Motivation Killers
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No one is "censoring" the thread.
I'm laughing at some of the doomsday mentality frankly and the short attention spans of people who are complaining today about the things we fixed for them yesterday. That stuff is honestly something I'd have to laugh at or I'd go insane actually trying to please people whose issue is not really anything I can control.
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I think Arabel is great the way it is and I will admit that some positive has come from bringing up the quest train mentality because now more people are getting back to plotting and building PC's with a story and doing things to pursue their own plots. That said, I still feel a lot of the negativity in this thread could be adjusted by taking a look at what you yourself are trying to do and how down you can get on yourself over one interaction or one thing that doesn't go YOUR way. This is a server where multiple characters and players interact, things don't always go as planned.
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The only solid problem as far as DMs needing to do the things and stuff, was the bad DM issue. Anything else was relatively low priority.
Player or DM Faction, if you have a relatively directionless PC it will remain so.
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@Tharg:
CB, you haven't been in game for a bit, but there is TONS more plot pushing going on. In fact, since I've been back from my vacation in mid december, I haven't seen any of this quest train mentality. I have done 3 party quests on my current PC and I'm already level 7.
Hes right, its kinda flipped recently. I have done maybe 10 quests in total in two weeks and am level 9. Theres been alot more plots and RP recently. Ive also noticed DM xp has been slightly higher recently as well, which is a good thing
I believe that is a great help. I've noticed the DM XP has increased. It gives the plotters the even field in PvP and actual DM events to the questers. When you are at level 7-9 from pushing plots you don't feel the need to do as much questing except for the occasional gold run. Which could easily be fixed by All level Fivestar type quests. Yes people are going to farm it for gold, but that's essentially what it's there for. When you only use consumables pushing plots (Which usually get reimbursed anyway) you don't need to focus so much on gold. I could see more people farming it to save up for loot they never normally would've had. Plus, if it's like every other quest, they won't be able to do it more then once a reset.
The only thing I fear about this recent boost in DM XP is, will it return to normal when the DM's go back to their usual playtimes aka having to deal with real life. I understand that can't be helped though. Best suggestion I have is players continuing to communicate with DM's. Screenies could help. DM's then reward players when they do have time to do stuff. Be it XP or GP. Communication between everybody is going to be key.
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@Dripster:
The only thing I fear about this recent boost in DM XP is, will it return to normal when the DM's go back to their usual playtimes aka having to deal with real life. I understand that can't be helped though. Best suggestion I have is players continuing to communicate with DM's. Screenies could help. DM's then reward players when they do have time to do stuff. Be it XP or GP. Communication between everybody is going to be key.
Yes communication is big. I am happy to pop in and reward people for stuff that I wasn't available to help with at the time. I need to know about it though.
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No one is "censoring" the thread.
I'm not talking about this thread. I'm talking about the totalitarian way the DM team seemed to enforce the 'EVERYTHING IS FINE' mentality in the past.
A behavior that has continued right up to very recently, when a player who will remain unnamed presented you with a discussion, and the following things DID happen.
- That player was snap banned from the forums. I'm not even sure they realize that this happened, as they were unbanned pretty quickly after, but why was the DM team's first snap decision to ban a player who had legitimate concerns about the DMs and Players who play on this server? THIS is the mentality that I HATE about our DM team. I love all of you and everything you do to make the server fun for us, I really do. But your moderation methods infuriate me to no end. This is something that I know Hominid is working to fix, but you're just laughing at us and telling us we're wrong instead of engaging us.
2)The thread was 'moved,' and never put back. It pointed out pretty much exactly what I'm saying here, as well as a few other things I both agreed with and disagreed with. The tone could have been better in parts. There are certain parts I think should have been omitted because of their tone and implications, but it was no reason to take the entire thread away in my opinion.
I really want this trend of transparency, cooperation, and discussion to continue. What I don't want is to be laughed at by the DM team (Or more accurately, one DM on the DM team) for trying to have the conversations that have been rebuked so often in the past.
Nobody is saying CoA is dying. We're trying to make it better, and it actively seems to be working. Stop laughing at the people who are trying.
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HellzYeah, this is called "conspiracy theory" honestly. You don't have the entire picture, but instead of asking, you create a scenario.
That said, I'm glad you asked!
He got banned because he was reposting things that the DM team was moving so we could discuss how we wanted to respond while making sure we didn't see a negativity induced flame war. He was unbanned because the "ban" was just to stop him from spam posting until we could explain why the thread he was making kept disappearing on him (with his assumption and yours being it was "deleted" even though we had only moved it to another forum).
2). The thread hasn't been "put back" because we haven't had a chance. We had two threads at once to deal with. One of us made the decision to move them, no one's had time to put it back.
Calling us totalitarian or second guessing our "moderation" methods is a huge demotivator, probably the biggest one on the server. Want to take a guess why most DMs don't stick around very long? Its the negativity from players who attack us the second we step behind the curtain to try to create a game for you all to play with us. We get burned out, you aren't helping with your attitude.
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Okay. This has really gotten out of line.
Yes. I posted something, it got moved. I reposted it. Honestly. I did that mostly to give the DM's an actual chance to respond to it, since I had already sent it to most the players through PM anyway. After the 2nd one got deleted, I didn't even see the need to post it again. I wasn't informed until a bit later that it had just been moved, and I let it go at that point. You all should've too.
As for it not getting put back, I honestly don't give a crap. The only reason I didn't just tell the DM team not to move it back is because I felt they still had the right to respond to it for the entire server to see since I did let most the players read it. If they don't want to post it at this point, that's up to them. It's not a conspiracy theory.
On the flip side of that, you seriously need to calm down Moloch. Not just about this, but in general. I have heard so many times, from players and DM's alike that you get extremely defensive, and I definitely see it here. The other DM's are mostly the ones who have been calming the nerves of some of the "couple of rotten players who are never happy and only gripe and should go find something else to do until they can come back and have fun with the rest of us." I had the full intention of coming in here and playing nice and just asking the fellas to back off a bit. We are moving in the right direction and it needs to stay that way, but if the players are going to get in trouble for bringing the negativity to IRC and like, the DM's shouldn't be either. You're still putting it entirely on the players while the other DM's are accepting that some of it falls on them too. I get that this server is like your creative child but it's time to let that child go off to school and learn a few new things to stay capable in the changing world. We aren't trying to control others, any more then the DM team tried to control people when the server first got started. Returning to the fundamentals, while working on the fun new skills we've developed.
The server's changing. We get that. The Players and DM's alike both need to calm it down. This was never my intention to get everyone so angry about it. When I made my post, it wasn't just my arguments. I went to many different players and heard what they had to say. The fact that it was seen as such an angry post makes me realize I need to work on my communication better. Lets just get through this next month and work together. I feel like if we can keep up with all the great new motivation we have seen we will be able to at least rope back in a bit of our playerbase back.
Tl;DR
Stop acting like a jerk. Player or DM. No one was trying to attack the DM team. No one was trying to suppress the player's views. Shit got out of hand. Lets ring it back in. It's new years. Lets start it right.
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Hi Guys! (best kevin Costner in Silverado voice)
What the heck does TL;DR mean?
Thanks :-)
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I know this one!
Too Long; Didn't Read
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@Dedagin:
Hi Guys! (best kevin Costner in Silverado voice)
What the heck does TL;DR mean?
Thanks :-)
Too long; didnt read :P
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I get what you're saying Dripster. I know I've been defensive in the past, but honestly, I always will call bs when I read it. I may be being defensive right now, but mostly I'm just frustrated with people attacking other DMs. I don't worry about defending myself, but its the people I see getting stressed out when people go after them and make nasty comments. None of us are perfect, but my team mates should be treated with more respect.
The DM team knows what problems the server has and works hard to fix them. So hard some of them just can't keep DMing as they realize its work not fun to keep this place fun sometimes.
I know the biggest problem CoA has now is a group of players (who exactly is in the group actually varies sometimes as people chill and relax and others get tensed up) who want to control how other players play the game. They think controlling other players will make it more fun for them.
The negativity today I saw started when Faerydae and Falanthos respawned, players got nasty, accused them of 'horrible roleplay' and attacked the DMs for not taking away their characters. The complaints demoralized people who even said they'd just quest now and not push plots or stories because of railroading DMs. Other people got demoralized, people tried to control how other people play here and complained "some people just quest too much" or "some people roleplay in the spire too much" –they even came up with a judgmental term "spiremancer". The player who played Faerydae got so demotivated they quit. I was sad to see them go.
You are totally right though Drip, if there is a problem, you need to present a positive solution and not just complain.
So here's my best guess and it agrees with yours, people need to chill out. Stop trying to control how other people play. If you have a concern, bring it up along with a solution. Recognize your "solution" may not work, few of you have been here long enough to know some of the 'solutions' were tried before and created worse problems. Things do change though, stuff goes in cycles.
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my solution was self serving, i am not sure how it would have effected the server, to the positive or the negative, i can only speculate
it would have certainly modified slightly how i play, my play is focused only on my character the here and the now, helping new characters has always been a trait i share with all my characters, with the exception of the one i am playing now, the only reason i do not help beyond merely words now, is i cannot afford to via in game currency, that will not change nor do i expect it to.
there is one thing i do find hopeful, i think i may have found a free place to rest in game, if it is indeed true, the need for in game currency will have passed for my character, i will then be able to help some characters in a smaller way if i can verify this (which i intend to do in the near future)
but my observation is this, if people stay on for longer periods of time, it can encourage others to do the same,i would remain on longer is i had resources to hunt down new characters having more to do even small things will have a cascade effect, nothing of course will match the wonderful DM events that effect the whole server (ignore what some naysayers spout) those events most people find fun and the proof is in the pudding, when those events happen, lots of people are on and stay on
i try to not bother the DMs when i am in the game and support them when i am on the forum, but in retrospect even the smallest complaint even if done with the thought of best intentions (my case a self serving suggestion) can and will come across as unkind criticism, if i have presented in any way this attitude i am sorry, the DMs do a wonderful job (we need to remind ourselves they work hard for no pay and do so to keep us happy and having fun, no easy or small task considering who they are dealing with….i am not pointing at others only myself in this statement)
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@Tharg:
@Dedagin:
Hi Guys! (best kevin Costner in Silverado voice)
What the heck does TL;DR mean?
Thanks :-)
Too long; didnt read :P
Ah ha! got it. thanks Tharg!
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too long did not listen
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I know the biggest problem CoA has now is a group of players (who exactly is in the group actually varies sometimes as people chill and relax and others get tensed up) who want to control how other players play the game. They think controlling other players will make it more fun for them.
DMs were doing this long before players started doing it and for better or for worse I think it kept the server's roleplay quality as high as it was for many years. Don't get me wrong, there have always been problems but I think it was more clear than what behavior was acceptable and what wasn't than it is now. Players reinforced it sure, if your playing on a server which is all about -roleplay- than its understandable why folks might be irriated when certain people treat it like an action server because there are plenty of servers out there to do that. Roleplay is a niche genre in itself and was a minority even within NWN community for quite awhile which is what made CoA so special for a lot of people because it was a server that prided itself on focusing on roleplaying characters within a rich setting. I think what has contributed to the anxiety and frustration over the years is that player's have seen their niche corner slowly become a bit more main stream than they like it added by the constant setting changes that catorgized v4. To many I think it feels like their server abandoned them which is why when BrokenGunBlade made that thread about the server lacking an identity and theme it really resonated with a lot of folks. When v5 as it was originally presented offered hope because it looked like it was going to capitalize again what made the server so well liked including a fleshed out setting. I realize rebuilding a whole module takes a lot of work but in this case I think it would go along way if the setting were more fleshed out than it currently is. There is a saying that I remember hearing in a marketing seminar; if your marketing yourself to everybody than your really marketing yourself to nobody. Every product has a niche group and CoA's has been roleplaying with player versus player and adventure included of course but it was in a character centric context. Now I am not sure what the setting or even the server is supposed to be out about or what it stands for anymore and that worries me.
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@Darlene:
if i have presented in any way this attitude i am sorry, the DMs do a wonderful job (we need to remind ourselves they work hard for no pay and do so to keep us happy and having fun, no easy or small task considering who they are dealing with….i am not pointing at others only myself in this statement)
You didn't, you make a point that makes sense. Not everyone wants to play a character who quests, but everyone still likes to have gold/resources to do other things in game.
There's some stuff we can really do to help out with that and don't mind the suggestions.
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Wildcard, the server is still about a city on the frontier trying to survive in a dangerous world. Its not complicated there. I'm really not sure what you're thinking though, I don't think I quite "get" what you're trying to explain there.
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A new player to the server just sent me a tell, in response to my sending: "I would like to speak to lorekeepers, linguists that are available at the Spire library. I would also like to meet with a librarian if that were possible."
New Player: "I want to get involved and help you out, but so far I've seen nothing on this server I can get behind when it all digressed down to the "Hack and Slash" Mentality"
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That is just unhelpful Thune.