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Sure Is Quiet!
Topic Started: Apr 15 2017, 10:28 PM (3,984 Views)
Mr_Otyugh
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Dungeon Master
I'm just going to say it, because I think it needs to be addressed. It sure is quiet in the server lately. And I don't mean "spring break" quiet, if you look at the nwnlist.com, you'll notice a huge difference in player numbers. Where SCoD used to be among the top three, we're now contesting of the 4th position. This has been relatively recent change, and I'm sure it's in parts fatigue, but for a larger part I think it's about a rift between the people of SCoD.

I don't have some super good answers as to how to solve this, but I think it's a thing that should probably get some more attention on. And with that I mean, looking for things that unite us, not things that divide us. Before I get to that point, I'd like to take a moment to talk about my vision of SCoD, or rather what I perceived my role to be in SCoD once.

When I was an administer in SCoD, I could for a large extent do whatever I pleased, there was like one person that could've stopped me, and they tended to agree with me most of the times. I however didn't. Players aren't tied to SCoD by strings, they make their own choice to stay here. Sure I did demand respect, but I also worked hard to give respect for the people. However the most important part for me was to try to be worthy of the respect I demanded. The first two are very easy, the third part requires doing some work to earn it. That role to me was more about being a teacher, and trying to learn how to most effectively say what I wanted to, so as to decrease the misunderstandings to a minimum.

I'm not an easy person to get close to, that far is intentional, because as an admin my general policy was "I have no luxury for friendships", though friendly, definitely. And it has kind of stuck since then. It was a simple message to players who wanted something out of me via asskissing, and that I'd give them no special treatment, even those few who did manage to become my friends generally were to deal with other DMs instead. Often I am given two choices to pick from, I generally refuse to be confined by choices and instead think of a third alternative if neither appeal to me. To me it was important to remain impartial, think for myself and represent the SCoD as objectively as possible, for it always would have players that didn't share my interests, but that should be alright, as long as some core values would not be tampered with. Those core values to me are:
  • - Things should be possible to be communicated respectfully. Even in matters of dissent.
    - SCoD is a hop on, hop off gaming server, people come here to relax, not to deal with drama. As such public displays of drama should be minimized by handling things in private. And things should be reflected as stable and to some extent predictable.
    - People should feel welcome. I did try to foster as open environment as possible, make sure people felt like they could talk to me, and other players.
    - Don't look for trouble, or you'll find it. Identify the string of events that lead to the problem, and determine whether or not it requires attention, and to what extent.
    - When people are to be deemed guilty inevitably, try to teach them to a point where they should be able to avoid further incursions of similar kind. A misbehaving player at first is a failure to explain how things function. Doing so may just make them the assets of later date. After they've been sufficiently told how, and still misbehave, it becomes the problem of the player.
The reason why I wanted to mention that, was to try to bring transparency of how I view things, and how I think they should be. Perhaps mend some differing views. It might sound or seem simple, it's not, it's a dedication that can consume hours upon hours. But it's not something I've ceased to believe, so when I say "I'm on SCoD's side", that's what I stand for, and what I still try to ensure, though in a diminished extent.


Now then! Lets talk about trying to revive the server a bit! Events! I think we should try to get more events and get involved in more events. Maybe we don't usually feel like it, but hey! Might as well give it a shot, might end up liking it. I'll even open up myself as a free think-tank for people that might want to bounce off ideas, and might be able to shove in one of my characters to help out in some way or another. I should even have some expendable characters that can literally die for your ideas. So bring it on! I can try to enable activity to the limits of my time.
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zethrenx99
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Greybeard
[ *  *  *  *  * ]
:clap:

I Think Events will go a long way, but they need to be open generalized events maybe having a couple of em's working on one plot line so that as many people who are interested as possible can be involved. We are in the center of the multiverse! anything one could think of could and would happen on a daily basis and those one couldn't think of even more so :lol:. I currently don't a lot of time, but soon I will be able to focus a little more on some plots and such, Shoot them out to the EM team. I think a forum for plot idea's that is accessible only to EM/DM's would be good, i don't know if one exists already (and i haven't really looked to be honest.)

I would make one point about stability though, and this could just be my own personal preference, but i think that a little instability can go a long way in keeping people interested. I've actually seen quite a few new players lately and many of them are keeping around, but i think that maybe having the prospect of flux, that is, everything in the server isn't already set in stone but is instead a growing and organic thing is a good way to keep new and old players invigorated. So what does this mean in practice? Perhaps some open faction power struggles? Things of that nature that would give players a feeling that their actions will make a difference. Maybe try to Run some faction recruiting events? Try to keep new players informed of the different factions and give them an ease of access to those communities.

But I love the server, the setting and the people that keep it going in game and behind the scenes! I have no doubt that we can drag all those nwn2 players back here by force ';..;'
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Mr_Otyugh
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Dungeon Master
Oh I agree entirely, stability shouldn't equal to IC stagnation. When I say stability, I mean on the OOC side rather than IC side. I do believe that IC should be governed with entirely different set of ideologies. And EMs do already have a forum for discussing plot ideas, which is visible for DMs also, DMs do have their own forums visible only by them.
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zethrenx99
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Greybeard
[ *  *  *  *  * ]
Ah I see ^^, I suppose I misunderstood. Where is the forum under?
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MimiFearthegn
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Mistress of the Toolset / Player-Side Admin
Admin
zethrenx99,Apr 15 2017
09:59 PM
Ah I see ^^, I suppose I misunderstood. Where is the forum under?

Its hidden unless you're an EM (or DM).
Do not hesitate to send me a PM if you:
- Have questions about building, or joining the Dev Team
- Want to join or start an event for the Mercykillers, Fated, or Signers
- You have been waiting more than 2 days for me to post in an IC forum thread
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DigitalDragoon
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Builders/scripters
It seems like things rarely ever drop lately when out fighting stuff (not that i ever find much regardless). I cannot help but wonder if that is a contributating factor, combined with the holiday/spring break stuff.
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coyotesage
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Greybeard
[ *  *  *  *  * ]
I generally stopped playing a while back due to mostly creative differences and the feeling that the admin staff was generally tightening the ropes of expectation. The creative differences I get, to some degree. My almost completely open style does not mesh here, even though Sigil tends to be more open than most settings, it doesn't fit my Rick & Morty "literally anything is possible" tastes. So be it, I can't get too upset if people want to stick strongly to "lore" - I just didn't really understand that was so important to the server when I first started playing here 4 or so years ago.

Stuff like the OOC room though seems like an attempt to force people to "go and role play and not horseplay". People love to mess around - almost every table top game I've ever been a part of has had more messing around than actual role play, and that's been fine. Good even. At the end of the day people want to have fun and relax and engage in role play when they're ready to. That's kind of the biggest advantage, in theory, to having a persistent world that isn't time governed heavily by a DM. I know some things were brought up about server performance, but surely there could have been some accommodations made for people. From where I sit, I got the feeling that it was a "If you aren't here to role play the moment you log into the server, then we don't want you." I have a feeling this is why things have been quiet - people felt unwanted, so they left. I've seen many attempts over the years, from NWN 1 to NWN 2 servers to try and force people to role play more and clown around less, and not a single one of those attempts has worked - at least with a large player base continuing to login regularly.

I've had some great times here though and I wish the server the best, just wanted to say what I think the culprit might be. The Universe knows I've been wrong plenty of times though, so take it all with the grain of salt it's probably due. Cheers. :beer:
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Nerull
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I'm not Evil, I'm morally Ambiguous.
[ *  *  *  *  *  * ]
I think folks just get burned out too quick.

Sigil is a great server, I'll never change my mind about this but to realize the things that may cause problems may just bring them to light.

Larger Issues:
- Quick Leveling
- Items & Equipment, Too Easy but no wait, too difficult? But wait, how does he/she have that?
- Grandfathered characters
*This covers:
- Immense Wealth
- Player owned shops that act like cash siphons from newer players.
- Equipment only substantially gained from Immense Wealth.
*
World Interaction:
- Lack of Real, Substantial Events with lasting effects on the world
- 20347 Player Factions, Everyone wants to be a group. Forces Attention to a smaller basis than a whole.
- Primary Factions Ignored, Struggling from lack of players due to the above.
- EM's, majority contributing little. More focused on own characters. "Being EM just to be EM to have DM client access".
*Which once again revolves to how little events can be substantially, how little can be changed. How many events are completed, only to be forgotten in less than a week?
- Lack of Diversity with player interactions. We're all either nobody or an OG... or just boobs and butts.

How do you fix such things without utterly re-rolling the server? Personally, should just wipe the entire playerbase. Make everyone start fresh. Have a catastrophic event force the LoP to draw back on everything that's happened since a set point to try to avoid disaster. Heroes keep their memories for those who were present. Make a server plot to try to correct the events from transpiring.

If people really like their characters, they'll keep playing them. If they were just in it for the gear, they'll move on or make new ones. There comes a point where you have NWN2 max amount of gold, everything you'll ever need, a house, sexslaves and an obedient dog... that things just get boring.


Disclaimer:
This is just my personal opinion from my time here. Nerull speaks openly about his opinions, not everyone likes them, nor does he expect them too. Nerull still greatly enjoys the server but prefers to do so from the cover of darkness.

Cheers. :beer:


Minor Edit: Nerull likes how DLB is 3rd from the bottom. They had it coming. :drool:
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Theodoreick
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Wiki Contributer
Out of curiosity how many SCoD players have advertised the server to people who do not play on it or who do not play NWN2?

I saw around the web some old posts from Agony Aunt from three years ago and that was all.

I speak for example of stuff like this →https://www.reddit.com/r/neverwinternights/...riendly_to_new/

If we do not advetise anywhere and keep the knowledge of how awesome the server is only among ourselves it is really no surprise that the active population will eventually decrease.

Other ideas:

- Implement Mick's proposal for OOC room so we can have again idle there → players call players. Few except for die-hard Planescape fans would log on a server with 10 players online when there are three other servers with 20 or even 30 users in the same moment.

- Equipment and leveling. I think this does have a role, especially for new players. Undersigil already is a tad too deadly for the average newbie and going to higher level areas depends on whether one finds a PC merchant online with the gear and decent prices. There should be an alternative, even if less effective that could guarantee decent equipment to at least continue leveling. Also I have read around of older players reporting that now grinding awards way fewer loot. Is this confirmed? If it is this will worsen the situation, by making prices for equipment even higher. And that's really not needed.

- Last but not least, IC interaction and involvement. I am sincerely convinced that a good player is better than a DM in stimulating roleplay and involving people in plots. In particular I think there should be an attitude to share, within reason and consistency, what is going on, and even to initiate plots autonomously, especially if they can involve outsiders. This, I think, is essentially what Mr. O said a while ago when he suggested that factions should have been engines of interaction instead of exclusive clubs. To this I may add that it would be nice to have some journalists who write on SIGIS the main events, in particular what could reasonably be mainstream, and also some gossip and other stuff. I have seen this used elsewhere with very positive results. Also a museum that illustrates history of past events and plots would be very nice to have, as a side addition.

While I think these last three points may play a role in bumping player count a little, I do believe that they are not so decisive to the point to bring us on top of the scry. I think that advertising on the other hand can have a much more positive impact by bringing new, fresh players to the server. So maybe we could organize an advertising team, that for example take screenshots of new released contents and post them on vault boards, reddit and other places.

About player numbers I also noticed, and it is an impression so take it for what it is, that Sigil's numbers did not really drop -that- much, rather the playercount of two servers that used to be below us rose quite a bit. I wonder what happened, but I guess it'll be difficult to learn.
PnP, Pencil-and-paper: the term refers to the ancient tools that were available to early roleplaying humankind. The pencil was a long piece of wood that contained a soft, staining, carbon-based material called graphite encased inside. Early roleplaying humans would scrape the pencil across the surface of paper. Paper was the term used to describe an early form of random access memory, consisting of pressed tree pulp that was smooth and designed to easily absorb the scrapings of pencil graphite.
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Am Not Here
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Prime
[ *  * ]
i wouldnt take into account levelling and item acquisition too much when comes to player scarcity. fewer and fewer are the old characters who actually have items not findable anymore, and those who are wealthy is because of many hours of trading , or gambling, until it was profitable.
the level cap on items makes so that is very rare that someone has items others can't obtain, and i dont think people weould enjoy slower levelling all that much, more so if enforced. if someone wants to slow levelling hey just have to avoid grindind and instead simply rp in safe zones, or get in events.
i dread to play in server where to max lvl you need a year or so. THAT would indeed separate more the difference between older and newer players.
and more so, the more time you need to dedicate to levelling the less you'll dedicate to RP, unless perhaps with a strict levelling system which requires you to do RP like in those serves where you can't advance without a dm and it takes you a year or more to cap :P

as for rewards it may be it has decreased, in some places it has, not sure if in all of them

there're not many buyers right now, several player stores have items in multiple copies too, and some had to dump prices

undersigil is a nice area for this reason: is one of the few areas where using simple consumables has its use. potions, tricks , that stuff, it does help you survive, it's something of a tactical aspect later areas lose in favor of level, equipments or better items


some players do come here to simply relax and not get bothered or can't dedicate too much to it , perhaps while sorting work out while they play, i don't hold it against who stays quiet or simple in their rp. i more of have it against who makes snark remarks toward those abovementioned, cheers.

i didn't play in two of the most crowded servers, baldur's gate and trinity. the latter is a story driven campaign doable in co-op? the former is the more familiar faerun pw, though i wont shrink it's popularity to just that , not having played there, so i'm not privvy of what differences besides setting there are



as for vault wipes....did the other servers ever needed to do that, intentionally?

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LeonDuguit
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Clueless
[ * ]
I'm very new here, and thought I would throw my two cents in. While I may be wrong about many things, you might find my observations valuable in that they are the impressions I have been given over a short period.

At very low levels, I just wandered around exploring, until I realised that I needed to grind a bit in order not to die immediately on entering certain areas. Fair enough, I think there is something to be said for a little bit of a learning curve, so that people get comfortable in the setting.

Around the low 'teens I grouped up with people whom I met randomly, and we visited higher-level areas. This was nice, and a decent mix of RP with casual play.

I'm now in the low 20s. I mostly have the gear that I had at level 5, although that is probably my fault - I have been advised to seek out PC merchants. From my perspective, almost nothing of significant value drops in the loot table, and those which do are truly random (and often unusable by my character). This is only really a problem because they cannot really be sold in a convenient way to NPCs, but again I accept that PC merchants may be the remedy.

One thing I have noticed an acute lack of is a feeling of a broader story. Maybe it is the lack of a goal, or well-defined groups, but nobody that I have met has spoken about ongoing conflicts, or issues, or current events. That may be a play-style, but based on the forums I suspect that there may not be an overarching plot event in play at any given time to give the characters something to choose sides of and RP around.

So now some suggestions, again apologising in advance for my ignorance of this community at large. This is all based on an extremely small sample space.

I used to be the main DM for an NWN server with over 200 players and probably a dozen DMs in its hey-day. I generally didn't play a character, but would hop on, and if I found a small group of players, would run a quick event. NPC with fair thin plot hook, send them to a level-appropriate area, set up "checkpoints" with plot-advancing enemies or exposition PCs, and let them battle through the area to those points, so that I wasn't constantly trying to keep up. It was especially easy to do so if there was a broad plot going on, as those little adventures (30-60 mins tops, maybe 15 mins of active work on my part, and another 15 or so rolling up plot NPCs). I'm not experienced with the NWN2 DM client, so this may be more difficult than in NWN, but would love to see things like this. Maybe they are happening, and I haven't heard about them!

If there are too many factions/groups as a poster above suggests, an overarching conflict would allow them to be grouped up a bit more around positions on that conflict.

If you opened up the loot tables a little more, it might be more common for groups to form regardless of the xp penalties for grouping up with a level 30. If someone used the Shout channel to spread word of a spontaneous skirmish in the Blood Wars (let's just assume that this doesn't get abused), or to visit a challenging area, that might encourage newer players to join with established groups and be carried along, meeting those characters.

Just some thoughts. I hope they are of interest.
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Mr_Otyugh
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Dungeon Master
There is currently accidentally reduced loot rate, but it's getting fixed, so the current loot drop ratio isn't really representative as to what it normally is. But it is unfortunately kind of tedious.
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MimiFearthegn
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Mistress of the Toolset / Player-Side Admin
Admin
We are currently working on both the equipment / loot issue, and the story issue.

And of course, we're always accepting new EM applications if anyone feels like running quick quests now and again! :)
Do not hesitate to send me a PM if you:
- Have questions about building, or joining the Dev Team
- Want to join or start an event for the Mercykillers, Fated, or Signers
- You have been waiting more than 2 days for me to post in an IC forum thread
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Tomekk
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Dark Soul
[ *  *  *  *  *  *  *  * ]
Kinda agree with Nerull here, too many player groups kind of siphon away what little players we have in factions... which are still an unresolved issue. Ignoring cannon and giving each faction a designated role or two in the city would make them much easier to grasp for new characters and players alike, in my opinion.

But on the other hand, a server wipe will see nothing but a mass of players not bothering to play again. Grinding to level 30 is not fun at all, getting the equipment needed to do so is even less.
"From the realms below we ride,
And in terror they run and hide,
From the shadows of old we rise,
Awakened, from the dark!

Over the ancient ruins we fly,
Where the old kings go to die,
And the new kingdoms rising high,
Awakened, from the dark, dark slumber!"
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Niryain
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Anarch at Heart
[ *  *  *  * ]
Haven basically overtook you guys in the 'creative classes' department (and they're OP as hell and the PvE content plays even more like Diablo than NWN2 usually does) and they offer the same type of mostly-sexual RP that a portion of the playerbase here was largely interested in. There's even a growing kind of serious RP scene going on outside of the main Social Hub. Sigil's always billed itself as an action/rp/social mix and there's just another server that's doing the same thing but with slightly different sliders on those three values these days. That might account for how it got above? As for BG they've been under new management for a year+ now and seem to have reformed well and offer a 'harder' leveling experience and a more traditional FR setting which a lot of people like.

So what does Sigil offer as its draw? The setting, mostly. Which is woefully underused. But enough people in this thread have bemoaned the state of factions already, and for years at that. I have no actual idea how a player is supposed to advance without using/abusing PC merchants, as in my time playing here I've never been able to kit a character reasonably out through drops. Alts are kind of the saving grace and draw of things, especially with the setting as there's like infinite ideas but.. Doing the rats > Undersigil > Brux > Ice/Fire > Swamp > Abyss progression for the tenth time (Sub Gith in there if you're smarter than I was) gets really dull really fast. And there's no high level PvE either these days. I've legitimately never been on a Carc run. The few times I've tried to organize it in the bazaar, none were interested. So PvE's kind of out. No PvP or player tension plots, look at what happend with the Doomguard a couple years back. Dramatic llamas.

The event thing, well.. Sigil is kind of an immutable setting by design. The Lady of Pain is going to shut down anyoen that tries to rock the boat too hard, and for the planes, uh. Congrats, you're ruler of Prime 3415, enjoy I guess? So I don't know how to solve that issue, but more DM/EM events and involvement might help. I know though that in the past, the few events I was in, I felt kind of like the supporting cast for an 'OG' player as Nerull put it, which kind of soured me to it. Small wonder some players retreat into the depths of an inn when sexually charged races are offered and they don't feel like they have an impact elsewhere.
Level 30 Forum Warrior

Also I sometimes play on the server I guess.

“I don't know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve.”
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