessers during the odd blue moon. I'm also perfectly fine with people wanting to go 1v1 with the shells, but Aetolia is not currently in any state to handle what was attempted here, especially not after multiple scenarios of perceived bias (that never found resolution, had players lied to, and are still clearly being felt now by both tethers). I'm glad that people think it's cool, but it doesn't change the fact that it's wildly inappropriate and only engenders hurt feelings from the side that doesn't get the advantage, nor does it teach a side to improve, only rely on the admin to bail them out. Emir used to claim that we had a problem of the playerbase waiting on the admin for everything, this only further reinforces that notion.
I'm trying to be fair here, I'm trying to convey why I see this as a negative experience, and to see my reactions called incendiary and knee-jerk while people proudly flaunt their tether tribalism is both hypocritical and upsetting to say the least. If the shoe had been on the other foot last night, I would have felt the same way and been extremely sympathetic of people's negative experience. The current dismissive reaction from some doesn't encourage people being heard, and in a game with with sub-100 regular, active players, we can't afford not to listen. We're not an MMO with a vocal minority that can be safely ignored.
To answer the thread's questions:
Is it okay if there's no XP loss?
Yes. Exp means nothing and is, at this point, a largely outdated concept and poorly maintained system that's only served to foster specific mindsets (such as defeatism after a single setback).
Events only?
Yes. Whether that's a world versus some big bad or both tethers versus Daixomoth/Aban/Abhorash or even a single tether locked into mortal combat with the admin shell and his player companions, this will always be the better way to handle special NPCs and shells. If they show up, it should be because their presence means something and they have both a story and a purpose to advance for the game as a whole, not to "rally the troops". No side's apathy is going to be solved by an NPC showing up, it's temporary morale that will quickly be forgotten in the face of much deeper issues that need addressed by the players themselves.
Do we need to make sure someone is active on both sides?
It depends wholly on their purpose. If we're going to insist that they show up to world PvP outside of an event, then yes. You'll otherwise be dealing with accusations of bias and unfairness again. If they show up to events and players attack them/the shells are given sufficient motivation to attack players, then no.
Honestly, I'm aware that I seem to be in the minority regarding the cool factor, fairness, and overall impact this may or may not have. I simply don't feel it's a worthwhile endeavor, especially because it puts the onus on either the admin to be fair about how often, when, and who they use these shells for or the players to put aside any negative feelings they may have when Abhorash shows up for the third time in a year and Aban hasn't been seen because he doesn't have an admin player.
Iazamat
5
Re: Mildly Irritating: Aetolia's Pet Peeves
Nah. Let's not. It shouldn't have happened and "pray you get the same attention" doesn't justify it.
Iazamat
0
Re: Mildly Irritating: Aetolia's Pet Peeves
It shouldn't need said, but Aban (and other admin-controlled characters) should not be showing up to lessers (or other player-based group pvp) for either tether.
Iazamat
1
Re: Aban at a Lesser!
I am going to be harsh here, because you asked for feedback:
I think it was fine and people that offered complaints are just bellyaching. I think you shouldn't take the incendiary reaction from Shadow as indication that this should never happen again. You should look at how you can improve the experience instead of saying we can never have it. Here's some feedback I'd give after fielding a few discussions with players on the other side (thank you for your civility @Rijetta and @Bulrok ) ...
1. Don't let them participate in conflict that clearly matters. I might be in the minority, but lessers as a conflict mechanism are old enough where they possess much the same quality as Who's Line does: the rules are made up and the points (ylem) really do not matter. This means don't let Aban show up to majors or orrery or anything else with discernible rewards that aren't a pointless tallying of a resource we don't really care about accruing these days.
2. Tune Aban, Abhorash, or other shells to not be an absolute pain to fight. If you want them to be a little extra powerful, cool. What I've heard from other people is that Aban is not fun to be hit by or fun to hit. Every complaint that I seem to hear comes down to the fact that Shadow decided to try hitting him and couldn't, wasting valuable rounds where we went through Shadow's team like a hot chainsaw through butter.
3. If an NPC shell dies, make their death be a 'narrow escape' and then we rely on Aban's pilot to respect scout's honor and not come back. Woundsight, as @Rijetta said! I would love to see Shadow players gain fame lines like 'She bested the Hand of the Il'ahji in combat.' for bringing those characters down. I could definitely see this then becoming a really cool and rare collectible. 'Spiritbane' comes to mind as an example title for such a neat fame!
4. I'm of the opinion that it is getting tiring to hear NPCs prattle on about the importance of their values and then expect PCs to be the ones to back up those claims. Aban actually showing up is a force multiplier for the relevance of Duamvi as a Spirit concept.
The problem with Aban showing up to this specific lesser is that the first fight was an exceptionally strong lineup on Shadow's end of the field and Spirit was, as usual, a ragtag crew of lower-end players who are just trying to get their guild progression done or their city points tallied. The moment Aban volunteered to come help out, Spirit felt galvanized because of this: the only time Spirit gives a shit is when the narrative forces them to. If you can capture that specific lightning in a different bottle, maybe do that... but really, what I notice about the psychographic profile of Spirit players is that they don't want to participate in something unless they know it is admin generated. We have finally come out of a wintry environment recently where none of us really roleplayed with one another and were trapped in our own personal bubbles; the only thing that ever popped that bubble before (and sometimes still) is a god shoving their way into Spirit's comfort zone and bodychecking them out of it.
More than anything, I must reiterate: do NOT take the extreme path here. Do not take the potential of this experience away. This was a terrific experiment and you can make something fantastic by incorporating feedback in a way that doesn't entail ruling out doing this again.
I think it was fine and people that offered complaints are just bellyaching. I think you shouldn't take the incendiary reaction from Shadow as indication that this should never happen again. You should look at how you can improve the experience instead of saying we can never have it. Here's some feedback I'd give after fielding a few discussions with players on the other side (thank you for your civility @Rijetta and @Bulrok ) ...
1. Don't let them participate in conflict that clearly matters. I might be in the minority, but lessers as a conflict mechanism are old enough where they possess much the same quality as Who's Line does: the rules are made up and the points (ylem) really do not matter. This means don't let Aban show up to majors or orrery or anything else with discernible rewards that aren't a pointless tallying of a resource we don't really care about accruing these days.
2. Tune Aban, Abhorash, or other shells to not be an absolute pain to fight. If you want them to be a little extra powerful, cool. What I've heard from other people is that Aban is not fun to be hit by or fun to hit. Every complaint that I seem to hear comes down to the fact that Shadow decided to try hitting him and couldn't, wasting valuable rounds where we went through Shadow's team like a hot chainsaw through butter.
3. If an NPC shell dies, make their death be a 'narrow escape' and then we rely on Aban's pilot to respect scout's honor and not come back. Woundsight, as @Rijetta said! I would love to see Shadow players gain fame lines like 'She bested the Hand of the Il'ahji in combat.' for bringing those characters down. I could definitely see this then becoming a really cool and rare collectible. 'Spiritbane' comes to mind as an example title for such a neat fame!
4. I'm of the opinion that it is getting tiring to hear NPCs prattle on about the importance of their values and then expect PCs to be the ones to back up those claims. Aban actually showing up is a force multiplier for the relevance of Duamvi as a Spirit concept.
The problem with Aban showing up to this specific lesser is that the first fight was an exceptionally strong lineup on Shadow's end of the field and Spirit was, as usual, a ragtag crew of lower-end players who are just trying to get their guild progression done or their city points tallied. The moment Aban volunteered to come help out, Spirit felt galvanized because of this: the only time Spirit gives a shit is when the narrative forces them to. If you can capture that specific lightning in a different bottle, maybe do that... but really, what I notice about the psychographic profile of Spirit players is that they don't want to participate in something unless they know it is admin generated. We have finally come out of a wintry environment recently where none of us really roleplayed with one another and were trapped in our own personal bubbles; the only thing that ever popped that bubble before (and sometimes still) is a god shoving their way into Spirit's comfort zone and bodychecking them out of it.
More than anything, I must reiterate: do NOT take the extreme path here. Do not take the potential of this experience away. This was a terrific experiment and you can make something fantastic by incorporating feedback in a way that doesn't entail ruling out doing this again.
Iesid
8