All I'm saying is that if this idea is implemented.. man, there's gonna be some funny @Khizan v @Ultrix scenes:
'How can you not notice my new shiny frog-boots?!?!'
'Uh... I toggled it off?'
It is impossible to not notice when Ultrix gets a new frog-themed thing, because she will spend that entire week showing them off.
"On the battlefield I am a god. I love war. The steel, the smell, the corpses. I wish there were more. On the first day I drove the Northmen back alone at the ford. Alone! On the second I carried the bridge! Me! Yesterday I climbed the Heroes! I love war! I… I wish it wasn’t over."
I leave the forums open on my comp anytime I'm
on the game and I vote virtually every time I get an in game reminder.
Don't give up on the voting. So what if we don't have the population to
topple over the next game up in a day. Do you enjoy playing imperian? If
so, vote. If you don't, express your concerns to the powers that be
and or the forums and don't vote.
Let's try that.
The following is all commentary.
When I
was new to this game the first month I played I got a token for logging
in 25 days in a month. I could speak with a guide during almost any
point in time during the three days I was a novice. When I got my first
tradeskill I got three rejections in half an hour then three approvals
an hour after that. It took me three months to interact with a god, but
when i finally did to a new player it was astonishing and unique and
I've never seen an interaction like it since. I've spent a lot of money
on this game, (more than many, not as much as some.) But I find myself
buying less and less all the time. Imperian lacks active volunteers
(guides, approvers, dunno about builders or entities) because they pay
peanuts. I've known a few former guides and a lot of approvers and all
of them have stopped or slowed down because the pay off doesn't justify
the time/interest necessary. I -rarely- see any guides, approvals after a
great improvement (that involved Alend threatening to can the
non-workers) has muddled back down. Imperian simply fails to excite and
entertain me like it used to. In truth events haven't really grabbed me
since the Hammer. I didn't sign up for this years Ironcon, I didn't
participate nearly as much in our Tournament of Ages, I didn't even try
to get into the events that unveiled the underworld (which I've been in
all of twice.) There's nothing wrong with these events, they've simply
failed to capture my interest/attention like they used to. And while you
can write that off as a personal problem, I'm not the only one, the
number of players on reflects that. The game just isn't as lively as it
used to be, there's fewer players, fewer visible members of the garden.
The most common complaint I've heard about Imperian is that it's become
too much about money. I'm sure there's no lack of people wanting free
stuff, and giveaways alone don't make things better, (thought they can
certainly fool you into thinking they are). That's not to say we're
entirely devoid of handouts either (the wheel was here for September,
and Ironbeard is alive and well). And I'm not saying there needs to be
something free every month (thought letting more of us have
stockings/snowglobes/wort making pots in exchange for time instead of
money would be cool), but things seem less generous than in years past.
The game has changed. There's been a shift in soul, in scope. It feels
like we have gone from getting the most invested/active players, to
getting the most money from the players we still have. I'm not likely to
quit Imperian, addictive personalities can be hard to alienate, but I
didn't spend four grand on credits this year, and I'm not likely to next
year, (or ever again) either.
As far as the lack of interest goes, and the dwindling player base, that's just a by-product of people growing out of the MUD gaming mindset as they grow older. I mean the game has been around what 11 years now? That means the 16 year olds are now 27 with live and likely families of their own. While yes some people still play while having such a life, others aren't able to balance out the time, so they ditch the MUD. We haven't attracted many new players, that is true, and I honestly don't see that changing much in the near future if at all. But you've got all your core players from 11 years ago still. So you can log on to keep in touch as a pure social setting if you like. I did for a few years while my wife and I lived out of town while she went to school. I'll also agree on the guides part, I couldn't tell you the last time I saw a guide around...but having them around to just throw out random help files was a bit annoying in my opinion. As far as the garden goes, it was to hit or miss in my opinion on newcomers picking up the roleplay of previous gods and changing the flow of things for the worse. And I'm like you, couldn't tell you the last time I spent a crazy amount of money on this game, but that's because I've got other financial obligations now. I'm not 18-22 with a job and living with no rent or bills. I'm 27 with a job, fixing to leave it and head back to school, while I raise my 11 month old son with my wife...so my money doesn't come here. It's not Imperian's fault our priorities shift.
The greatest draw for Imperian will be her storyline. Mechanically, if you think about it, Imperian is a huge amount of effort: to just track my own thornroots, I have to implement 4 triggers, manage 1 timer and handle trigger failures (i.e. non-capture).
On WoW, GW2 or any similar MMO, it's simply a matter of 'clicking 1 button' and watch the image cooldown. 4 triggers, 1 timer, 1 non-capture and maybe one display method --> 1 click.
For design:
Look at Minecraft, SecondLife or any other collaborative design environment. With the flurry of online tools to help you design and create really beautiful things with very simple instructions, the draw of text descriptions no longer holds so much relevancy.
For shopkeeping: Man that syntax.
From a value proposition point of view, $ 25 pm is comparatively pricey for a game that suffers all the aforementioned problems.
That's why I think it is 100% folly to ignore storyline. It is so easy to roll out a new story given the right structure - comparatively speaking, of course. You don't need to render new images, don't need to upload (and download) a large number of resources for the game to be 'enjoyable'. Mechanistically, the traction to be gained by improving and balancing combat further is in the region of zero. The biggest, purest gain in terms of attraction for Imperian will be a dramatic improvement and commitment to a well thought out, global, inclusive storyline.
I've been thinking on this for a while - the whole why opt out of something you've put so much effort into. Imperian isn't a very 'casual' game, once you get involved. At least that's my feeling on the whole thing. To get to the juicy parts of it, you put in your hours and there's reward, to a point. And that's the rub.
I struggled to put my finger on just what it was that was 'lacking' as it were. Messages weren't answered to admin, or just plain ignored, issues are deleted, rulings on so many things are inconsistent, or contradictory. The player base is left scrambling to cope with a dynamic environment, when it feels that sometimes nobody is left at the wheel. That has a name.
Unprofessional.
That's what this place has become. It feels like an inconsistent, piecemeal experience trying to be far more than it is. Yes, story is of alpha importance, but so is the foundation for it all to run on. We all know the lack of back-end support is strangling this place, and yet nothing is done. And in that, with all these foibles, there's an opt-in monthly fee of $waytoomuch.
I can pay a nominal fee and engage in something highly professional with graphics, that's user friendly, prompt to respond and consistent. Or I can burn $25 a month and feel ignored, frustrated and abused.
How about have the area's outside of the various arena's where you can 'supposedly' watch the fights, actually allow you to watch them. Say you can choose a person in the arena to watch, and any action in their room is displayed to you as if you were standing there.
I wouldn't disagree with you, @Bellentine. My view is that with a gripping (and yes, it has to be top notch) story, then all these issues of inconsistency will be mitigated to a large extent.
We understand it's a low resource environment, but your deployment model is similarly low-resource.
Consider now how much time and effort went into things like Mercenaries, and consider how many people are actually involved in it now? It's a token gesture in 'creating content', when really it's creation of additional bloat to a system already leaden with a decade worth of 'add-ons'. Essentially, the admin has traded player goodwill and novelty value for money by creating a system, while implemented reasonably well, doesn't enhance the general experience.
On the other hand, high fidelity story creation is -always- content that people are willing to pay for.
How about have the area's outside of the various arena's where you can 'supposedly' watch the fights, actually allow you to watch them. Say you can choose a person in the arena to watch, and any action in their room is displayed to you as if you were standing there.
Besides, if you want to partake in combat you should do just that. You can watch countless fights and or read oodles of combat theory but in the end, the best thing for it is to simply join in. You'll learn much more and far faster too.
I can understand that, to an extent. But surely there is a way around that. I mean eavesdropping on conversations doesn't bog the server and that's essentially the same situation. The admin being able to look in on anything without actually being there doesn't bog it down and that would be the same thing. Seems to me like it was just a cop out answer of we don't want to do that...Not to mention the fact that with a playerbase of 80 or less there is no way it should be bogging it down to any noticeable degree. Especially with all the declutter and de-bogging down they've done with vialbelts and the new message system.
They implemented a system like that before and it totally did bog things down to a noticeable extent; the system is more fragile than you think.
"On the battlefield I am a god. I love war. The steel, the smell, the corpses. I wish there were more. On the first day I drove the Northmen back alone at the ford. Alone! On the second I carried the bridge! Me! Yesterday I climbed the Heroes! I love war! I… I wish it wasn’t over."
The function exists in other IRE games, who, having had the same issue of bogging down the server, have found new ways to implement the functionality that do not.
I'm in the same boat of finding the game hard to get into lately. The niche isn't the primary factor - while the community has aged since IRE started a decade and a half ago, the open-ended and immersive elements of MUDs fills a niche that 'traditional' MMOs can't provide. I do feel like a lot of the time we get the impression that things move even slower on the admin side than the player side - I can't imagine the volume of issues/messages/questions is overwhelming enough to justify the lag in response time, even given a limited administrative team. This is a minor issue in the grand scheme of things, but I promise it can very much affect player satisfaction.
I think Imperian has delved far too much into a sandbox mentality that it's going to be hard to get rid of. Implementing things like the Mercenary system only adds to this issue - while it might provide neat components for players to spend more money on, it's irrelevant to the game as a whole and only serves as an accessory to the 'main appeal' of the game: dynamic, character-focused interactions (including combat obviously). I don't want to place any blame at the feet of those in charge, especially volunteers who are paid only in gratification, but at the end of the day these interactions are few and far apart and it can't be placed on the players (the paying customers) to fix these problems. It's good that classleads serve to balance combat out and that event suggestions (sparse though they may be, sorry @Svorai!) are happily acted upon, but Imperian's overreaching storylines, the ones that serve to foster the conflict between factions and get players excited and involved, are essentially dead. This isn't a problem that can be solved overnight, but it's very clear it can't be solved by the contributions of players either.
I freely admit to sampling bias here - it could just be that Demonic's
storyline feels 'deader' than the rest - but I feel like these are
symptoms of a game that doesn't know what it's supposed to be. The Horde
provides a good central point for unifying the game against a greater
conflict, but this isn't the same thing as dynamic conflict between
factions. Players have to feel like they're contributing, and they have to feel like they have a dynamic place in an evolving game world. Addons like mercenaries do nothing to address these issues, and new mechanics for combat (such as the upcoming sect changes) will only cause a shift in where the emphasis lies, while the older conflict mechanics (obelisks, shardfalls, can we include townes here because seriously these feel like the biggest dead end Imperian has experienced, yes bigger than islands/five year plan/moonsages) will continue to depreciate.
Something big needs to happen to change up the status quo, and we already killed off all of the gods. What can be done next? I hope it's exciting, and I hope it's before more interest continues to wane.
TLDR: I have a lot of vague feelings of discontent and no solutions and I know I'm not the only one.
The last time I can remember any meaningful org conflict/story(outside of gods dying) was way back in the day before guilds got to merge and rouges were hunted down until they dropped the profession. And oddly enough it was more the guilds that took the conflict/story lead as opposed to cities/councils(Most of which were all player driven). Since then though, the story line of imperian, while important I suppose, was pretty much a non-factor to me. Maybe it was because during my most active times playing this game, there weren't really any grand events to meld the story of imperian. What I'm trying to say, is to me, the story of Imperian is of little consequence to me. What I always focused on was the story of my character. How am I going to get him to be a leader of a city/council/guild/etc. After that, how am I going to step down because I'm tired of all the whining. Now I'm just running my own little side story that far outweighs any currently set up by the game. I can't comment on the merc system or any changes of that nature, cause quite frankly they don't look fun to me.
The nature of guilds now doesn't help at all. They are all pretty much just a watered down version of what they previously were. A copy of a copy of a copy. So much gets muddle out that were staples of the game for so long. Circles helped create clear and concise conflict grouping, but it also took away many avenues of fun. Like intercircle mingling. In the end it's been a give and take, but right now I guess it just seems like to much has been taken away.
And yes, I know money is big factor in the decisions that take place in this game, but if you want fresh blood it's going to come from teenagers. And last I checked teenagers aren't just rolling money. You'll be hard pressed to find any 25+ year olds just trying out the MUDing world for the first time and getting hooked like you would some teenager. So with all that being said, decreasing the amount of things you NEED to spend money on might help. Otherwise, eventually you'll just be left with the people who have spent over 2k on this game that just log on to keep from feeling guilty about their wasted money on text.
I know that you all have been asking for "more story, more story." I do not want to reveal too much of what I have been doing in this aspect at this time, but this is my main project. Mind you; I, along with my assistants in the effort, are attempting to create overarching story lines for each city and council, so it is taking some time. As they start to progress in being put together, I do plan on releasing them (Stavenn's is already in its first stage, and a small bit has been released for Celidon, but not on such a big scale as Stavenn's).
I want to take time to make sure each city and council's story will go well with them, rather than lumping the city and council together per circle, as we all know that each circle has two different sides to their coin.
Now, if you are interested in helping out, or have ideas, you may send me a message in game or on the forums. It is quite limited on what some can do, so you may not be able to do a ton.
This is one of my main priorities over the next year, but I do have several other projects running along side of it that I am doing as well.
I will say that, at least for initial investment, the buy-in for Imperian (and IRE as a whole) is the lowest it's ever been. 2000 lessons for $20, over twice as many credits as previous for leveling up to 100, the monthly iron elite bonuses, the monthly promotions... compared to 10 years ago, it IS cheaper than ever. Is it cheap enough to capture a big chunk of what is largely a bloated and transient gaming market? No, not even close, nobody would argue that. But it does still offer unique advantages and experiences, and this is where the emphasis needs to be.
Historically, when the population of the game is high, it's possible to lean on the playerbase to provide their own interesting roleplay and events to sustain themselves. Political intrigue and rivalry, city/faction wars, conflicts in idealogies - these were (and are) largely player driven and provide a huge amount of the day-to-day interest needed to pull people in and sustain their interest. This is clearly where this niche of gaming shines, because players can work by themselves and with like minded players to develop characters and concepts that can play out in the game atmosphere. The games with larger playerbases (Achaea clearly, and the other IREs during peak times) can still fall back on this model of player interaction - there's no need to fix what is far from broken, simply to find ways to encourage and stoke these movements.
This is again erring on the side of personal bias, but I don't think that Imperian is capable of relying on this sort of model anymore.
The worldwide events step around the need for inter-faction dynamics by providing a common goal for players to work towards, but they're unsustainable and much more difficult to become mentally and emotionally invested into, since you're only able to control the outcome to a limited extent.
Pitting factions directly against each other is more favorable but much harder to balance, because the small playerbase dramatically reduces the 'buffering capacity' of PvP/faction vs. faction conflict. Our individual factions are relatively small AND fluctuate rapidly by play time and interest, and flavor-of-the-month components. Essentially, because we're only looking at groups of 10-20 players involved at a given time (this is generous), small changes in players dramatically shape the outcomes, leaving players in the outgroups unable to participate meaningfully. Demonic's rise-and-fall-and-rise(?) in the same year is a good example of this, when small numbers of players move factions or lose interest, it pushes some players to the point of non-participation.
One thing is clear: you NEED interesting storylines and mechanics to retain players during those downtimes, because let's face it: it's not as simple as saying "well just get more players". You need this sort of immersion and support, however, to retain the few new players we do get, and to encourage old players to return and stick around, and to encourage current players to WANT to log in - not to feel obligated to, not to increase the chances of getting to play the game they're paying to play, but because it's interesting and it involves them.
What's the solution? This is where hopefully some brilliant minds in charge can come up with something good, because it's a real problem that has no easy answers. We've built a lot of walls up between the factions in this game, but we've also largely been unable to sustain the impetus for it - why does AM vs. magick. vs. demonic matter in a world of dead gods and a looming global threat? Maybe it's time to think about radical, story-driven changes, and to start building the story of Imperian in the modern era. We don't have enough players to sustain 6 organizations and however many guilds while still having that 'buffer' I talked about to make the factions competitive. New players are oftentimes missing out on vital resources and perhaps more importantly, vital 'hooks' in retaining their interest. There's a great framework in place on a mechanical level - combat is engaging, fun, and for the the most part pretty balanced - but it's a hard sell when you rarely get to use the skills you've purchased.
EDIT: Because I was busy being long-winded and vague, just in response to @Svorai here: these obviously sound great, and it's exciting to hear that storylines are progressing. But it kind of highlights my point in a way: there's an event going on for Stavenn, and the beginning of an event for Celidon, because each faction has two sides to it. But is the best solution to a game-wide problem going to be relatively insular roleplay for each of 6 organizations? To the other 2/3rds (or 5/6ths) of the game, nothing is going on that they have a role in, and there's no guarantee that the outcomes will be visible or have an impact beyond an events post. I'm likely being cynical here, but I question if that strategy is the best use of limited creative resources. This isn't to say they aren't important or amazing, but we're such a small game for efforts to be driven at accenting each of six organizations.
I enjoy hearing everything about story - storyline and the ongoing narrative of Imperian. If challenged to define what imperial's story is, we revert to "The gods are dead, now what?". This has been rattling around for nearly forever and is somewhat indicative of the lack of new ground being broken. Certainly, Horde and Undead are gnashing away, but they provide little more than the occasional relief from the everyday. An outbreak or uprising is put down within a week and if you're having a heavy few days out-of-realm, you'll miss it without consequence.
Can I talk to the elephant in the room? Imperian's best, and worst resource is its players. Say what you will about events and city-specific stories, but the things that get the blood going, as far as I can tell, are the events that grow organically out of the player base. They work within a specific framework of conflict and bloom from there. So what's the problem? Imperian is too small, and too poorly run. I've already had my two cents about professionalism, so to the other issue.
Plainly, there are too many divisions within a small player base. Looking at where just a few key players have chosen to hang their hat this month will fairly accurately indicate the flow of combat in this place. Three circles is too many. There needs to be a redivision along different ideological lines, down to a binary of conflict. The greatest stories happen when there is one hero, and one villain. No one cares about the sidekick.
Be it pro and anti magick, gods vs heretics or something along the often under-utilised race system that has so much effort put into it, there has to be a reason to log on and get angry. Mercenaries are fine for the few who that entertains, and the crafting professions are neat when they are maintained, but if I'm not logging in and seeing a sea of red on the QW, I don't care.
I agree @iniar , and there needs to be the option for either side to be 'villainous' as it were. Something beyond simple resource mechanics or the claiming of territory, that doesn't seem to work.
On issues, aside from their incredibly slow turnaround time in the administration loop, it seems to me that most come from a place of frustration. The lack of transparency and consistency in how they are applied only perpetuates the problem (Saying issue here seems redundant). However, issues exist for a reason - because some cannot follow the rules, and others deliberately exploit things.
Returning to villainy, we've all read wonderful pieces of fiction about or around conflict (Several schools of thought state that you cannot have story without conflict) so the question becomes, what fight do you want to have? What is engaging enough to get most of the populace out swinging an axe? Ideology comes to mind, but sects don't seem to have the desired effect, nor is there the population to support it, not like in Achaea.
Three circles is too many. There needs to be a redivision along different ideological lines, down to a binary of conflict. The greatest stories happen when there is one hero, and one villain. No one cares about the sidekick.
This will never happen, and the reason why is the conversation we used to have about circle changing, the one that goes something like...
"You know, Bellentine, if you're not happy in the Magick circle you should just leave." "No I can't leave. Bellentine is a magicker and will always be a magicker because being a wizard is core to the character."
Too much of this population feels that way to make it possible to change things. I mean, yeah, there's a lot of us who don't care. Eldreth, Juran, Septus, myself? Sure, no problem. We are unusual, though. We abjure labels. We fight for money and an indefinable pride. The politics, the ethics, the moralities, are irrelevant.*
We are also a minority. Most of the people are not like us; if you tell people that their faction is being dismantled, a lot of those people are just going to quit. You will never see a major organizational shakeup for this reason.
I know that you all have been asking for "more story, more story." I do not want to reveal too much of what I have been doing in this aspect at this time, but this is my main project. Mind you; I, along with my assistants in the effort, are attempting to create overarching story lines for each city and council, so it is taking some time. As they start to progress in being put together, I do plan on releasing them (Stavenn's is already in its first stage, and a small bit has been released for Celidon, but not on such a big scale as Stavenn's).
I am incredibly "meh" about this. I don't want organization-specific storylines. In my opinion those provide an insular type of RP that just primarily serves to isolate people. The storyline that needs to advance is the global storyline. Give us reasons to get out there and do things with each other, instead of sitting around in the cities. Horde invasions, aetherstorms, maddened elementals, anti-magick crusaders from across the sea, moon shards falling from space, whatever. That stuff is awesome. Organizational stories? Meeeeeeh.
*Yes, I stole that like from the Black Company and Eldreth's sig.
"On the battlefield I am a god. I love war. The steel, the smell, the corpses. I wish there were more. On the first day I drove the Northmen back alone at the ford. Alone! On the second I carried the bridge! Me! Yesterday I climbed the Heroes! I love war! I… I wish it wasn’t over."
I know that you all have been asking for "more story, more story." I do not want to reveal too much of what I have been doing in this aspect at this time, but this is my main project. Mind you; I, along with my assistants in the effort, are attempting to create overarching story lines for each city and council, so it is taking some time. As they start to progress in being put together, I do plan on releasing them (Stavenn's is already in its first stage, and a small bit has been released for Celidon, but not on such a big scale as Stavenn's).
I am incredibly "meh" about this. I don't want organization-specific storylines. In my opinion those provide an insular type of RP that just primarily serves to isolate people. The storyline that needs to advance is the global storyline. Give us reasons to get out there and do things with each other, instead of sitting around in the cities. Horde invasions, aetherstorms, maddened elementals, anti-magick crusaders from across the sea, moon shards falling from space, whatever. That stuff is awesome. Organizational stories? Meeeeeeh.
The two aren't mutually exclusive, and we're working on both types through different avenues and at different paces. I'll let Svorai get into whatever detail she wants to in the morning, but there are definitely global storylines planned.
Tbh, there's a list of people who something or other romanticize text pk. Yeah, no.
You pk because it's the only thing you're good at in this game.
You pk because A allows you to solve 90% of your problems why lowering the hammer on someone petulant enough to step up.
You abjure labels and politics because they limit the extent to which you can min/max.
Spades are spades. An elitist jerk is an elitist jerk. Bathan should totally roll up in here with reams of "Your e-bushido is retarded" insults dating back to like 2006. He'd make a killing.
Speaking of back in the day, weren't you 100% for killing the gods and endorsing player driven rp? Then you mocked and trashed the first successful attempt (Conquest) and have jellied that horse. Org specific story line may not be for you, as it inhibits your freedom, but a lot of people want it. A lot of people need it. The best example I've seen of its impact is watching Aleutia's character develop from what she had planned and what she has now. Even Bellentine took a small city-rp and based a really cool clockwork mage rp on it. You really have to look at those small, city-based events as catalysts to get other **** going. It lets people synchronize their rp to their overall schema of what the administration wants; And that's something that's been lacking since we killed every god.
Please and thank you. The give-me-attention-or-I'll-slay-these-things-you-don't-care-about spam should be limited to like, 50 messages an hour, rather than the current once every 8 seconds. Generating 450/hour+ is a little excessive, I would say.
On top of that, I really hope those new storylines that are being worked on are good enough to hook people. I've seen terrible RP before, but get these people something to do besides chopping trees all day. It's not like the trees take a long time to replace, but there aren't enough Defilers for Purifying trees to be worth it, and how bad must the whole thing look to novices when they see things like "I'm bored, let's go chop down trees." and "They're chopping down trees. Go about your business, ignore the tree spam, and they'll go away eventually."
Comments
It is impossible to not notice when Ultrix gets a new frog-themed thing, because she will spend that entire week showing them off.
"On the battlefield I am a god. I love war. The steel, the smell, the corpses. I wish there were more. On the first day I drove the Northmen back alone at the ford. Alone! On the second I carried the bridge! Me! Yesterday I climbed the Heroes! I love war! I… I wish it wasn’t over."
Let's try that.
The following is all commentary.
When I was new to this game the first month I played I got a token for logging in 25 days in a month. I could speak with a guide during almost any point in time during the three days I was a novice. When I got my first tradeskill I got three rejections in half an hour then three approvals an hour after that. It took me three months to interact with a god, but when i finally did to a new player it was astonishing and unique and I've never seen an interaction like it since. I've spent a lot of money on this game, (more than many, not as much as some.) But I find myself buying less and less all the time. Imperian lacks active volunteers (guides, approvers, dunno about builders or entities) because they pay peanuts. I've known a few former guides and a lot of approvers and all of them have stopped or slowed down because the pay off doesn't justify the time/interest necessary. I -rarely- see any guides, approvals after a great improvement (that involved Alend threatening to can the non-workers) has muddled back down. Imperian simply fails to excite and entertain me like it used to. In truth events haven't really grabbed me since the Hammer. I didn't sign up for this years Ironcon, I didn't participate nearly as much in our Tournament of Ages, I didn't even try to get into the events that unveiled the underworld (which I've been in all of twice.) There's nothing wrong with these events, they've simply failed to capture my interest/attention like they used to. And while you can write that off as a personal problem, I'm not the only one, the number of players on reflects that. The game just isn't as lively as it used to be, there's fewer players, fewer visible members of the garden. The most common complaint I've heard about Imperian is that it's become too much about money. I'm sure there's no lack of people wanting free stuff, and giveaways alone don't make things better, (thought they can certainly fool you into thinking they are). That's not to say we're entirely devoid of handouts either (the wheel was here for September, and Ironbeard is alive and well). And I'm not saying there needs to be something free every month (thought letting more of us have stockings/snowglobes/wort making pots in exchange for time instead of money would be cool), but things seem less generous than in years past. The game has changed. There's been a shift in soul, in scope. It feels like we have gone from getting the most invested/active players, to getting the most money from the players we still have. I'm not likely to quit Imperian, addictive personalities can be hard to alienate, but I didn't spend four grand on credits this year, and I'm not likely to next year, (or ever again) either.
We should have an RP-liason officer for each city.
They implemented a system like that before and it totally did bog things down to a noticeable extent; the system is more fragile than you think.
"On the battlefield I am a god. I love war. The steel, the smell, the corpses. I wish there were more. On the first day I drove the Northmen back alone at the ford. Alone! On the second I carried the bridge! Me! Yesterday I climbed the Heroes! I love war! I… I wish it wasn’t over."
I'm in the same boat of finding the game hard to get into lately. The niche isn't the primary factor - while the community has aged since IRE started a decade and a half ago, the open-ended and immersive elements of MUDs fills a niche that 'traditional' MMOs can't provide. I do feel like a lot of the time we get the impression that things move even slower on the admin side than the player side - I can't imagine the volume of issues/messages/questions is overwhelming enough to justify the lag in response time, even given a limited administrative team. This is a minor issue in the grand scheme of things, but I promise it can very much affect player satisfaction.
I think Imperian has delved far too much into a sandbox mentality that it's going to be hard to get rid of. Implementing things like the Mercenary system only adds to this issue - while it might provide neat components for players to spend more money on, it's irrelevant to the game as a whole and only serves as an accessory to the 'main appeal' of the game: dynamic, character-focused interactions (including combat obviously). I don't want to place any blame at the feet of those in charge, especially volunteers who are paid only in gratification, but at the end of the day these interactions are few and far apart and it can't be placed on the players (the paying customers) to fix these problems. It's good that classleads serve to balance combat out and that event suggestions (sparse though they may be, sorry @Svorai!) are happily acted upon, but Imperian's overreaching storylines, the ones that serve to foster the conflict between factions and get players excited and involved, are essentially dead. This isn't a problem that can be solved overnight, but it's very clear it can't be solved by the contributions of players either.
I freely admit to sampling bias here - it could just be that Demonic's storyline feels 'deader' than the rest - but I feel like these are symptoms of a game that doesn't know what it's supposed to be. The Horde provides a good central point for unifying the game against a greater conflict, but this isn't the same thing as dynamic conflict between factions. Players have to feel like they're contributing, and they have to feel like they have a dynamic place in an evolving game world. Addons like mercenaries do nothing to address these issues, and new mechanics for combat (such as the upcoming sect changes) will only cause a shift in where the emphasis lies, while the older conflict mechanics (obelisks, shardfalls, can we include townes here because seriously these feel like the biggest dead end Imperian has experienced, yes bigger than islands/five year plan/moonsages) will continue to depreciate.
Something big needs to happen to change up the status quo, and we already killed off all of the gods. What can be done next? I hope it's exciting, and I hope it's before more interest continues to wane.
TLDR: I have a lot of vague feelings of discontent and no solutions and I know I'm not the only one.
The nature of guilds now doesn't help at all. They are all pretty much just a watered down version of what they previously were. A copy of a copy of a copy. So much gets muddle out that were staples of the game for so long. Circles helped create clear and concise conflict grouping, but it also took away many avenues of fun. Like intercircle mingling. In the end it's been a give and take, but right now I guess it just seems like to much has been taken away.
And yes, I know money is big factor in the decisions that take place in this game, but if you want fresh blood it's going to come from teenagers. And last I checked teenagers aren't just rolling money. You'll be hard pressed to find any 25+ year olds just trying out the MUDing world for the first time and getting hooked like you would some teenager. So with all that being said, decreasing the amount of things you NEED to spend money on might help. Otherwise, eventually you'll just be left with the people who have spent over 2k on this game that just log on to keep from feeling guilty about their wasted money on text.
Historically, when the population of the game is high, it's possible to lean on the playerbase to provide their own interesting roleplay and events to sustain themselves. Political intrigue and rivalry, city/faction wars, conflicts in idealogies - these were (and are) largely player driven and provide a huge amount of the day-to-day interest needed to pull people in and sustain their interest. This is clearly where this niche of gaming shines, because players can work by themselves and with like minded players to develop characters and concepts that can play out in the game atmosphere. The games with larger playerbases (Achaea clearly, and the other IREs during peak times) can still fall back on this model of player interaction - there's no need to fix what is far from broken, simply to find ways to encourage and stoke these movements.
This is again erring on the side of personal bias, but I don't think that Imperian is capable of relying on this sort of model anymore.
The worldwide events step around the need for inter-faction dynamics by providing a common goal for players to work towards, but they're unsustainable and much more difficult to become mentally and emotionally invested into, since you're only able to control the outcome to a limited extent.
Pitting factions directly against each other is more favorable but much harder to balance, because the small playerbase dramatically reduces the 'buffering capacity' of PvP/faction vs. faction conflict. Our individual factions are relatively small AND fluctuate rapidly by play time and interest, and flavor-of-the-month components. Essentially, because we're only looking at groups of 10-20 players involved at a given time (this is generous), small changes in players dramatically shape the outcomes, leaving players in the outgroups unable to participate meaningfully. Demonic's rise-and-fall-and-rise(?) in the same year is a good example of this, when small numbers of players move factions or lose interest, it pushes some players to the point of non-participation.
One thing is clear: you NEED interesting storylines and mechanics to retain players during those downtimes, because let's face it: it's not as simple as saying "well just get more players". You need this sort of immersion and support, however, to retain the few new players we do get, and to encourage old players to return and stick around, and to encourage current players to WANT to log in - not to feel obligated to, not to increase the chances of getting to play the game they're paying to play, but because it's interesting and it involves them.
What's the solution? This is where hopefully some brilliant minds in charge can come up with something good, because it's a real problem that has no easy answers. We've built a lot of walls up between the factions in this game, but we've also largely been unable to sustain the impetus for it - why does AM vs. magick. vs. demonic matter in a world of dead gods and a looming global threat? Maybe it's time to think about radical, story-driven changes, and to start building the story of Imperian in the modern era. We don't have enough players to sustain 6 organizations and however many guilds while still having that 'buffer' I talked about to make the factions competitive. New players are oftentimes missing out on vital resources and perhaps more importantly, vital 'hooks' in retaining their interest. There's a great framework in place on a mechanical level - combat is engaging, fun, and for the the most part pretty balanced - but it's a hard sell when you rarely get to use the skills you've purchased.
EDIT: Because I was busy being long-winded and vague, just in response to @Svorai here: these obviously sound great, and it's exciting to hear that storylines are progressing. But it kind of highlights my point in a way: there's an event going on for Stavenn, and the beginning of an event for Celidon, because each faction has two sides to it. But is the best solution to a game-wide problem going to be relatively insular roleplay for each of 6 organizations? To the other 2/3rds (or 5/6ths) of the game, nothing is going on that they have a role in, and there's no guarantee that the outcomes will be visible or have an impact beyond an events post. I'm likely being cynical here, but I question if that strategy is the best use of limited creative resources. This isn't to say they aren't important or amazing, but we're such a small game for efforts to be driven at accenting each of six organizations.
I blame all the issuebots.
This will never happen, and the reason why is the conversation we used to have about circle changing, the one that goes something like...
"You know, Bellentine, if you're not happy in the Magick circle you should just leave."
"No I can't leave. Bellentine is a magicker and will always be a magicker because being a wizard is core to the character."
Too much of this population feels that way to make it possible to change things. I mean, yeah, there's a lot of us who don't care. Eldreth, Juran, Septus, myself? Sure, no problem. We are unusual, though. We abjure labels. We fight for money and an indefinable pride. The politics, the ethics, the moralities, are irrelevant.*
We are also a minority. Most of the people are not like us; if you tell people that their faction is being dismantled, a lot of those people are just going to quit. You will never see a major organizational shakeup for this reason.
I am incredibly "meh" about this. I don't want organization-specific storylines. In my opinion those provide an insular type of RP that just primarily serves to isolate people. The storyline that needs to advance is the global storyline. Give us reasons to get out there and do things with each other, instead of sitting around in the cities. Horde invasions, aetherstorms, maddened elementals, anti-magick crusaders from across the sea, moon shards falling from space, whatever. That stuff is awesome. Organizational stories? Meeeeeeh.
*Yes, I stole that like from the Black Company and Eldreth's sig.
"On the battlefield I am a god. I love war. The steel, the smell, the corpses. I wish there were more. On the first day I drove the Northmen back alone at the ford. Alone! On the second I carried the bridge! Me! Yesterday I climbed the Heroes! I love war! I… I wish it wasn’t over."
On top of that, I really hope those new storylines that are being worked on are good enough to hook people. I've seen terrible RP before, but get these people something to do besides chopping trees all day. It's not like the trees take a long time to replace, but there aren't enough Defilers for Purifying trees to be worth it, and how bad must the whole thing look to novices when they see things like "I'm bored, let's go chop down trees." and "They're chopping down trees. Go about your business, ignore the tree spam, and they'll go away eventually."
And, doesn't a vbelt refill any vial that empties as long as there is a matching fluid in the vbelt. Nothing is connected.