Medieval & Fantasy Minecraft Roleplaying

Greetings Explorer, Navigate into the Lobby!

Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

Be sure to "Get Whitelisted" to join the community on server!

Starfall Feedback

Kamaoe

The Green One
Legend
Kamaoe
Kamaoe
Legend
=+=

As it says on the tin. I want to hear your feedback at every stage of this campaign so that I can learn from any negative feedback early on and adjust or fix while there's time to do so.
Please give me your thoughts on the events so far!

=+=
 
Last edited:

Scardrac

Felsummer
I know the first event usually isn't the one that changes the course of the campaign forever but thank you for doing it right in the way that what happened was able to happen. Very cool.
 

Ruu Darling

ʕ •́؈•̀ ₎
Aware Single
Legend
Retired Staff
RuuDarling
RuuDarling
Single
Usually, the first opening of campaign events isn't very interesting for me, but I'm incredibly curious where this is going. You got me hooked, Kam.
 

Archbishop

Faith prevail
Retired Staff
Archbishop
Archbishop
Pros -
A pretty rainbow gem
One traumatized kid
One dead elf (with a great new title)
A small momento of the event (space rock)
Hours of pissing off Pod

Cons -
Spit-covered jewel
Not sure where to head next with this thing.
We’re now living in Lovecraftian Horror
 

Shao

Bring back angry react
Got a bee, won a joust, didn't get my head caved in by a space rock like a scrub. Interested to see what happens.
 

Scardrac

Felsummer
God the first event was so good but so far this second one is a testament to atrocity. Currently in the middle of it but so far what's gone on is pretty irreparable so I am confident in posting my first impressions. Elaboration comes later. Wanted to get my foot in the door before 'praise' comes in.
 

Arken

is Barken
ArkenGuard
ArkenGuard
Good
Somebody just watched Annihilation but then forgot the entire plot and drew the story board in crayon
 

Lannis

You've yeed your last haw
Staff member
Admin
Events Staff
In-Game Tech Staff
Lore Staff
Server Outreach
Server Owner
Shadow Owner
God the first event was so good but so far this second one is a testament to atrocity. Currently in the middle of it but so far what's gone on is pretty irreparable so I am confident in posting my first impressions. Elaboration comes later. Wanted to get my foot in the door before 'praise' comes in.
Look man, you're entitled to your opinion but kindly keep feedback at least somewhat constructive. The thread is not going anywhere before you have a chance to elaborate.

Somebody just watched Annihilation but then forgot the entire plot and drew the story board in crayon
You were not at the event, if you don't have anything to contribute kindly keep the commentary to yourself.
 

Cap

Lord of Altera
Legend
This was not good. There isn't a bad atmosphere- I'd appreciate even an attempt. There just is no atmosphere at all, no vibe. Normally I would do my best to praise the attempts of the campaign DMs to work around a poorly written event idea, but in the case of this event I cannot even bring myself to do that. The DMing was lazy and vague, and throughout the event myself and my companions had no actual idea what was actually happening due to the unsatisfying writing quality. Additionally annoying is the fact that the alien made it impossible for mages to cast and caused debilitating pain in the eyes (described to me as blinding, though a DM later contradicted this) which made it impossible for magic characters to engage in satisfactory RP with the alien. This seems to me to be a countermeasure to previous events where Eviscism mages were powerful counters to event antagonists.

At this time I haven't experienced enough of the campaign to comment further, and I remain optimistic as the opening event and the following experimentation was excellent and high quality. However the experience of this event has fallen short of most if not all expectations. It was mentioned on the thread that the DM had to reschedule- maybe some more prep time should be considered before the next event.
 

The Cinnaroll

The Cinnamon Roll
Very Sweet
Legend
Retired Staff
Pronouns
She/Her, They/Them
Asirel_Luik
Asirel_Luik
Sweetheart
From what I've experienced personally so far I've had fun with it, magic being blocked or not. It's been an interesting thing so far, and it's not something I've seen done on HW before. Not with the stars and Elementals and the connection to them. I'm personally looking forward to what else Kam and company has in store.
 

RagingLunacy

Lord of Altera
Lover
Legend
Hollicynthea
Hollicynthea
Lover
I had fun investigating. The bad effects happening earlier on were a surprising and interesting element, even if I may have thought of them more severe than they were. Seeing some warped beasties, especially which ones, also was a nice surprise, seeing I hadn't seen the original creatures used before this. And as I said, scouring the place even as the rest had already wandered about and taken stuff, only to find more bits and bobs left in missed spots simply drove me to wanting to search even more for what was hidden around, almost like an easter egg hunt.
Unfortunately, had to miss out on the cave bit, despite people wanting me to be there, so I'll reserve judgement on that and leave it for the people that are doing that portion now. :heart:
 

Luam

friendly neighborhood inquisitor
Legend
Retired Staff
SirLiam1124
SirLiam1124
Legend
pod cleaned up part of a mansion by sweeping together a bunch of shattered glass, throwing out some rotten food, and praying over, then dragging six bodies outside, where he burned them in the light of the sun to ignis on makeshift pyres. all the while, everyone else was in the cave portion of the event and i have exactly 0 regrets with this decision

edit: he then waited outside the dungeon for everyone to walk back out, and saw people looted the vault of a family that got killed and pod was the only one to take care of and called them out on it. he was the moral compass for once. extra +1
 
Last edited:

Lavilethorn

Lord of Altera
I enjoyed setting the stage for the big baddy. I'm glad I was able to partake in the dungeon bit Azur for dragging the wounded Makani along. Was quite fun and I do look forward to how horrific things will get from here on. I am both excited and horrified.
 

Elz

hmm
Staff member
Admin
Very Sweet
I admit I was quite out of it when I joined and with IRL going on, I wasn't as focused as I could've been. As a result I had very little idea of what was occuring in the start, beyond the mutated fire birds. Then I think we all got rainbow streaks of hair (Is that perma?) and sickness as we passed a certain place. But I'm still not clear on what the golem was doing - And if the golem was a statue. If it was moving we kind of all moved past it, I think it stopped moving but I'm unsure. The house had the occasional loot pieces, but I do not believe they held significance. Generally I think there could've been more clarification on what we were looking at/dealing with in the beginning, and some emotes could maybe be parsed a bit better as another preference. Slang in emotes doesn't come off quite as engaging as it would otherwise, I feel, even if it seems extremely minor to some folk.

There was not too much direction for me personally. A house that we had to get very sickly and rainbow hair'd and mages got worse to approach, but I don't know if we were meant to focus on the meteor or the golem thing instead.

I did not do fighting as I didn't really get into range for it (aside from blargs bird) so I can't comment on that.

The mazes and puzzles below were... I want to say they were well done, but I personally don't enjoy them as much as others may, so I can't really critique you there. It's just a preference. They frustrate me and they get cramped, and constantly being bumped into was enough for me to start tabbing out and waiting for the next bit to be done. I lost a lot of immersion by this point and I just wanted to see what it was at the end that we were all led here for, this house with a living statue. (Unless the house was a normal house and the meteor simply happened to fall here and animate it, which it could be, but then I question why people have such extensive mazes in basements.)
The second maze was an extension of the first and I tuned out and ended up getting frustrated in local because I assumed it was a ruse for DM's enjoyment. Fair enough, some people liked it, but being my review I just didn't.
I'm not sure what to think of the end there - It was a long, secure vault but I did think there'd be something else related to the beginning.

I do look forward to future events, and I apologise if my review is negative or shitty. It's been a tough day and I've tried not to have it reflect here too.
 

Azur

Lord of Altera
Lover
Legend
A_Z_U_R
A_Z_U_R
Lover
I enjoyed setting the stage for the big baddy. I'm glad I was able to partake in the dungeon bit Azur for dragging the wounded Makani along. Was quite fun and I do look forward to how horrific things will get from here on. I am both excited and horrified.
Always keep the KFC on hand.

I will say that some of the effects/general ideas for the beginning part of the event did seem eerily similar to the movie Anihilation - and I don't know if that was coincidental or if it took a lot from that specific idea. It was neat regardless, though.
 

Heie

Lord of Altera
Lore Staff
Legend
Staff
When I found out that the Giant statue was indeed /not/ the stone elemental like thing, a lot of things made more sense. I enjoy the plot hook Meteorites and their ability to cancel out magic, that and somehow corrupt nearby things such as the Emberlark, a horse and some vines, along with i believe some fish in SL. A lot of things were presented, and will spark further research. I also look forward to what will happen as what I believe to be elementals continue to get stronger.
 

Electric

professionally deranged
Retired Staff
electricwisekid
electricwisekid
Legend
I found the event quite fun! The meteor had some cool effects and I enjoyed that we used T E A M W O R K to solve the puzzles. The builds were nice as well; the eerie mansion provided a mystery on top of the going-ons with the elemental.
 

Scardrac

Felsummer
Look man, you're entitled to your opinion but kindly keep feedback at least somewhat constructive. The thread is not going anywhere before you have a chance to elaborate.
OK. So my words were quite harsh but honestly over the past, paragraphs don't equal progress. I'll keep it short. Event page was very vague, and so were the directions leading up to the event itself. I recall there being a single broadcast that explained the big "wow" thing that lead us to where we went, but it was all forgettable, considering I didn't remember it. I was paying close attention up until the point where we arrived at a mansion, and so many things came all at once:

White, glowing rainbow hair appearing on everyone that approached the event area.
Mages got their magic literally cut out. Eviscists eyes glowed and sparks flew out of them.
Corrupted creatures attacked people, white glowing emberlarks, two horned horses, and vines that had the ability to attack people.
A fucking elemental? Pardon my language but it's the first time someone uses a skin to play some tremendous, mysterious character that has been successfully grounded in the lore from previous, successful events, and it's tossed in with everything else that was going on. He should not be drowned out by players emotes and tons of other distractions. If players aren't shutting up and paying attention to something that deserves it, you're doing it wrong.

No sense of direction, atmosphere, creativity, writing ability... It's like I was tossed into a middle school gymnasium with a few attractions at each corner of the room and had to pick one. Each of the DMs had their own thing to do and if you picked one, you had to finish it quick and catch up with the others. It was chaotic.

Cons:
Very anime (Glowing rainbow hair and eyes? Forlorn did it right in giving this stuff to the people who did things wrong/right in different ways, it ended up being only three people to get them. You don't hand that stuff out to everyone. I had to just keep my character standing back and out of the way standing there like an idiot because I didn't want his first roleplay to ruin him with rainbow hair. Yeah, I know it's a single strand and it could probably be cut off, but if you're going to add a 'this effects people, it's a dangerous space thing', make it something like a weird bruise or something under the clothes.)

Very chaotic (DMs everywhere, the event area was an open mansion with a clear purpose at the end of it, but everything between the start and whatever the end was felt like forced filler, DMs given confetti to toss at you before the real show begins. I get it, context of 'creatures are being weird', but everyone was all over the place and I felt like it could be done better.)

Lack of descriptive writing and abundance of immersion breaking commentary.
https://gyazo.com/0e3ea531d16e31b8a9621f21ee1189ee (Could have been a broadcast or forum tag to tell people later. Instantly killed any tension with the mages magic, even if the broad magic turn off switch was a bit of a cheese move)

https://gyazo.com/a8b732cbba7e7bfeef8dea2a549a5b58 (Honest mistake I am absolutely certain. It happens, but I think some ambition should be put into quality control with stuff like this.)

https://gyazo.com/a8840aa885fa03dd4a2fdcd3dc6842d9 (Can't remember context, but clear spoilers of a situation and lighthearted commentary has no place in DM emotes. You're the exposition, here. Tell a story, don't force it down our throats.)

https://gyazo.com/3c0d0490919c2e1fd33d16fdf7a8d4d7 (Same as one before. xD? Seriously?)

https://gyazo.com/704d61c3bbe86d0d5664086e728a3720 (Just providing some more here. Point is that it's not very encouraging to see the people who are trying to forge an unforgettable story do stuff like this. Corruption didn't do this.)
Trope of 'you get sick if you get close'. Addendum from 'lack of descriptive writing': You could describe what the player is feeling. Takes me five seconds to write: Those approaching the foreign object of our realm from the skies above feel as if a ball of lead weighs upon their stomach. Their lunch threatens to abandon their body violently. Not that hard.

Annihilation plot of DNA getting merged, forced evolution of creatures to make them corrupt and dangerous (Incursion and Forlorn did that, granted each in different ways with different reasons, but it's a stale concept now).

Just shutting off magic. Sorry, mages! No exploding the event creatures. Or destroying the crystals. Yeah, I know they could be destroyed without magic, and I know the crystals themselves didn't shut off magic, but taking magic away still seems like a "go at our pace" move done wrong.

Pros:
It wasn't a cave.


What can you do better?

Take some time to actually write up meaningful dialogue, ambient descriptions, and heavily enforce not straying from that pack. DMs should keep their OOC commentary to a minimum unless absolutely necessary. Pre-write. There were tons of typos and empty descriptions of things and objects and places. Boring word choice. Write things up that sound write, descriptions to paste into chat when players reach a certain point. Sure I know things change on the fly sometimes but it's not as drastic as you might think. The event would go one way, the way the DMs intend it to, despite player interaction, if they truly want it to. I think they should. Improve your writing and people will enjoy it ten fold.

Don't be afraid to tell a story, please. Not only will the quality benefit, it will be much more efficient in the long run when you have a clear outcome in events and things to show and tell. But show more, don't tell more. Freeform has its beauty when there's a detailed world and event to use it in. Freeform doesn't mean be afraid to jerk the players around a bit with your DM'ing, it doesn't mean plop your plot devices down at their feet and wait for them to make the move. They don't do what you want players to do? Inject an NPC to help guide them along to the right path. Corruption did that right.

You have an amazing concept here but right now it feels like we're being treated like children. Smorgasbord of things we're told are good and we're told to go wild. Force fed storytelling (if there's some story to things at all). You have so many people here to help you write up cool events and I know plenty of them have genuinely cool ideas. But ask for help and don't slack on the things that matter, please. I love this place and I don't want to see another event flop.
 
Last edited:
Top