Re: What should the new Event Team do?
Posted: Fri May 01, 2009 5:08 pm
The problem as I see it; there is no factional/national relevance to the current conflicts concerning OP's. I think that adding some event/developmental interaction to the mix would add a lot to the overall experience. However, it does need to be meaningful. Something that advances the goals of either faction/nation. The factions have relinquished the most lucrative resources for nothing and that is not consistent with the lore, story, or fundamental design of the game.
I am gonna do a quick aside to address the language thread from the general forum, as I think it ties into the lack of story development. When players take control of something, it is quite possible they can really screw up timelines, plot lines, and game reality. How do we know there were ever four ancient, separate and unique languages on Atys? How do we really know that homins have been on Atys for longer then 100 years or so? What if we are clones with imprinted memories, prisoners who have been mind- wiped and genetically altered and dumped on some penal planet. There is so much we do not know and so much of what we do know that may be wrong.
Back to Outposts, they are now and always have been a completely player controlled commodity. What I think would be worth looking at, is making them significant to a larger purpose. Make them a part of racial wars or some sort of factional development, give them storyline and contextual meaning. It might be worth considering something as simple as a "factional/racial" reward on overall goods created from the OP's that can then be used to distribute to nonOP-holding followers. As in, if your faction and citizen status owns so many OP's you can pick up so many stacks of cats from the NPC "our faction rules" office on a daily basis. For those who are on the losing end, they can do a mission from "our faction will rule" NPC and get something to level the playing field a bit. I just think players need to be reminded, continually, that the factional powers are powerful instead of being arguably the most irrelevant pixels on Atys.
Why not make OP's sole ownership of the nations/factions and allow visiting citizens to trade for supplies, allow them to be upgradeable by supplying materials and of course conquerable? Take guild ownership completely out of the formula, making the guilds vassals of the state, to be rewarded by the state for successful engagements. This is just an idea, something I am throwing out there.
The allure of the factional conflict for me was the fact that there were two very realistic and competing ideals of political and religious thought. I liked how the developers designed the game to attract certain personalities to certain aspects of either faction. Whether it is there intentionally or not, I see a lot of design manipulation within the mechanics, lore and (when we had them) events of Atys that fed and shaped these two competing ideals. It is what kept me in the game, and it is my lack of faith, that these ideals will return, that keeps Pero out now.
My hope with this thread was to give the event team some of my ideas and let them know that at least one player would like to see the factions rise from the ashes and do something. If I get really lucky, maybe prod someone else to post who has even better ideas.
I am asking for "divine" intervention. A purpose, something to 'fight' for.
I am gonna do a quick aside to address the language thread from the general forum, as I think it ties into the lack of story development. When players take control of something, it is quite possible they can really screw up timelines, plot lines, and game reality. How do we know there were ever four ancient, separate and unique languages on Atys? How do we really know that homins have been on Atys for longer then 100 years or so? What if we are clones with imprinted memories, prisoners who have been mind- wiped and genetically altered and dumped on some penal planet. There is so much we do not know and so much of what we do know that may be wrong.
Back to Outposts, they are now and always have been a completely player controlled commodity. What I think would be worth looking at, is making them significant to a larger purpose. Make them a part of racial wars or some sort of factional development, give them storyline and contextual meaning. It might be worth considering something as simple as a "factional/racial" reward on overall goods created from the OP's that can then be used to distribute to nonOP-holding followers. As in, if your faction and citizen status owns so many OP's you can pick up so many stacks of cats from the NPC "our faction rules" office on a daily basis. For those who are on the losing end, they can do a mission from "our faction will rule" NPC and get something to level the playing field a bit. I just think players need to be reminded, continually, that the factional powers are powerful instead of being arguably the most irrelevant pixels on Atys.
Why not make OP's sole ownership of the nations/factions and allow visiting citizens to trade for supplies, allow them to be upgradeable by supplying materials and of course conquerable? Take guild ownership completely out of the formula, making the guilds vassals of the state, to be rewarded by the state for successful engagements. This is just an idea, something I am throwing out there.
The allure of the factional conflict for me was the fact that there were two very realistic and competing ideals of political and religious thought. I liked how the developers designed the game to attract certain personalities to certain aspects of either faction. Whether it is there intentionally or not, I see a lot of design manipulation within the mechanics, lore and (when we had them) events of Atys that fed and shaped these two competing ideals. It is what kept me in the game, and it is my lack of faith, that these ideals will return, that keeps Pero out now.
My hope with this thread was to give the event team some of my ideas and let them know that at least one player would like to see the factions rise from the ashes and do something. If I get really lucky, maybe prod someone else to post who has even better ideas.
I am asking for "divine" intervention. A purpose, something to 'fight' for.