Unabridged

[Solus]

Excuse my wordings~ [Oh my gosh, I spent a long time writing a response. Good thing I had the day off ..]

Spoiler

1) Pulling magic away from the world is pretty unfortunate. One of the appeals of the world was that it wasn't just an ordinary medieval world. With different races and then a chance to learn er... magical things. From what I've seen, the characters that do have it seem to handle their use maturely. I have barely seen anyone use theirs frequently or at all, including you. [Healing of course is a frequent necessity. Even then, Tzemik handles her use with scarcity and she plays the over-use of it well and handles that maturely. My example is during the time I had the Plague and she was healing all over the place and gaining fatigue from it, pressure, nosebleed and all. Cogitation I've seen use a few times. Just minor tricks such as reading minds. And when the characters their reading on dislikes it (not sure if they disliked it OOCly as well..) But they back off as soon as they sense the uneasiness. I realize I've only listed magic in non-threatening to character form. But I've rarely seen it used in combat/battle, so I haven't seen it enough to make a comment on it.]

The other end of the spectrum, however... may not be ready for it. Perhaps they dislike having their characters at a disadvantage, even if it is at its slightest. I am not sure why.. The world is unfair and full of disadvantages. Why bother about it in a somewhat-realistic-fantasy-based rp world. Sure, you're here for fun. But so are the rest of the people playing. My two cents to those people would be to work to find an advantage. A legitimate one, of course. To not complain if they are one-uped by someone else (Magic or no magic. It seems people can't take it at /all/.) It's no fun to win all the time. Sure your ego would boost and you'll be happy for a short while. But it's more fun in the long run if you play the game with your disadvantages and learn to overcome them... or find away to avoid them. Perhaps they think Magic is too big of a gap to gain over. I'm not going to make excuses for them, though. If they couldn't deal with magic... maybe it's best to leave it. I will be sad to see it go, if it does.

"This is why we can't have nice things."

Edit: I really don't want it to leave, but if it can't be helped...

2) It is understandable to want to pull the reigns over. The title of "Lore Guy" seems very stressful from what you've written. From my experience, you've handled it with careful thought, answering questions and all. (i.e. Experiment on the Plague and that one mistake~. I was fine with how it was approached and ended on both parts. I wanted to follow through instead of voiding because someone has to follow the rules, right? That's why there are rules. Of course I was unwilling at a point, but I'm pretty glad I followed through. It makes your job easier, too.) But if this line of work is getting to you, then it's fully a-ok step down. Not much I can say, since it's your will to do other things, besides you've done good.

3) I wish I had interacted with your character more. Perhaps I found it hard to approach you rp-wise. From IC-experience you were someone who knew lots of things.. an experienced character. Funny thing is, I wasn't intimated by your /magic/, but more of your character's knowledge. And I am not entirely sure why knowledge should be intimating, but that seems to be how my character works. Either way, I found it completely legitimate that one time you gathered people for the Kilrox ..er.. molding. Naelwyn had the knowledge to do these things, so why shouldn't he use it to help Altera? No one else was doing much. We're all just slushing around waiting for the Corruption to go away. I felt that characters such as yourself and your actions were justified from the things you knew.

But yet again, not everyone thinks the same. And the same problem is perhaps rooted here as well. One of people not wanting their own characters at a disadvantage to others.

I rarely see your character out-and-about anyways, but it is your choice here as well to keep him away from the world as long as you choose to.

4) + 5) ...I think my main theme going here is people not wanting to be at a disadvantage... These two parts seem to mold together so I thought, why not. I don't mean to insult anyone at all. But I may be doing so as I write this...

I believe a mature rp-er can handle not letting their RP behavior effect their OOC behavior. (I just passed by a bunch of people at spawn while writing the first part of this...throwing ooc insults at each other. I believe it was an argument on a fight. I did not stick around to find out the problem and fix it. "Whoops.".)

Once people learn to stick their arguments/questions into RP, then there is no need for OCC fights. In regards to new players: If your character doesn't know something, it's perfectly a-ok to ask whilst In-Character. The less OOC questionings, the better. If you're Rp-ing a fight, it is good practice to rp in as much detail as you can so that there is no room for argument in OOC. And it is /eloquent/ and /considerate/ if you only rp two lines of action so that the other player can respond. It is also considerate to answer questions if a player asks you to explain your moves. If you shrug off saying "It's legit," that won't help the other player at all and will only incite anger...OCCly. It is also good practice to /work with eachother/ while you are rping. This isn't a single player game. This is a multiplayer game where your goal is to play and not /win/.

I realize I'm bringing up statements that should be common sense which it seems to be one of the main reasons for arguments in OCC, as you wrote somewhere up there.

..I know one can get wrapped up in their character. If you feel that thirst for revenge because Guard A killed your best friend, then so be it. But if you're giving the player who plays Guard A a hard time with questions like, "Why'd you kill him," "How did you kill him", "I'm coming for you with a hoard of men helping me," "If I see you around in my rp range, Imma keel you." Then you need to just breath, stop pming Player Guard A, and go /RP your hate out/. Leave it out of OOC and just go play.

I can think up more examples...Maybe next time. In the end, people's RP thoughts/reasonings need to stop bleeding into OOC.

6) On Villains, I fully agree~ I find it quite interesting to think of different ways rather than 'Plow ahead" being an option to thwart a villain. I can name a reallllly good villain, but it's too obvious for me to say. You know who you are. If you're up against a villain who's docked full of armor, there are plenty of weaknesses they have. Your best option being out running them. This also pertains to people who play armor...should /play/ their armor as well.

To this part, I just have to agree and say "Think outside the box."

7) Rules are important. I believe there should be a common sense post guide just so people can understand that instead of being told "that's just common sense..". Makes for less arguments. (But that would make it less of common sense and more of basic rules...). In regards to those two questions, I suggest making a range of 'basic' skills. We have RP organizations for a reason. They are there to train and polish character's skills. If everyone started off as a skilled archer, we wouldn't need the Rangers.. (Or whoever has an organization to teach such.). Now deciding what "basic" skills are...would be a problem to overcome~ I'll let other experienced people suggest things on this part...

Conclusion: Well, I did my best making a thought out response. I feel like I deviated a lot and left many things out. But it's a lot to take in. I wish you luck in figuring out the next step you choose to take and hope you know even if there people who dislike rules and decisions made..and feel as if there are many people who complain...there are some people here that appreciate the things you and others do. We may be quiet and silent and not say much (probably because we don't complain...) ... But we're still here~!

 

[Itzzaboy]

The only thing that really bothers me personally it that YOUR roleplaying experience is affected because of your OOC position. Staff should be treated with respect outside of the game yes but within game their character should be treated just like any other regardless of the person playing it.

 

[Faelin]

I've just stared at this box to try to think of something detailed and constructive to say for a good while, but in all honesty there's only so much I feel can be said. You said unabridged, you meant it. All has been said already.

To yourself, I would simply put forward a what can only be called a vast thank you for the thought, time and effort you have put into the lore. Work done and done well in spite of resistance and persecution over a position so, so wrongly viewed by many as unfairly advantageous, when in fact it had placed tremendous limitations on your ability to enjoy your writing and your character, arguably one of the most legitimately developed in the server's history.

For what you have said of roleplaying habits, standards and behaviour, I would agree with the addendum (fun fact: learned that word from you!) that it is something I will be thinking about to a great extent in future RPs, not directed at the mysterious "everyone" or "some people" but evaluating my own actions, and I would ask that we all do this. There is no perfect level attainable; we can all do better, we should all try to. Having read this post in full twice now, and having read through the replies so far, I begin to have faith that things might well change.

In terms of the future of magic on the server, I feel there is an irony that it is only when it's phasing out from the game is proposed, the advantages of the existing system become the first thing on everyone's minds. But then, we never do seem to realise what we have until there's a chance it will be gone. It's certainly something I'll be sad to see a close to, though I feel the decision is one that should, ultimately, be in the hands of those having to bear the strain of running it in the first place; for that, I will support whatever decision is reached.

 

[Boulderpaul]

Just be chill about it.

I think some of the most fun I've had is my friendly rivalry with @Boulderpaul regarding MCMMO stats. He was actually the first person on the server I interacted with in any meaningful way and it's been fun to date...

Even though we've had one or two differences we've also certainly had some fun too! I only have the greatest of respect for you Naelwyn, both as a staff member and player and creating this thread has only added to that. I won't weigh in here on the topics brought up as I feel it isn't my place due to how very little I've ever actually roleplayed but if you (or anyone else) wants to discuss, throw ideas to me or simply rant a bit then I am all ears! I'll certainly read through the posts at least a couple more times and take on board everything said and I encourage everyone else to try and do the same.

Maybe we can also have some more friendly rivalry soon... A number of things have been happening recently which have caused me to not be around much on the server, some are now resolved and others may never be, but rest assured... I'll try and keep second only to Cherbert in McMMO Power Level!

- Boulder

 

[Naelwyn]

On further discussion of some midrange points:

One of the things I'd like to try doing is just demoing how I could seriously try to tactically surpass someone (Using just ordinary kitchen items and workshop tools and no formal weapons) in a fair victory sense in the form of a sparring match.

IE - there is literally no consequence if you lose so you don't have that psychological block.

I still think @Legion has the healthiest idea of how to conduct a combat roleplay on this server and I guess I kindof want to try demoing my best attempt to do that.


Edit1/Addendum:

It's something I just don't really get to see as often as I honestly thought I would - whenever I see people fight it's fighting with lethal intentions.

I'm only really aware of my own sparring matches with Legion when I was getting better at using magic comparatively and my own barfights and such - I imagine other people have some stories but I'm just surprised at not really seeing much fighting without trying to kill people.

I think if I kept Naelwyn around he would probably enjoy teaching unarmed, nonlethal fighting to people.

 

[Gaby]

ok.

OK.

let me just say something right here.
this entire post has put into words everything that I've been thinking quietly at people for this past month.

thank you Nael!
thank you!

now I don't have to yell because I want to roleplay a cool story but people are being babies about combat again.
or at least, now when I yell, I can just quote you!

 

[Spark]

Throughout the years there have been some many rant threads, complaint threads, "constructive" criticism threads, actual constructive criticism threads, etc etc. You seem to have done what all of those couldn't... It's somewhat sad to say that most of the stuff in that post is true, and a lot of the points are why I stopped roleplaying, or even being on the server in general.. *sigh*.

 

[Exclaimer]

I don't really have much to say... Sadly, I don't know too terribly much about Naelwyn (the character mostly, but the person I see here is also a tad unknown to me), but this whole thread is quite amazing. Sad to see that you're upset with all this; I personally say sorry for anything I might have caused to fall under any of these things.

I do have one, minor thing to say: I think the hue of red used for Admins is slightly intimidating in its own right. I know that sounds REALLY silly, but at some very deep subconscious level it is a little intimidating... I've noticed this when I talked to any of the admins, yet, talking with the moderators doesn't affect me the same way.

It might have to deal with authority, but I like having an authority so I don't think that's it.

That's my little contribution, might be worth looking into that.

 

[Baron]

@Exclaimer Oh, that's intentional. All the admins are various horror monsters. Naelwyn is Nosferatu, Sally is that hook-handed guy that attacks teens at Makeout Point, and I'm actually a T-800.

 

[Mad Hatter]

Amazingly informative and insightful post. I have too little experience on the server to say much so I will say this, you have done everyone a great service by writing this post and I hope that before too long you can get back that loving feeling towards the game. Also, I am sympathetic to your feelings and I wish it had not had to get to this point of clearly wearing you down and stressing you out. To better days ahead!

 

[Firegirl]

@Baron I'm sorry, but I must admit, I skimmed over most of the lore magics. (Because there was a lot of and I didn't read all of it.)

And I know that's why you got rid of such Elemental Magics, my point was, that everybody should have a bit of mana, reguardless of trained or not trained, lore or no lore. I know it goes against the Lore, I know it goes against a hundred million things, but I think that everybody would have a /bit/ of mana, no matter if the lore said's otherwise.

"Well Firegirl you mad girl if you arn't going to suggest anything then don't post anything at all."

Ahah! But that's where I have it! I have found it!

I know this may be hard, but my idea was that, like I said, everybody has a /bit/ of mana. This mana however, cannot be used /unless trained/ by somebody who knew what they where doing. Just like the current magics, exsept this time for Elemental Magics.

As with what I said, you would have to post down who your trainer was, if you still training, and what Element.

So it /sorta/ fits with what we got now. But if we have the Magics we have now, there's gota be "base magics".

This is just a suggestion. (Don't yell at me )

(eek!!! Angry Baron! Do not want!)

 

[French Roast]

Disclaimer: The only posts I read fully were Nael's, all others I briefly skimmed, because I'm lazy and that's too much reading. If I repeated any points that were already responded to, please forgive me and tell me nicely that you aren't going to repeat yourself :3

I have never been a staff on HW or any other server, so I haven't had quite the same circumstances around such experiences, but I am actually somewhat familiar with the kind of experiences you explained. In fact, the experience you have right now with your character Naelwyn I can really empathize with.

I can honestly say that I love everything you posted. Even though I don't wholeheartedly agree with the idea of putting a totally objective system on skill development and that sort of thing (I personally enjoy free form roleplay, when I want objective systems I go play FTL or something like that), I want to appraise you for making such a thought-out, non-clichéd, and non-ambiguous post that I can actually fully understand your reasons and points from and makes no attempt to hide what you're actually thinking, bend the truth or any other such thing, because I have had many a negative experience with other server staffs (as in non-HW staff) where they do the exact opposite. Really, well done.

So I really don't have much to say other than that I love and agree with all of your points except for putting strict system on skills and whatnot, because as mentioned above, I enjoy HW for the free form combat and that sort of thing which allows me to fight with my own knowledge of weapons, and not with set moves and skills that tell you exactly how much "damage is done" and what "effects/debuffs the enemy may receive" and "what items I'm now able to forge with an anvil and furnace at level 15". I think maybe something that puts more strict moderation without fully turning HW into Runescape (I quit that game years ago for a reason... I don't want it back ;- would be fantastic, if that's possible. A system that I have in mind is one that reinforces the idea that every weapon and armor has advantages and disadvantages that must be taken into account, and you can't just pick up a bow and be an amazing shot instantly like in Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (*picks up bow for first time, hits a 5-inch-thick wooden post from several hundred feet away without the Hawkeye on the first try* O_O) but doesn't strictly state how long it takes to learn something or how many skill points are needed to level up. Basically, moderation without use of the strict game mechanics that are used in other RPGs.

 

[SallyPirate]

Unfortunately I couldn't read all of it(Already compiled loads of info this morning)- so I can't build and walls of texts for responses, but I do agree heartily with all of the points you made.

One sentence did stand out to me:

[People these days really have no idea what 'Staff Abuse' actually means, but again, I digress.]

This is something that bugs me whenever people say the staff abuse their power for whatever reason >_>.. I remember days where it was okay for an admin to hop into creative mode and build their city. It was okay for Admins to spawn their own money. It was okay for admins to troll players, break immersion by building things around players. It was okay for Admins to use World Edit freely around their towns to the point of crashing the server.

THIS IS ALSO WHY I GET REALLY ANGRY WHEN PEOPLE SAY THEY MISS HOW THE SERVER USED TO BE.


Nowadays, Admins aren't allowed to win in a battle or even contribute to a fight (Anyone ever wonder why I got rid of Sally?), not allowed to have any form of power above others. Not allowed to be different in any way. That's not fair at all..

.. I am happy with my boring and normal characters, but everyone's different and I'm very sure other admins wouldn't want to have weak, normal characters just to avoid complaints. It shouldn't come to that.

 

[Pirapple]

[DISCLAIMER]I'm going to put more and more into this post as I remember things, and find documents I have saved on older hard drives. I'm mainly going to rant about magic, because this is something that has been a part of this server since I joined in late 2011. I'm going to use terms that have not been used on this server in a very long time, and I hope that they offend no one, but rather help me bring my point across. [/DISCLAIMER]

Magic's History
According to myself, semi- TL;DR'd

Back when I joined the server, November 1, 2011, there was a significantly different set of players than there are now, as many of you know. The first day I logged on the server, I knew nothing about roleplay, so I tried to find people that could help me understand what to do. Using the old port system, from what was formerly Port Silver, now known as Daggerfall, any player could go between the Port and a city for free. At the end of one of the docks, instead of a ship, there was a strange building, covered in vines, and quite strange. It teleported you to the former school of magic, Uthrandir. In this town was a character, known as Bellon, the archmage of the school of magic, who I believe ran the magic system at the time. Magic was extremely free form, basically anyone could learn it, as long as they agreed to help the town and do duties. Magic was taught by some the high level mages, much like I presume it was planned to be used now.

After the first exodus, in early summer 2012 (for the 1.2 jungle update i think), Uthrandir moved, as with most towns, to the new world. They didn't keep the buildings and such, but instead headed into the mountains. Magic died down, due to the inhabitants keeping to themselves. Kinda all of a sudden, near the end of the summer, two very popular admins suddenly left the server, taking many of the players and characters that were part of the town with them. Magic seemed dead, because soon after they left, the admins and mods, rightfully, started to crack down on the kinds of characters you could make, restricting the amount of races, and a lot of the crazy abilities that some characters had. Magic was gone for my first anniversary as a member of this community, and had been a pretty impactful part of my roleplaying career here.

I'm pretty sure magic popped back in very early in 2013, but don't quote me on that.

Then I was gone, for the end of 2013, so I do not know what happened, but when I did return, I had found out that a new magic system was going to be put into place, and that Nael was writing it. Great idea! I would have loved it, I hope, as long as we saw the whole thing. I read what lore was out there, and saw some of the spells. But then I started seeing this being used in roleplay, and some of the spells being used were... powerful, to say the least. None of the spells being used had any lore backing that was publicly visible, and after trying to figure out where I could find out some more info about the spells and curses being used on me. Since there was no info, I decided just to wait it out, and if I saw a situation where magic could be used, I backed out of it, trying to avoid getting angry over it again.

Here we are today. We again have no magic lore. I love the idea of magic in our world, and I think it would be very fun to have magic for roleplay use, as long as it is balanced and fair to all involved.

Use of Magic Over Time

Over the years that I have been here, magic has been used for two major things in roleplay, healing and combat. With the addition of potions (1.0) the healing magic very slowly died out, as more players utilized potions for healing, because they had quicker effects, and didn't require another person to use their magic on you. (will add more later, need to go to work)

 

[RexJen]

I had no idea that people would actually make it /harder/ to do the RP and be so focused on winning that they ignore others story arcs.
If I have ever done this I apologize sincerely

 

[Baron]

@firegirl356879 And now you're describing the interim magic system between the unbounded madness we had and the one Nael wrote. Players applied to be able to use magic, but everyone was capable of using it if trained ("training" which was done by sending an application on the forums and learning from any of the higher level users ingame from there).

Believe me, we've been through enough iterations to know what doesn't work, even if we haven't found the right match yet.

 

[Gaby]

@Baron

at the risk of sounding like an utter tool...

I recently made a magic system designed for a highly magical, low technology world. it has four schools of magic (Blood Magic, Earth Magic, Dream Magic, and Fire Magic). even though the system was designed for a world where its normal to literally vanish into the dream world or turn your arms into fire, I will note I made interesting limitations for each of the schools:

Blood Magic (shapeshifting and healing) couldn't fabricate flesh from nothing, or even from the air. it needed a water source to properly work.
Earth Magic (divination) was very imprecise. you could train for years and still have a hard time getting a clear image. it also needed stones and sand to work.
Dream Magic (mind control, dream walking) required one to shift their entire way of thinking to match the bizarre nature of the subconscious to perform even the simplest spell, let alone have the ability to shift your physical form into the realm of dreams.
Fire Magic (transmutation) really only had two practical uses: burning things, and changing a certain metal from one substance to another.

in general, a mage's limitations would be the innate power of their spirit, and their ability to shift their mode of thinking to comprehend the strange nature of magic (basically, away from linear thinking)

Im not saying transfer this system into Altera. this system was designed for a very specific world, one with much more magic than people would like in Altera. furthermore, it was created with an entirely different set of races in mind, and wouldn't fit at all.

my thought is, instead of trying to limit solely by traditional notions of "training" or "mana," instead, perhaps think of the physical limitations of magic, what aspect of the world they manipulate, and how a mage trying to do something OP might hit a roadblock because they forgot the first law of Thermodynamics.

 

[Soccernut13]

Although I don't go on this server much anymore as I'd like to Naelwyn, I absolutely love your post and completely agree with what you point out

 

[Itzzaboy]

You'd like to Naelwyn?

Everyone do the Naelwyn!

...what is the Naelwyn?

 

[Naelwyn]

@Baron

my thought is, instead of trying to limit solely by traditional notions of "training" or "mana," instead, perhaps think of the physical limitations of magic, what aspect of the world they manipulate, and how a mage trying to do something OP might hit a roadblock because they forgot the first law of Thermodynamics.

:c