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Vortex Event- Feedback
With the ending of the recent Vortex event, I am interested in getting feedback on the event itself from the perspective of players, and of what sorts of events you'd like to see in the future. Feel free to ask any questions, give criticism of the Vortex event, say what you liked about it, and offer suggestions. For those who aren't aware, I am considering the event to have begun with the messages about feeling 'weak or ill', continuing with visions about the Bloodwood, angry demons, the release of the Vortex, the rifts and runes and portal tuning, and ending with the unfortunate death of the amalgamation of corpses, aka, Sid. Anything which happened related to the event during that period of time is fair game.
However, I have several caveats about replies:
Please do not post criticism of past events. For one thing, odds are good I'll have no idea what you're talking about(I haven't been around that long), and even better that there's nothing that can be done about it now. Please do not post criticism of other players/organizations or their role in this or any other event. Please do not post criticism about the Vortex area itself. Please do not turn this into a rage thread, as it will, of course, be closed, and I will be sad. Criticism is not rage when it is constructive, which means being specific... and keeping in mind that, as a volunteer, my only reward is to make the game fun, and to get better at doing that.
Assuming that your reply adheres to the rules above, I will probably respond to it, if only to say how awesome your ideas are. And I will answer any questions, to the best of my ability.
However, I have several caveats about replies:
Please do not post criticism of past events. For one thing, odds are good I'll have no idea what you're talking about(I haven't been around that long), and even better that there's nothing that can be done about it now. Please do not post criticism of other players/organizations or their role in this or any other event. Please do not post criticism about the Vortex area itself. Please do not turn this into a rage thread, as it will, of course, be closed, and I will be sad. Criticism is not rage when it is constructive, which means being specific... and keeping in mind that, as a volunteer, my only reward is to make the game fun, and to get better at doing that.
Assuming that your reply adheres to the rules above, I will probably respond to it, if only to say how awesome your ideas are. And I will answer any questions, to the best of my ability.
2
Comments
- Mob interactions and RP and the building story
- Keeping track of the various visions and trying to piece them together
- the challenges in coordination to get the runes once the syntaxes were sorted out
- Some of the scuffles and fights to try to sneak in and get runes attuned and conflict in conflict-oriented areas
- That the portal room got god-locked during that final build up so we could have a chance of seeing the story and emote before the fighting took place.
Things I did not like:
- Doomsday prophecies that never seem to hold any water can be frustrating and tiring to try to rally behind. They give little choice IC save apathy or 'we have to do something this is BAD' - then we're the perpetual chumps when the thing ends up happening anyway and it's really not that big of a deal. IC I guess it can be like the anti-vaxxers claiming everything gives autism when it doesn't, but that gets pretty flat after a while.
- That the Vortex (which the portals were going to happen regardless of what we actually did, though maybe this new portal would have had more of a Demonsbane result if Ascendril had attuned?) is left in a bit of a weird spot. What is the point? Is it really bad, or irrelevant in the end? Demonsbane don't seem to hold much water now.
- What's up with these Indoron/Indoroni? The terminology and history is getting blurry for who is what where, when it comes to the Aztob (Indoroni being the current guild, Indoron being the old empire).
Questions:
- So the Indoron that got through the portal what, another future event? Went back into the portal? A new threat to add to the list of things to be wary of in Sapience (that is, they're out in Sapience hiding out/hanging out in BL/etc)
- What's stopping them from completely coming through now that their portal is up? What is stopping any of them from coming through now that the portals are up, and maintaining the Vortex as a 'thing'?
The portal-tuning thing was designed to alter the ending of the event. If the Ascendril had won, much would have gone differently. I'm not sure how, exactly, since I didn't spend any time on it once they lost, but there would have never been a Sid, Mandre, or the Indorani escaping. Otherwise... yeah, in some regard, it was irrelevant to the Vortex itself. The second portal still would have been there. It is very difficult to create an event where the players drastically affect the outcome... I'm not sure I can give a better explanation than that, but I wish I could.
Indorani is the current guild, Indoron is the old empire, and the Aztob is a sect of the Indoron that broke off from them 300 years ago. Mandre and the other indorani did not go back into the portal. Where they are now and what they do next will be answered soon(a couple days or so, by my prediction)
Once the sciomancers were gone, the portal destabilized and returned to the state much like the one of the portal in the Bloodwood. I.E., the Indoron cannot leave, but those outside can enter/exit. They were never able to escape through the Bloodwood portal because they were bound, in a sense, to that plane by the ritual done to create the Vortex in the first place. Right now, also, new recruits for the demonsbane are taking up the fight in keeping them from trying again.
Anyway, I agree with most of her points. One thing I really did NOT like was the god-locked room. However, later on, I realized it was probably necessary. Those players, like myself, who are very very conflict-oriented normally don't stop once the first lick has been thrown, and it can be difficult to be like, HEY ISHIN, KNOCK THAT SHIT OFF MAN, GOD. Usually because I don't listen.
The only other thing is that really, what reason do we have to care? One side was Scio, one was Ascen. I don't even know what the preachings of the Scio side were, but I sure heard several times SIDE WITH THE DEMONSBANE OR THE WORLD MIGHT END. PLANAR MERGING IS BAD, OKAY?! That could be blamed on the Sciomancers not really having a stake in Spinesreach, as most are from Bloodloch, but outside of those two and the Cabal being all WE HEROS MUST SAFF WURLD, I really didn't see a reason for Spinesreach to like...actually care at all.
I would really like to see more effort being put out to motivate organizations on the individual, or composite(city) level to care about events and the like. Like Areka mentioned, it's really easy to be like THE WORLD WILL END IF YOU DON'T TAKE PART IN THIS, but imo, that really cheapens the quality of the event itself. I'm not sure if this event was intended to be open-ended or not, but when things like locked down rooms happen, it(to me) makes it seem like it's being more admin-guided than allowing we, as players, to dictate the world we live in. Which isn't necessarily bad thing in some situations(like Dreikathi raids), but I think it's something that should be kept in mind.
Also please bear in mind I'm very conflict-oriented, like I said, so I'm not trying to offend anyone, just give my feedback.
I remember, involve me and I
learn.
-Benjamin Franklin
Re the god-locking: it allowed for the RP to happen a bit, which only delayed the PK rather than turning it off in entirety, which was nice!
Re involvement: people will get involved in just about anything. The world always ending then those threats fizzling out like old soda makes the end results, in a story and RP sense (as well as a "I lost sleep trying to stop -that-?! We were warned of another Kerrithrim, not Mad Uncle Ernie."), kinda iffy. If it's doomsday, it really needs to be doomsday - all of these boy cried wolf scenarios are what make it a bit harder. More localized threats with a more realistic representation of their threat level and sphere of influence I think would both make event writing a bit easier as well as player-side grasping just how it fits into things. You'll still have lifers rushing to defend a threat to a smaller area that could potentially provide enemies with new allies, at least, and I'm certain the BL and Spines crowd would equally turn up if they had a chance at another tool to stick it to us with.
Thanks for the clarification on the portals and stuff! That makes more sense than the impression I had otherwise.
What I liked:
- The PK of the entire event (of course, I'm not a very heavy RP player either)
- Having to work together, both offensively and defensively, to stop the spirit side from attuning and winning the portal.
What I didn't like:
- God mobs: As a darkie, I really don't care to hear what any spirit mob has to say as it is generally in line with "I don't agree with the darkies and here's why". So making them unkillable, to me, is abit ridiculous. Yes, I understand that they may have pertinent information, but thats the price we pay for killing any mob. Though I will listen to neutral/darkie mobs and not kill them, though that's probably self-explanatory.
- God-locked rooms: Yes, doing this allowed the event to go on, but the event could have gone on anyway between the lulls of PK. Only difference is that it allowed the event to finish quicker.
- Mandre/Sid: Even after being asked who his allies were, the amalgamation AKA Sid, still attacked those who said they were his allies (Bloodloch and some Spireans). Made it really difficult to actually believe that we were able to affect the outcome, especially when we couldn't stand in the room to actually protect it.
Questions:
- What the hell were we even fighting over?? Everyone was confused and pretty much only fought because #PK and #conflict.
I'm always reluctant to use mechanical means like the room-lock and invincible mobs for exactly those reasons, and try to balance it for what's necessary story-wise. It's tricky, sometimes. I didn't find any of that offensive, but thank you!
Although, they probably shouldn't have been able to attack, and I wouldn't use one to attack a player during an event. Shrug. Hindsight. The event needed to finish quicker! Kind of the same deal with the invincible mobs. I get that you want to pk, but if we were gonna wait till everyone got bored pking...well, I'm pretty sure the event would still be going on. (Her) Whether or not Mandre believed the large crowd of complete strangers, some of whom claiming to be allies and some not, Sid was basically mindless, beyond recognizing its creator. Just because it's also evil doesn't mean it needs protecting... Besides, Mandre warned you!
Some of it you did affect, just not everything. There are things that may still happen that you can control, so there is that. To stop the apocalypse! Or... for freedom!
As I mentioned/agreed with before, the dark side didn't have much of a motivation to get involved... but then, since you got involved anyway, you didn't seem to NEED much motivation to get involved. So, I dunno. I'm all in favor of giving more motivation to both sides in the future.
As a caveat I got to learn a bit more about some other facets of the game and even got some novices included whom would have maybe otherwise not have found something engaging in the Cabal, which can be difficult in our niche roleplay setting. It's not for everyone.
I learned that even in a make-believe game, people will only listen to what they want to hear.
It's kinda like real life.
So while I wasn't part of the ending, with Sid and Mandre, I liked the parts I was part of. Whether you like rp or pk, you could find something you like.
Hrm.
The event just quickly went from super exciting to fairly irrelevant in my opinion. I haven't really thought about it all that much since I am not really playing Aetolia very actively these days, but I guess it was anticlimactic to have all this stuff building up over time and then it not really affecting anything at all. I guess events/storyline arcs that hinge on being present at the final event just never appealed very much to me since I live in the wrong timezone to participate (it was basically the same with the Dreikathi and Nega-Iosyne events, which I really enjoyed to participate in and felt really frustrated that I missed the important events at the end).
Otherwise, I'm thrilled to see events happening again. I'll take not-so-personally-compelling events to none any day... So thank you for the hard work!
I found the Cabalist/Bloodloch division rather interesting to watch myself, for the politics of it.
Sadly, giving people a heads up about major rp events (with the event syntax for example) takes away from immersion, but perhaps if events are started and are building up, people could be a bit more attentive during the coming saturday to see if things come to a close or not. Take this event as an example.
Week one: Strange elemental Waves of energy.
Week two: Rifts.
Week Three: portal is stabilized.
Saturday of week Three, Three Days Before howling: Big booming ending event.
Not sure it would work out, but it's an idea.
One particular event one I'd like to see is a confrontation about the cabal and the indoron about the arts of necromancy and domination. If I am remembering, the Indorani see this as a 'gift' that has been shared and not to be used inappropriately by either guild. Seeing cabal using the gift to aid the mortals in this event as a whole made many in the vortex, called them 'fake necromancers' in the arts, but also makes me wonder if the Indorani can forcibly revoke it from them?
I also feel like it could be a mini-event an a line drawn in the sand in how it is 'expected' to be used by those of shadow. An if the cabal refuse....maybe We can use that awsome Alchemy skill set an mutations that was used as an April fools joke
http://forums.aetolia.com/discussion/417/fallen-and-alchemist-previews/p1 When I saw this Alchemist build, I immediately thought it was the future design of cabal!
Other issue I had was not being able to SAP the rifts, since it was necromancy (and I assume devotion) only, it made it a bit harder for the sciomancer side, especially when one of the necromancer guilds decided to help ascendril. It was kind of cool to see the cabalists decide to help ascendril, since it created a rift at least for me within spinesreach.
Best part of event was the tuning of runes mechanic, it would've been cool if it took longer / channel to tune, but it allowed for some fun conflict pk stuff.
I wasn't a fan of the locked room because RP or not, our characters shouldn't really be forced to peace to learn what's going on. I mean, if one side beats out the other side, they then learn what's going on and can tell that story however they wish. As a Syssin it becomes incredibly difficult to trick people into acting a certain way based off misinformation if the gods force a way for them to be allowed to get the proper information.
The phased bug did make it seem very awkward sometimes spying on what the hell was going on in the vortex and trying to act upon bits of that, as I only saw actually say cmd from the npcs. I did at least manage to figure out what the hell the Aztob side was all about and I'm glad to see it didn't completely skew what I thought, what you said about them is what I was telling the people I was trying to sway.
My issue was a bit of confusion. I expected the main event with the strained Indoron speaking at first and then Mandre appearing to be a divided fight of us players. I thought that the Indorani and Bloodloch supporting them were suppose to defend the Indoron and even Mandre and Sid from the other players assembled there. So when it just ended up Sid being an all around bad ass and attacking even those whom had always supported the vortex opening and the Aztobs, I felt the story line was lost, at least IMO.
Likewise, keep this in mind with objectives. The last bit of the event, where people had to rush and kill the 5 sciomancers or whatever, this is actually an impossible objective to defend. So basically the only defense was to kill everyone as soon as they stepped foot outside the city so that they could never reach the room.
Bug test stuff.