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It's boring to be Duirani
I've been putting some thought into this over the last few weeks and thought a forum post would be the best way to express my opinion on the matter. I am aware that, as a city leader (and a long tenured one, if we look at all the times Iesid has been some form of leader in Duiran), it is something I am theoretically in the position to fix. That is not really why I am posting this; I'm not really looking for intervention or some kind of admin assistance, and I'm definitely not here looking to shame the people who work hard as guildmasters or other Speakers in the council. However, I think pretending there isn't a problem is doing a disservice to the other organizations in the game that depend on our participation to have the game world feel 'real' or 'alive', and it is also doing a disservice to ourselves as players who log in to find something interesting to do.
To cut to the chase, I think Duiran is an org that is largely defined by its apathy. No matter what angle a leader tries to go 'in' at, it never seems to really stick. The 'the world is bigger than us' and 'big picture' thinking is just too disconnected from the day-to-day lives that Duirani citizens seem to want to roleplay. 'The Cycle' is an excellent concept on paper, but it has been boiled down to a very tepid 'I guess we kinda dislike undead and vampires, sure' with back-and-forth law adjustments and hazy policy changes that give me the impression of an organization in full identity crisis. The apathy to organizational roleplay is so strong that a lot of characters did not even remember that Dendara is dying - a reminder from Haern about the core of our org RP ended up sending the entire council into a spiral of 'what if we do this?' and we have had not much to show for it after it inevitably burned out into 'whatever just put it on the town crier'.
Not only is the organization apathetic, I kind of perceive it as afraid. Duiran seems terrified of the idea of being the aggressor, villain, or antagonist. If nobody wants to be our villain and we won't play the villain, that means there is no story. Bloodloch and Enorian seem to be happy to bash each other's heads in, but there's no organization that wants to pick that fight with Duiran and Duiran sure doesn't seem to want to pick that fight either. To me, that's not fun. It makes me want to go do something else - or play someone else or somewhere else that isn't Aetolia. I don't want to feel forced to join Bloodloch or Enorian if I want a piece of the action, but Duiran's collective outlook (leaders and all) seem to be collectively unwilling to do anything besides say 'well we have to help Dendara' or 'well Dendara has to come first'.
Dendara, the core aspect of our organization's story, is being used as a way to avoid interaction/conflict and that is not healthy whatsoever. Something has to change. I feel as if we pick and choose what we care about in our organization's roleplay and, when we do not want to do a part of it, we write it off as 'for Dendara'.
Am I crazy? Am I just expecting an org to warmonger? Is it unreasonable for me to want my organization to do cool things instead of trying to make friends with every single NPC and every single PC org?
To cut to the chase, I think Duiran is an org that is largely defined by its apathy. No matter what angle a leader tries to go 'in' at, it never seems to really stick. The 'the world is bigger than us' and 'big picture' thinking is just too disconnected from the day-to-day lives that Duirani citizens seem to want to roleplay. 'The Cycle' is an excellent concept on paper, but it has been boiled down to a very tepid 'I guess we kinda dislike undead and vampires, sure' with back-and-forth law adjustments and hazy policy changes that give me the impression of an organization in full identity crisis. The apathy to organizational roleplay is so strong that a lot of characters did not even remember that Dendara is dying - a reminder from Haern about the core of our org RP ended up sending the entire council into a spiral of 'what if we do this?' and we have had not much to show for it after it inevitably burned out into 'whatever just put it on the town crier'.
Not only is the organization apathetic, I kind of perceive it as afraid. Duiran seems terrified of the idea of being the aggressor, villain, or antagonist. If nobody wants to be our villain and we won't play the villain, that means there is no story. Bloodloch and Enorian seem to be happy to bash each other's heads in, but there's no organization that wants to pick that fight with Duiran and Duiran sure doesn't seem to want to pick that fight either. To me, that's not fun. It makes me want to go do something else - or play someone else or somewhere else that isn't Aetolia. I don't want to feel forced to join Bloodloch or Enorian if I want a piece of the action, but Duiran's collective outlook (leaders and all) seem to be collectively unwilling to do anything besides say 'well we have to help Dendara' or 'well Dendara has to come first'.
Dendara, the core aspect of our organization's story, is being used as a way to avoid interaction/conflict and that is not healthy whatsoever. Something has to change. I feel as if we pick and choose what we care about in our organization's roleplay and, when we do not want to do a part of it, we write it off as 'for Dendara'.
Am I crazy? Am I just expecting an org to warmonger? Is it unreasonable for me to want my organization to do cool things instead of trying to make friends with every single NPC and every single PC org?
11
Comments
Duiran has arguably some of the -best- lore in the game, the nature/life/cycle/renewal RP is something that I feel has a prominent place in our encompassing lore and opportunities for some amazing things to be had. I have seen some of the -strongest- roleplayers come from Duiran and embody those idealisms and beliefs with such detail and prose that it is truthfully a force to be reckoned with on a roleplay level.
That being said.
Duiran has struggled to be willing to sever its connection to Enorian, much like Bloodloch arguably had with Spinesreach until recently.
I would say outside of Ylem conflict Bloodloch and Spinesreach are seperate entities, as we have seen in recent battles/wars, with Spinesreach taking a more passive stance not having vested interests in the conflict and Bloodloch taking a few lumps along the way to build its identity and (I hate that I am using this term) Patriotism for the Empire. Duiran however seems to stand more as the accomplice to Enorian's goals rather than its own in many facets of things, and truthfully I believe in my heart Duiran strong enough to stand alone as well, they have some strong players, fighters, roleplayers and writers who could develop upon the lore and mission of the Council and provide it some real energy to avoid the apathy that speaks for its purpose.
Afterall you have Dendara, a plane riddled with corruption and aberrations, obviously things like Teradrim/Shaman RP to stand on and push conflict, Sentinels could become vampire hunters, the monastery could challenge the Archivists as those of knowledge and know how, and state that their arts are a perversion of mortal body and discipline (Im spitballing here) That being said, I have been in Duiran, and it absolutely does feel like you get struck down if you are outside the box, but you have to take some lashes, I know during my time there, we had some struggles with players like Wylliam and Courene who were adamant about a certain way of things. I name them specifically cause years back they were a bit of an argumentative IC hot button.
You can be like that sure. But bandwagoning that an organization should be a certain way requires a leadership that is willing to piss off its populace and say no, this is the direction of our organization. Unfortunately you do take some losses having to do this, you cant please everyone and you will be damned if you try, trying to please everyone is a downfall of organizations, the antagonism and conflict is what will make an org thrive. Unfortunately this is a game and not a chat room. These are characters and not the behaviors of players. There is IC and OOC. I honestly left Duiran my last round through, as I was a spirit member of Bamathis order, during the time when there was alot of heavy words and symbolism being struck against both the God and the Player of the God. It was a troubling time, I was called racist, a nazi and many things OOCly based on Oonagh's decisions from players in Duiran.
It was disgusting.
I know that Duiran is not like that now, I know that there is some strong god roleplay, a from what I have seen a great Haern, and opportunities to develop and push things. In the end this is something I faced as Imperator/Ivoln RE: Bloodloch. Azvosh is not the charge of Bloodloch, it is the charge of Ivoln's chosen, the Teradrim Warband is not Ivoln's army, it is duty bound to the Pillars. In this same vein, Dendara is the duty of the Shamans. Not the entire Council. The Sentinel have the prime wilds and defending it externally, the Sentaari....I still don't know what their purpose is....be a catholic monk monastery? (Sorry @Rihrin I know you are working on this, and have goals...it has to be as frustrating for you as it is from the outside).
I think that Duiran needs to divorce itself from a singular purpose that defines itself however, it cant be apathetic to the world because Dendara is first, and unfortunately it has struggled with this for some time, I would recommend leadership maybe chat with Elene a little bit on what she has done with Bloodloch, I think she has a good head on her shoulders and could provide some feedback to strengthen Duiran and see it as a force in the world, and not just a force for Dendara or Enorians handmaiden.
I love you guys and I love Duiran lore, I want to see you thrive, you deserve it and while my words can often be harsh and blunt, they are done with good intention and hope that Duiran finds itself, you have some amazing people there who want to as well, I know it.
1. Some people are playing as Enorian's henchmen because there's no other conflict to be had. The slavery war is a great example; sure, they all had IC reasons, but I think I would personally not stretch cause as much if I had some cause of my own to care about - Duiran refuses to take these kinds of stances to the point where we were willing to negotiate with a bunch of NPCs cutting down our trees. We, as an org, have to take our own stances sometimes and we just don't seem to be.
2. Enorian is just another ticket in the DENDARA LOTTERY that dominates the organization's entire mindset.
What is the DENDARA LOTTERY, you ask? The Dendara Lottery is my nickname for the idea that anybody, at any time, could be the solution to the defining aspect of Duiran's organizational roleplay. Because anybody, anywhere, any time could be a winning ticket to solve this woe, we have to be careful with everyone and everything we meet until we're sure it's not useful. This means that Duiran is often everyone's henchman, because we just can't be sure except in the most obvious cases, so we have 'got be careful.
The OOC secret is that Dendara is never going to die but also that player characters are probably never going to fix Dendara permanently. If they did, Duiran would need something new to be motivated about - 'protect Dendara now that it is alive' is just asking them to go further down the 'isolate and don't participate' rabbit hole. I do not expect players to warp their character decisions based on this OOC knowledge, but I think there's a certain aspect of 'we are playing a game' that we should all keep in mind when we start drifting towards very passive game states.
This is something I've said before: Azvosh, Dendara, and the Shadow/Spirit plane, while absolutely interesting (and Azvosh/Dendara are some of my favourite parts of the game and its lore) are passive, intangible pieces of the game that discourage conflict rather than encouraging it.
If something happens to the Pillars, Azvosh crashes into Prime and everything goes kaput. If Dendara dies, everything goes kaput. If Shadow breaches Prime, everything goes brainwashed kaput. If Spirit breaches Prime, everything goes brainwashed kaput.
This is not compelling or conducive to conflict between orgs, as it is in no side's interest to potentially lose everything just to "get one over" on their enemy.
If this planar lore was a background set piece, this largely wouldn't be an issue. They would add flavour to their respective orgs and other aspects of org RP would encourage conflict. However, that's not how the planar lore has been introduced or implemented to the game at large, instead defining entire orgs and being the lynchpin of their RP and the game's "conflict".
Its unhealthy and, you're right, it needs to change. The planar lore needs to be shifted into the background or retconned entirely so as to be tangible, interactable parts of the game world that can be attacked and have stakes beyond "everyone dies".
YES... PLEASE!
I think it's fine for organizations to have their own unique RP that sets them apart from others, but I don't agree that conflict for the sake of conflict is the answer to that. Hating everyone and wanting to war with everybody simply because their views don't align with your own is really low-hanging fruit when it comes to storytelling, and I think it'll do far more harm than good in the long run. Especially because this is a social game, where people want to feel included and part of a community. So I guess if your community revolves around fighting anyone who isn't part of your tribe, how is this a good thing to for the game's atmosphere? It sounds like a worse version of the claims of tether tribalism.
I've randomly been hearing snippets of people in the playerbase wanting to push to get rid of tethers entirely, and frankly, I don't think the playerbase is mature enough to handle a complex game atmosphere like that, with a constant, shifting political landscape. I get the feeling it would ultimately devolve into cities being friends/enemies based on the personal relationship between the CL's themselves. And even doing this would put immense pressure on the different guilds within the cities, so with the current infrastructure we have, cities will continue to have all the power (if not more, if we get rid of tethers) to steer the direction of the game and guilds will.. essentially be strong-armed into changing their goals and directives just to fit in.
Re: the slavery thing - it felt super weird to not see more Duirani care about slaves. In the fantasy setting, freefolk and wildlings have.. typically been very pro-freedom, anti-slavery. Not saying there can't be some inter-org drama where a caste system would be in effect, that lower-ranked people were considered only for labor, menial duties, etc.
I wouldn't say Duiran is apathetic at all. There were some very hard conversations had between Sry and Rihrin about the lumberjack thing (and possible mass murder of everyone in Dolbodi), and I think Rihrin handled that tension rather well, all things considered. This example in particular was good for Enorian, because I think it helped us realize where our line in the sand in; and that happens to be slaying children. The shitty thing is that I get the feeling most people in Enorian would have no problem helping Duiran defend Dendara or protect the Cycle, but Duiran cares so little about the 'Light' or anything Enorian cares about so it's quickly starting to appear like a very unbalanced relationship.
I've been trying to keep an open mind when it comes to Enorian's goals, myself. Because while I think the idea of being these fanatical zealots who'd kill anyone who can't be converted sounds rad as fuck, I also understand that not everyone wants to buy into that type of RP. So really, it's on us as leaders to look at the orgs we run and ask, "Okay, what's a realistic atmosphere and tone I can set for my org that encourages other people to want to play, from die-hard Aetolia players to even the most casual, weekend warriors?" Because what's fun for me, may not be fun for another. And while yes, I may be one person at the helm of the org I'm leading, it's not my personal agenda I'm trying to push. I'm just steering the boat in the direction other people want to go, and trying to make it as fun and engaging for them as I can along the way.
Tell me how I'm doing!
Maybe it's not fine. Maybe saying it's fine isn't helping the conversation move forward.
Having just experienced a directionless, RP-diluted Bloodloch, I can definitely say that you're going to alienate some players, but those players are usually, in my experience, the very ones holding the org back and preventing it from existing in the overall game world. It's time for them to step back from the chatroom they've helped create and learn to exist in a living, breathing world around these themes and stances they can't seem to stomach - there will always be room for them, they just have to put in the work to find that space (even if that means making some RP changes or even changing orgs).
If you have ideas and ambitions for your organization, what is actually stopping you from branching out to tell the story behind those ideas/ambitions?
It could be that people are apathetic, or it could be that most people are happy with what they're doing and aren't interested in pushing conflict, in which case... I wish I had more useful advice, but I don't. I suspect there's an OrgReq that could get people excited about having tangible goals and getting into conflict, but I don't know enough about Duiran to make any suggestions. Yes, but also no. It depends.
This is probably something I'm going to discuss more in-depth Tuesday on the Gray Accords /plug, but the Spirit vs Shadow Tether made a strong impression on me when I came back to Aetolia. It's how the cities and classes are organized, so I naturally assumed it was a huge deal because it defines player conflict and player conflict is the main draw of IRE games. Since then, I think the only event I was involved with that involved the Shadow was the Revenant release, where the Shadow tether was fighting the Shadow. The Ivoln vs Dhar event might count as well, but I'm not sure how directly the Shadow was involved with that. It definitely felt more like a religious conflict.
There's definitely an IC and an OOC disconnect between what I've been told about the Spirit vs Shadow conflict and how that conflict has played out in the game from what I can tell. The Yvalamon event was a much bigger deal and it was basically the first time I paid any attention to Albedos beyond some past events that people still referenced on occasion and the endgame bashing areas.
Now, for most things I want to do, the Shadow vs Spirit conflict doesn't matter. Encouraging metaphysical conspiracy theories, nerdy philosophical lectures, science experiments gone horribly wrong, OrgReq items for the guildhall that allow people to roleplay experiments with some degree of uncertainty and novelty -- that's all built on the guild's basic themes. I want to add a Shadow flair to some of it, but that's mostly aesthetic.
But in spite of that, the one thing I've been struggling with the most is carving out a niche for the Archivists in the Shadow tether, and I feel it's something I absolutely need to do because it's the core conflict of the game. Let's be honest, HELP ARCHIVISTS does its job well, but to a new player who wants to try out the Shadow Tether, HELP SCIOMANCERS is much cooler. The Archivists need their own thing to draw people into the Shadow side, not just mad science.
And I have plenty of ideas for this! The hurdle is that, because it's such a large part of the lore, I need to work within the plans set by the Pools, and I don't know what those plans are. I can't ask for an evil bodyjacking Duamvi parasite to experiment on because, according to HELP DUAMVI, that's not how they work. The stuff I want for the Archivists is on a small enough scale that I'm confident I can get something that'll do, but I can see how Duiran could have problems when Dendara is core to the organization's roleplay and it's not clear how much agency the players have over it.
tl;dr: Orgs 100% have the tools and leeway to develop their roleplay, but there are cases where the lore creates obligations and expectations that are tricky to work with.
My frustration is that I think this mindset that players have collectively adopted is signing away adversaries or antagonists for the org. We can't have any bad guys or enemies if everybody could be the solution to our Dendara problem - not because the lore says we can't, but because that's how the organization has gone about interpreting that way forward according to that lore. After all, what if we accidentally sucker punch the one guy that can fix the problem and he no longer wants to help us? That's not an impression that the admin gave us, it's just some restrictive nonsense we invented amongst ourselves in the collective approach to the story. I think the problems I am running into, similarly, are all player driven. I sometimes get the feeling that my character is not taken that seriously, despite speaking to the truth that others tell him they want the council to embrace, but that's an IC issue that can be tackled or confronted.
On the matter of org direction and stuff like that, being taken seriously and all those important things come from consistency I think and unfortunately Duiran hasn’t had a lot of it. Yes the Dendara nature thing is always there but the org has had a rough go. From having to be restructured because of org abuse to welcoming shadow in their walls to deciding wait no I take it back to now, it’s a lot of flux.
Unfortunately it’s not a problem I know how to fix but I can speak to how FUN it is to give an org identity. Those of us in Damariels new order are having a good time mixing stuff up and while it would probably piss off anyone who was WAY into Jesus Damariel, it’ll make the org better as a whole. You just gotta rip off the Bandaid.
More topically, it's... hard to want to care about micro-level things when the macro-level issues are so important re: Xaspher. If I don't defend Dendara all Life dies. If we don't defend the pillars, presumably Azvosh and the Prime make out so hard that existence ends. If we don't destroy the Shadowbound, then Ohlsana will eventually make Sapience puppets for Her cause. If we don't try to stop Sciomancers from bringing more excess Shadow into the Prime, eventually existence becomes too hostile for life to survive because Shadow eats it all.
Almost everything org-defining is potentially world-ending. It's... hard to, OOCly at least, care about any one thing when everything is a catastrophe. My character has his own focuses, of course, but even those aren't really realistic with the kind of game that this is. Without y'all up top making major time commitments to coding/developing/etc things, the giant high-level Metaphysical/Planar/Age of Dawn related org goals never really go anywhere, and never can go anywhere.
The Age of Dawn is a good one - there's no way it can possibly actually happen, from an OOC standpoint. But it's been the basis for everything Enorian's bought into.
I feel this might help:
These types of broad concepts are more of a prompt to build mission statements off of. There's a certain degree of disbelief I suspend when deciding my character's actions: he does not know that Dendara or its state are just an idea that provides motivation for one of 4 city-orgs to have RP interactions about. It's really 'just' the plot to me, the player. To Iesid, though, this is a real and tangible thing that serves as a source of existential catastrophe or serious crisis. He will react how he needs to, but I as a player still accept that he's never going to do anything that ends the entire plot hook of the organization he belongs to. However, he can do things that either gives him or his comrades a glimpse of light at the end of that impossibly long tunnel. There are things that can be done to take steps towards these concepts, even if they are forever on the horizon for the sake of keeping the game open/plot running.
Being realistic what you want your character to do is important: instead of 'achieve the Age of Dawn', have you considered what your character could do that serves as a milestone on the road to that? I think that is what those goals or concepts are for - it's an unattainable finish line, but there are tangible victories that individual players or given generations of them can attain on the way there.
Is there something uniquely bad about the Age of Dawn that I'm missing?
You don't have to wait for the admin to respond to any of that. You don't need anyone's approval for it. This is going to sound uncharitable, but it feels less like an issue of permission and more that the attached consequences of doing so aren't something anyone wants to suffer.
And sorry for hijacking your thread, @Iesid.
The org and its guilds have issues and a lot of these issues have persisted for RL years to an extent I don't think that I have seen other cities struggle with (grain of salt, obviously, as I've only experienced my own experience, believe it or not). I would absolutely hesitate to put this on just the playerbase, or just the pools, so much as a consequence of a long term buildup of the overall environment. Sometimes it definitely happens because of leadership - and sometimes it happens in spite of leadership, which I'd like to think is the case now. Because as a guild leader currently, man, holy unicorns I am trying.
But sometimes it feels like that time I was an officer in an RP FC in ff14 - at one event I ran a ton of people (ten to twenty) would show up, and the next week I'd have, like, two people. No feedback, no criticisms, nothing in between but the occasional 'i had fun!' and I'm left doing guesswork as to why one approach worked once and then never again. At times it's worse in Duiran because I get a crumb or two of feedback, adjust accordingly, and continue to get nothing. I don't think I'm alone in that.
Duiran as a whole feels a lot like that impenetrable enigma. In one day, we get lore drops that should light a fire under our collective butt (most importantly, Haern reveals that Dendara is not only dying but actually in the death sleep) but seemingly really struggle to move forward with any of it despite what seems to me the best efforts of many players. I know I've chased geese down rabbit holes for RL hours in the time since and turned up, as best I can tell, absolutely nothing of value, and I don't think I'm alone in that either.
I do think there's nothing inherently wrong with having a section of the playerbase which is just more quiet than others, to be clear, even if I do recognize that can make it harder to engage with. And I don't want to devalue the useful feedback I DO get from other players, because as I hope is obvious from my previous writing I do really appreciate it; nor do I want this to just be me pitying myself, and I apologize if it comes across that way. But it's kind of exhausting when you can't tell if you're doing something wrong or not because, overwhelmingly, you don't even get negative responses. I'd like to think I'm still not alone in that (although it might be better from a game health perspective if I am lmao).
Consider this: Players can organically select an agenda based on what's important to them and execute the concept now knowing that there can be some form of respected resolution if outside forces intervene. And this is without the need for heavy, if any, admin assistance at all.
A Syssin spies on an organization and discovers they have come into possession of interesting relics/artifacts? They plan a heist or maybe just sell the information to the Archivists or blackmail another org because [insert theme/hook of choice]. The Archivists lockdown a zone because they want to do some experimentation RP or believe the area holds a clue to [insert theme/hook of choice here]. Perhaps the Illuminai want to set up an outpost or encampments for healing/purging because [insert theme/hook of choice here]. Maybe Duiran shifts their policy on Spirean affairs and applies heavy organizational pressure now because [insert theme/hook of choice here].
They can hit up their crafters for supplies to try and get the city abuzz with activity in preparation for the operation: posters, manacles, food/drink, tents, whatever they need. Engage in political talks, leverage treaties or contacts/relationships to push their agenda. Using the context clues from their own skills, established lore, etc. organizations can craft a fun story of their own that is as serious or silly as they desire it to be. "Woah! Did you know the esophagus of a Grook produces 2 metric tons of kinetic force when spitting? Maybe we can harness this into a weapon somehow! FOR SCIENCE!"
All these in turn can prompt several things. A Celani might get inspired and involve themselves to help enhance the story. Another player or organization might catch wind of the activity and seize the opportunity to get involved and mix in their own agenda. If diplomacy fails and things escalate to violence, players can now use battlefields to dictate terms of resolution to any given story. The Duirani prompts aren't any different.
Are there players that will eye-roll and ignore your attempts at storytelling for one reason or another? Sure. Will there be times where the story hits a roadblock or questions go unanswered? Yes. While I can understand the fears and frustrations that can accompany it, failure is a healthy part of the process. Take breaks here and there if you have to but remember to keep trying. There can be no progress without a bit of player respect, ambition and desire to go out and do things.
(Web): Abhorash says, "Nerds."
(Web): Abhorash has left your web.
Alela's Affirmations