How to make SotA great (please read carefully before posting)

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Corv, Jun 21, 2018.

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  1. Womby

    Womby Avatar

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    When I first started playing SotA I looked for a fun experience, and initially I found it. I made friends in the early stages of development, when the game experience was mostly social. I got involved. I wrote plays and stories. I co-authored (along with Vyrin) The Unreliable Travel Guide for a long time. I made a few tiny movies set in New Britannia. I acted in stage performances. I made positive contributions to the forums (check my stats on the left). I contributed ideas for a couple of characters in game (the cat lady in Aerie and her long lost friend).

    I was far from the only one involved in that kind of activity - there was and is a lot of unofficial game support going on behind the scenes.

    I also made some player-created quests. That became less frustrating when we were allowed to leave player-authored notes and books as POT decorations.
    However, other necessary changes to support quest generation (see below) never came, and then it was announced that spawners, when introduced, would be restricted to PVP scenes - despite that being a quintessential PVE experience. I don't do PVP. So, having abandoned any hope of being able to make my own quests, I finally sold my POT a few weeks ago. All I have left that for me is remotely interesting is the bookstores, and that alone is not sufficient to keep me playing.

    What would make SotA great? The answer will be different for everyone. For me, it would be the following:
    1. Let players place books and notes in scenes (sure, make a limit of one per player per scene, and give the notes/books a 24 hour timeout for performance reasons). That way I could create random transient quests that people could stumble across in their explorations.
    2. Allow player-placed spawners in PVE areas in POTS and basements.
    3. Modify container permissions to allow a setting where one item per player can be withdrawn from the container (for quest rewards).
    4. Create a container that has a combination lock (to give quest rewards only to those who have found the combination while completing the quest).
    5. Allow us to program an NPC to give quest information.

    Oh, and for the "official" game:

    6. Provide an optional form of combat that is intuitive, has no glyphs, and works more like Skyrim. The current system is too intellectual, and not at all visceral.
    7. Reduce grind.
    8. Increase rewards.
    9. Add random fun elements - e.g. maybe every so often an enemy will look at you and suddenly turn around and run, screaming "Help, help, I'm being oppressed!"

    tl;dr: Some of us want to do unpaid creative work for Portalarium, but they will not give us the tools to do so. Also, the usual complaints.
     
    Last edited: Jun 29, 2018
  2. Bubonic

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    Bummer. You have been one of the backbones of this community, Womby. I hope the devs read your post.
     
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  3. Stundorn

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    Hey @Chris some skill beyond GM and 100, this seems to be a bug too, also to have the possibility to GM (and further!) all skills including crafting.
    I'm sure it's a bug because it's not possible to have interdependencies amongst players and pvp balance, not to say hundreds of possible builds always ready and not able to get into deep identification with your build Avatar and Role in this Rich Roleplaying Game.

    :D:D:D

    I need to try it :rolleyes::)
     
  4. Stundorn

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    Ah sorry for double post, but i yesterday relogged since R50 and i still have this annoying Quest Bugs :(
    Many Quests just dont update.
    Really if i cannot RPvP because i'm casual and dont want to grind xp/hr like so many do and find it's the core of the game )o think it's the chore of the game) then i only can pve and Quest and do some socializing, crafting, agriculture stuff.
    I maybe want to even grind some pve , but you wont find me making this "work" define my playstyle, although you ask me to do it if i fully want to partake and create RPvX gameplay.
    The main cause i quit i'd say.

    So, to have broken quests for 2 years is inaceptable to me.
    With some other things i need to do very, very huge compromises to my favorite style to play it's keeping me away from the game entirely.
     
  5. Aetrion

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    You're right on the quests, that crap is one of the biggest fun-killers in SOTA. Nothing worse than broken quest markers all over the place. This stuff has caused me to pretty much just stop questing all together just so that my compass doesn't get even more messed up.

    I do not for the life of me understand why they can't at least give you the option to cancel quests.
     
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  6. Jaanelle DeJure

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    But respectfully- you have missed the point. :D

    It is not "at those times" because I am referring to a systemic, endemically toxic environment to which a player desirous of giving feedback and bug reports must subject themselves to.

    One in which the person whose job it was to censor genuinely abusive content somehow managed to often get sucked into the undertow, punishing the victims and supporting the aggressors because of a repeated failure to recognize that the person expressing a negative emotion or sarcasm isn't automatically "in the wrong".

    It's like a teacher dealing with a playground fight by asking who threw the first punch when the reality is that there was a chronic bullying and provocation going on, and they were complicit in permitting it to occur.

    Look... it's an innocent enough mistake that many people make, but you do not create a "safe environment" by banning sarcasm and negative emotion. That's a really naive attitude to take, and downright disastrous for a community manager.

    What you are referring to is a proper response to a transient change... something acute and temporary, not chronic and persistent.

    Granted- it might be nice if people were more able to keep our cool and respond with calm, collected, empathic cordiality to every situation.

    But it is unreasonable to expect people to do so. That was the point. What would be "nice in an ideal world" is a separate question from what kind of expectations would be reasonable to have of people in THIS world.

    Really I promise you that I'm not just being argumentative here for its own sake, but responding as a person who has to contend with a lot of exposure to toxic and verbally/emotionally abusive environments throughout my life and have survived them all to tell the tale.

    I'm sorry but it's a really old and nasty trick of controlling people... you condition the environment such that people do not feel safe to express their thoughts and emotions, and then you set up parameters such that complaining or saying anything "negative" about the situation is turned back around and mirrored back on the complainant as if they are the "source" of the negativity and then try to shift the blame to them for the environment being toxic and abusive.

    People shouldn't be expected or required to rise to the level of superhuman compassion and empathy in order to share feedback and bug reports on a game, or really, ever.

    And if you don't believe me, go ask Sequanna. o_O

    Similar to what @Womby shared, I didn't come to this forum guns all ablazin'. It started out with cordiality and respect. In fact, my original attitude was more one of "gosh what are these people so angry about over here?"

    And now I know.
     
    Last edited: Jun 29, 2018
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  7. Vladamir Begemot

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    I hope the theater troupe gets going again soon, I saw "The Green Rouge" and it was a tearjerker. Very excellent moment in my gaming history.
     
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  8. Jaanelle DeJure

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    The actual situation at hand is more complex and nuanced than that.

    What we have here is an environment where even offering evidence and facts could subject one to an attack, if those facts and evidence contradict somebody else's agenda for the game.

    Case in point- There is a perennial discussion around here about instituting hard caps. At one point, there were some users basically going around and derailing threads by interjecting the "hard cap debate" into threads discussing other topics. (This is a clear violation of Community Rules.)

    At some point I *tried* to make some charts and graphs showing the xp leveling curve currently implemented as part of the existing "soft cap" system, and demonstrating that a new player would be able to "catch up" to the veteran player base within 6-18 months, depending on their frequency of play.

    [NOTE: With Upper Tears now implemented this is more like 3-6 months]

    O! Sweet Grannus! Can you imagine the level of browbeating I took for "throwing facts in people's faces" ? Hmm? Do you know what happened next? All of a sudden I found myself beset with fake reports on my posts... there actually appeared to be one or more people following me around trying to "nab" me for expressing any whiff of sarcasm in my posts. (This is also a clear violation of Community Rules.)

    Sure, you might say it is my bad for allowing sarcasm to "taint" my posts, and we could go back and forth on this forever.

    But I am an imperfect being. I tend to respond with sarcasm when I make a genuine attempt to stick to the facts of an argument, and the person on the other end of the argument appears to be immune to facts, and insists on repeating whatever narrative suits their agenda. I feel angry when I find myself having been lulled into what I thought was a ***discussion*** but when, in reality, the other person had no intention of ever considering my point of view, and rather was more interested in simply using me as a catalyst to further their own agenda.

    You could still try to goad me into developing more equanimity, but at the end of the day, I am not really the source of "problem" in that sort of situation.

    The worst you could say is that I am not helping the situation. But that's not my job or my function here.

    Sarcasm is a literary/oratory tool. And using sarcasm is not against the Community Rules, and responding with sarcasm to another person's argument is not an attack on their person- it is an attack on their argument. And more specifically, it is an attack intended to frame the irony of an argument made by one who is contradicting themselves, or holds an untenable premise, or is making a clearly fallacious argument but steadfastly refusing to acknowledge the flaw in their argument.

    (As a point of ironic trivia, avoiding logical fallacies IS actually one of the Community Rules, but whoever posted it there posted it in the "Don'ts" section, such that it actually reads Don't try to avoid logical fallacies. :D)

    Making reports to a moderator claiming that another user's sarcastic tone constitutes a "personal attack" is an abuse of the reporting system. And a moderator who upholds such complaints is complicit in creating a toxic, heavily censored, environment.
     
    Last edited: Jun 29, 2018
  9. Cora Cuz'avich

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    +∞
     
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  10. Tiki Pirate

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    I really liked Womby's post.

    I think many people are frustrated by repeated feedback that was often not considered or acted on.

    My example... Fishing update?

    Ok, I understand a whole fleshed out system with rainbow colored fish eggs +2 that realign the stars is not happening, but the mythical "fishing update" has been promised and cancelled so many times I lost count.

    I would like to see a bone (a craftable/mountable fishbone at that) be thrown. How hard would it be to add another fish to the loot table that was rare an sold to NPC'S for a good amount of gold? Possibly as a repeatable quest. A different type (8 fish of virtue) for differnt towns . Anything besides more fairy wings - unless I can use them for bait .

    Serriosly stop with the add on store items and add content .
     
  11. mass

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    An observation I have made over the last 5 years is that there have been a few people that have told me I was being overly negative of the game at some point and asked why I slighted the game they loved so much, only to see some of those same people turn extremely negative, and then become 'absent', while I continue to play, mostly enjoy, offer a wee bit of financial support here and there, and offer the occasional criticism. There's some interesting irony in there some where.
     
  12. Jaanelle DeJure

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    Indeed. Ironically, in addition to being accosted for my so-called "negativity" I have also been berated for ostensibly being a "White Knight".
     
    Last edited: Jun 29, 2018
  13. Cordelayne

    Cordelayne Bug Hunter

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    Is it me or is this forum thread one of the best we have ever had? :) I love that we can have a good conversation, back and forth, without it being moderated. This is the way it should have always been, but I digress.

    Great post Jaanelle and I totally get where you are coming from. Specifically as it relates to your quote above, because I think we all started like that. Moreover, we are simpatico on your point regarding the banning of "sarcasm" and perceived "negative feedback". That should never happen and only leads to the fostering of greater resentment.

    I guess at the end of the day, even though I am absolutely furious, I simply choose not to respond in that capacity. Shoot, I have vented plenty in private (just ask my wife or guildies ;)), but here on the forums I try to do it as civilly as I can. Much in the manner you and I are talking now. In fact, my response to Chris' post to you yesterday was elicited from a place of agitation. His comments to you were completely unnecessary and quite frankly, rude. I would have have been remiss if I didn't say something because he was out of line.

    Whoa, you type fast, hard to keep up! :D

    Firstly, I would never try to goad you or anyone into trying to be something they are not. That is not my style. Secondly, I agree with everything you have stated from a substantive standpoint and I certainly do not in any capacity think you are the "problem". Quite the contrary. Utilizing facts and numbers, like you have, to prove your point is always the solution in my mind.

    I am sorry that you have had to deal with folks attacking you for voicing your opinion. That is something that I never really understood, how insanely emotional and combative folks can get here when they feel affronted. It's just a game and in the grand scheme of things, who really cares? The only time it draws my ire is when someone is just being blatantly offensive or mean. When I see that, I admit that I can't help but respond with a pithy sentence or two excoriating them for their behavior.

    As a fellow imperfect being, I would say stick to the facts at first, then if that doesn't work...go for the sarcasm. Or say, "F**k it!" and do whatever you want. ;)
     
  14. mass

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    That's just because you haven't leveled your 'goad' skill yet. :p
     
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  15. Cordelayne

    Cordelayne Bug Hunter

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    It's like every other skill right? I just need to get it to 80, lol? ;)
     
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  16. Chaox

    Chaox Dev Emeritus Dev Emeritus

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    I understand what you meant :) but please remember that this thread (and all others) are indeed being moderated.

    Thank you all for the great feedback and insight in here.
     
  17. Jaanelle DeJure

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    100%! I think it really illustrates quite nicely a lot of what we have been discussing here. I get the sense in "times past" this thread would have been pre-emptively locked. But here we are... proving that we are capable of having these types of discussions- even with a bit of heated emotion and sarcasm thrown into the mix- without becoming indecent to one another.

    We don't need to be "protected" from our own so-called negative emotions. We need to be protected from users who regularly violate the community guidelines, and the straight-up trolls.

    Luckily, it would appear nobody has attempted to troll this thread.

    Ha! If only that were the most of it, my friend. :)

    You might imagine what it feels like to have raised a question about all the outstanding bugs during a pre-Release telethon and having the Executive Producer look into the camera and wave your concern away with a wry smile and flick of the hand.

    Or what it might feel like to have specifically asked the devs if they felt in their "heart of hearts" that the game was ready for Launch, and have two of them give an unequivocal "Yes!" only to change course within 3 months and admit that the fundamentals still need some serious work.

    At least Chris gave a more measured response, acknowledging that certain bug fixes were forthcoming.

    :D
     
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  18. Cordelayne

    Cordelayne Bug Hunter

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    The ironic part Chaox, is that when I wrote it I knew it might get misconstrued. My apologies for not being clearer! :D
     
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  19. Chaox

    Chaox Dev Emeritus Dev Emeritus

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    None needed!
     
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  20. Waxillium

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    Can't shake the feeling of underlying ulterior motives in the development of the game especially with the flop of Ultimate Collector prior to SotA.
    Things seem cart before the horse. Where it was once Great game -> Community -> RMT develops it is now RMT -> Community -> ???
    Haven't played since November. Finally quit spending $5 on my three accounts per telethon a few months back. Not sure if I'll ever return.

    Really enjoying the $20 I spent on Grim Dawn and the subsequent $5 DLC and $20 Expansion.

    The addon store just grosses me out now and I'll never kickstart or spend more than $50 on a game excluding expansions.

    Edit: Axing addon prices in half and trying to make things single digit prices would be an improvement.
     
    Last edited: Jun 29, 2018
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