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Aban at a Lesser!
Tiur
Producer
A few of you were angry today when Aban took part in a Lesser! Let me address that real quick.
Under old Aetolia rules Abhorash did that once or twice. Aban has too. It's been a long time so it passed out of memory. As old as it may be, I never changed that rule. (And there is a rule, they get graced when they die and moved somewhere else)
The bad look here is that an admin took a side. We never want bias, so that's hardly what we were going for. We just felt like Spirit might appreciate some bolstering and rah-rah, a little admin attention. Things have clearly changed, so I'll amend the rule and you won't see this sort of thing again.
Let's make this a learning moment. What's your opinion? Is it better if the Adminchar dies instead of the grace stuff? Can this be done without frustration? The goal was to blur the line between NPCs being animated and never helping, or Gods just throwing lightning and blowing people up. Note, I ask this for education, not that we're going to make binding decisions with quick consensus here.
Other thoughts:
Is it okay if there's no XP loss?
Events only?
Do we need to make sure someone is active on both sides?
Under old Aetolia rules Abhorash did that once or twice. Aban has too. It's been a long time so it passed out of memory. As old as it may be, I never changed that rule. (And there is a rule, they get graced when they die and moved somewhere else)
The bad look here is that an admin took a side. We never want bias, so that's hardly what we were going for. We just felt like Spirit might appreciate some bolstering and rah-rah, a little admin attention. Things have clearly changed, so I'll amend the rule and you won't see this sort of thing again.
Let's make this a learning moment. What's your opinion? Is it better if the Adminchar dies instead of the grace stuff? Can this be done without frustration? The goal was to blur the line between NPCs being animated and never helping, or Gods just throwing lightning and blowing people up. Note, I ask this for education, not that we're going to make binding decisions with quick consensus here.
Other thoughts:
Is it okay if there's no XP loss?
Events only?
Do we need to make sure someone is active on both sides?
3
Comments
That as the deathsight, automatic teleport to the temple of the gods, and make him use a player skillset like zealot or templar with some special buffs to represent his unattainable badassery and I'd be perfectly happy to try and pop that deathsight. Woundsight. Whatever!
Also I don't want anyone on shadow side. If abhorash shows up I'll kill him myself.
I think there are other ways for the admins to show both sides support without actually doing anything that would tip the scales directly. I actually feel similarly when I see the Shadow gods favouring the Shadow cities as often as they do, especially when in the last two months where I've been here it feels like Spirit has had it much, much less. I can count maybe twice where it has happened.
Perhaps another way of looking at it is to ask why you guys feel the need to give Spirit some bolstering. I'm not saying there is any admin bias here, but the truth is that it seems like Shadow -does- get more attention just because their gods have been more active in general. I think if both sides had at least the perception of the Gods being active on a similar level then we wouldn't be in a situation where you might feel there is a need to use measures such as this.
We are always talking about IC repercussions for IC actions, SEE: Indorani
Let this kind of stuff upset the balance and have IC repercussions. Shells should not be immune to the repercussions that players face.
The bias has nothing to do with tethers as much as it has much to do with failures to drive the story in a meaningful and impactful manner, which is important.
Seeing a powerful Akkari fall in battle...would be an amazing RP plot point that could be utilised in storytelling for the volunteer/admins to use to bolster or empower through grief/loss.
Immunity and avoidance of repercussions, has little story driven meaning and only causes bad feels.
I would deeply hate to lose the potential for that interaction, because it provides me with an eternal carrot: if I win, I'll be unicornsing legendary
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.
As for a solution, I think it would be fantastic to see these NPCs at lessers or majors again. With the caveat that they only fight each other. In that way, they're maybe locked in combat with each other and used as a thematic or flavorful approach instead of a mechanical approach. Whichever NPC 'wins' a fight with the other would be dictated by whatever side wiped out the other side, etc. Hell, you all could even schedule when you want to do these by having said NPCs be the ones to discover the lesser(while spawning it with admin commands). Maybe you could even tie a fame line to it if your side wins. 'Aeryx stood side by side with Exarch Aban as he slew Meanieface Bob' or something.
There's a lot of potential for fun stuff here, I hope everyone sees that once they cool off.
Give me Dama and Bama at each other's throats, let it get physical and go beyond just emotes. As long as the players are able to hurt said divine or NPC or whatever and make an actual difference I don't see the problem.
if you're not going to let us kill them like normal people, force a teleport when they get graced. Kick them out of the fight, completely. Allowing them to sit there soaking up precious attacks from behind grace was what frustrated us (i'm taking some liberty to speak for a few people, they can kick me if I'm wrong) It felt better than usual when we rallied after and took the lesser back because we got merc'd by the admiNPC. No lie.
And maybe make them less irritating to hit or less irritating to get hit by? He bounced off rebounding and balknocked the target as if they had hit him >_>
The 'unkillable' part is one of those. Last time he was out and attending lessers he actually did get killed once or twice. I am looking into why he can't anymore, my guess is it was something temporary for an event that was later forgotten about.
That rebounding bal knock sounds like it might just be a bug, I'll take a look into it.
the complaints i hear from spirit RE admin attention generally fall into one of two categories: 1) lack of general interaction with gods, and/or 2) lack of blessings/boons (from gods). neither of these complaints is addressed by giving spirit a win button in a pvp (player-versus-player) conflict. have spirit gods just turn up to chat with people more often and give out blessings/boons. doesn't have to be big ol' events all the time - whichever volunteers play shadow gods seem to have had that figured out for ages. address the specific problem with specific (and tbh, the obvious) solutions rather than reinventing the wheel. whether or not this was "fun" or "fair" for both sides, it simply doesn't address the problems it was apparently intended to solve, and so in that regard, it's a failed attempt.
As far as Aban himself? Fix the bugs. I'm not aware of the abilities, but apparently he does damage through rebounding. With a weapon. Keep him tied to lessers and other skirmishes that are meant to be fun and nothing else. Could use him and Abhorash both as a sort of equalizer to encourage resistance when one side outnumbers the other. Since it's controlled by a player, you could make informed decisions about when to offer that help, too! If it's Benedicto and 7 level 30 novices (or 30 level 7 novices???) vs. Shadows A Team, sure, bring him out.
I think the idea is fun, but the implementation wasn't right this time. You guys seem to have this big deal where if something goes sideways on the first go, you just don't do it again. I'm supporting this to hopefully break you guys of this habit.
Experience Gained: 47720 (Special) [total: 2933660]
Needed for LVL: 122.00775356245
I'm going to echo some of the sentiments of @Iesid, @Mjoll, @Rijetta and @Bulrok;
As the longest running Spirit leader in terms of combat, I can agree with what Iesid said about Spirit's apathetic attitude towards anything they feel isn't an admin event.
Regarding admin involvement across tethers currently, there is an incredible difference in levels of interaction between players when there's an admin possessed shell saying 'Let's do something' as opposed to someone like me saying 'Could do with some help!' If there is something that can be done to improve those levels of involvement, I'm all for it. It is also highly depressing to know that you're fighting against Shadow folks who are rocking, in some cases, as many as three different blessings and all the benefits that those blessings provide to stats/damage resist/etc. Just having Aban around recently has prompted a much higher number of RP engagements both within the city and without. It's been nice to just know, if nothing else, that we're not being left completely in the wind.
In terms of admin involvement in combat, I think as long as the mob is killable, has to retreat from battle and isn't wildly OP in a fight, I see no problem with them being involved in things like lesser combat. I saw earlier someone say why would Aban/Abhorash be interested in resources like ylem/orrery. I can't speak for Abhorash but Aban and the rest of the Duamvi rely on Enorian for protection/shelter. It's just as much their home as it is any other character or NPC who lives there. He would have a vested interest in making sure that Enorian has the resources to remain strong and capable of defending it's walls. Ylem plays a part in that.
Rijetta's point about how badass would it be to get a 'killing' blow on one of these guys is something I wholeheartedly agree with. I love the fame lines that people have where it tells people they got the final blow on someone. It could also be something that actually helps/encourages people to turn out, like they do for big eld in majors, when they think there's a fame line to be had! Also also, it just adds a really interesting RP point to what is usually just PK mechanics driven event.
But we can't rely on admin RP'ing with us for it all, set up new systems but it needs to be things players can manage themselves. We need to be able to drive the incentives, and when things are released run them ourselves. Treat them as something important, teach the novices about them, explain why it is important to win them. RP around them, there are things I can think of to motivate spirit to wanting to keep ylem out of the hands of shadow. The death of Niuri could be a good teaching example for them, about the greed of shadow and how letting us control the ylem en threatens all of existence. How we are greedy and would abuse it, and even our own gods would turn against us to save creation from our greed. Plenty of other examples too, there is a lot of lore to build around to motivate people to fight shadow for them. But it needs to be organized and presented from the leaders to everyone, and built into the culture.
On a final note, I'd offer advice to stop using the term LOW-TIER combatants, and presenting it like they don't matter or don't count. Everyone helps. Even if they show up to just spam a bashing attack, or are just there and soaking up attacks, it helps. Discounting them, making them feel like it doesn't count, calling them low tier, will discourage involvement far more than anything admin can do or not do. No one will want to come or help or try, if they get put down for doing it the first few times they try. That kind of attitude would scare me right out of a game. Or at least out of trying to do any PK or conflicts. Every bit helps, and you shouldn't be negative about having inexperienced people helping, or call them low tier. They are the next batch of your top fighters, they should be encouraged, and if you have a bunch of them showing up that's a good thing, it means the next generation wants to get involved and come up. Teach them, help them, support them, stop calling them low tier. I can't think of something more unhealthy for the future of an organization than demoralizing everyone that's not super experienced, and discourages them from ever getting there.
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:
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).
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.
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.
This of course only focuses on the mechanical benefits of the perceived difference in activity between Gods of the two tethers, and doesn't consider the roleplay and non-mechanical incentives having active divine in organisations. For many people, seeing your own gods shouting, or even being on WHO, can be an incentive to engage in that aspect of the game. I've seen IRE orgs die because they had long periods of inactive gods, just to be revived very soon after one or two come back to being active.
The perceived activity of Spirit gods versus Shadow gods is actually the crux of the problem. That should be fixed rather than trying to come up with new ways to give mechanical benefits to either side just so they feel appreciated.
EDIT: I also think it would be quite interesting for Admin characters to show up in day to day affairs, but without being involved directly in combat. For example, appearing in person and giving people tasks to accomplish would be a pretty awesome way to use those characters!
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.
It is actually quite different. For the record, these are the mechanically important parts of a blessing in regards to PvP:
Three blessings would be, if I'm understanding this correctly, 9% damage reduction. It's not insignificant, but it's also not the game changer some make it out to be (speaking as someone who, until recently, often went long stretches without blessings). Given the right strategies and team coordination, 9% damage reduction can absolutely be negated. A point to all stats is arguably the more important aspect here, and that can be obtained via milestone wares if necessary, though it's important to note that milestone stats and blessing stat boosts stack.
Meanwhile, a shell like Aban not only adds another body to your total party count, it has (or had, depending on what changes are made) special mechanics and a unique class that people don't have access to for testing and creating system defenses for. It is, in my opinion, far stronger than a simple blessing or three, especially in the right admin hands.
I'll gladly concede the final part of your statement, that it's ultimately no one's fault for these things being unobtainable, but comparing the two otherwise as bare mechanical advantages is like comparing apples and oranges and, while not your intention, is a little disingenuous.
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.
We, as players, have suggested either auto-blessings or the ability to offer and bless oneself for 24 hours every 24 hours, but players and admin alike have balked at the idea in the past, and it's never been acted upon. I really think that if both tethers' gods can't be equally active and WILLING (this part is important) to bless, it's time to either ditch blessings giving mechanical advantages or make it possible for players to obtain the buffs on their own instead of relying on volunteers who all have their own rules and hang-ups around blessing freely.
It does add in the option for cities to try to actively recruit players from other orders that they don't have represented in their city, expanding on RP opportunities and possibly making cities work harder to try to get a certain mindset of people, and gives the added benefit of order membership having some sort of boost.
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.
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.