[Reviews] Aeon Act 1

[7632]

Right, so now that Act 1 is done, the staff would love to hear your feedback, reviews, and constructive criticisms. We will take these reviews quite seriously in planning for future events, so please be honest and post with the intent of helping us improve.

You are, of course, welcome to make your own thread if you feel you need the space, as Naelwyn has done.

 

[Auriel]

I thought the event was absolutely amazing, it being my first event, I'm glad that I attended and even moreso glad that Vaziel was able to go as a person. I thought that the ever-vibrant changing world around us was beautiful and the climax of the shadow-essences attempting to kill people was absolutely awesome as an ending to sum up the end.

 

[Ced]

Whoever made those trees and helped build that cavern needs a GOD DAMN MEDAL. IT WAS BEAUTIFUL. My only disappointment is that I wish I could have experienced the event with shaders (I'm using a crappy computer while I'm stuck at home). I had loads of fun, albeit partly because of Smurf, but at least equally because of the great event.

Quick cons:
+ Building a tight, cramped, and intricate cave system and letting ~40 players pile into it is inviting utter chaos. Probably intentional but all it did was make me jittery and anxious. However, if the cave system was much larger, then the massive cavern with the trees would not have been as fantastic, so IMO, the cramped-ness was worth it.
+ Cain remains an unsympathetic character. Ced is not interested in helping him (it was almost meta of me to make him go to the event), and is only invested in what happens now because of the obvious supernatural affects that occurred during the spelunking. A glimmer of his conviction did show through at the end when Sif wanted to kick off, and that redeemed him a bit for me.
+ Whispy shadowy darkness is perhaps a little overdone (Ced's probably seen that sort of evil aura shit half a dozen times now), but if you take it with the spoonful of sugar that is everything positive about the event, it can be swallowed easily.

Quick pros:
+ Wonderful, glorious building. Every area of that quest was an absolute joy to explore.
+ While Cain is unsympathetic, I think that the way he is played is very good. He takes a back seat whenever he can and lets the players direct (for the most part) the action. I would have been interested to see what would happen if someone tried to take the Bastion stone from him.
+ The players! I got to interact with a few characters that Ced would never usually get the chance to meet, and it was nice to see teamwork, and uh, the opposite of teamwork in some places. Lots of player interaction.
+ Bastion stones get my fantasy toes tingling. I like the idea of four stones unlocking/anchoring/powering something. It's very cliche classical fantasy stuff and I love it.
+ Having nearly 50 people at one event is always going to cause a few immersion issues but compared to the last campaign (which mostly consisted of watching Gods and characters that were basically Gods fight for a while), the whole thing flowed nicely without sacrificing player interaction.

 

[Magiik]

Honestly, I didn't have as much fun with the event as I was expecting to. I mean, I really enjoyed the little bits of story that were revealed and I greatly anticipate the future acts, but I felt as though I couldn't enjoy the work and effort that was put into it due to the entire event being hard to follow. I'll preface by saying that it isn't entirely on the shoulders of the DMs, but they still had a part in it. For one, the space was incredibly small. Even when a majority of the group had moved on to the final cavern (I was one of the last to go in), it was hard to see my surroundings because it was filled by nametags and the insides of people's faces.
Another major factor was the sheer amount of RP speak. People were asked to stick to whisper, but that just doesn't work all the time because we end up getting split up in the chaos of that massive crowd, so we have to use the RP channel to even see each other. Once that starts happening, very few people switch back, which makes it hard to tell what's going on. Granted, the DMs used the yell channel for most of the announcements, which was great, but whenever there was something the the RP chat, it was incredibly hard to spot, even with the title and shifting text. In fact, I'm still just learning about things that happened at the event that I didn't even know about.

That being said, I anxiously await the next act and love the idea of some shadowy evil. I don't care if it's considered cliche or overdone, I still really enjoy it. You have successfully intrigued both myself and Ater, who will try to go on the next one. I hope things are a bit more optimized for the massive crowd that showed up, and perhaps we can all learn to not spam the RP chat while important things are trying to happen. The story and build, though, I hope are just as good as they were today.

 

[Rygan]

To preface this I'd like to thank everyone involved for taking time out of their lives to work on the campaign and this event. I'd like to begin my review with what I thought was well executed. The introduction to the cavern with the pressure plates was masterfully done and a very warm welcome after the small, cramped, and frankly hard to roleplay in ice cave. The journey up the mountain was also very fun to roleplay out, though that fell mostly to the players.

The event lacked any sort of interactivity for players at all. There was no physical action (which is OK if it's a puzzle orientated event, but I'll get to that in a moment) to partake in aside from what some imaginative players generated on their own via detailed dice rolling and climbing RP. Here we reach the problem I found with the puzzles - There was no point to any of them. The moment we had trouble navigating the cave (which I would say was very well designed for a smaller event but had no hope of housing the large turn out campaigns receive) a trail of glass was laid out, making the entire maze meaningless. After that we reached a very stunning, beautiful build and I thought the event was going to pick up with the dangers Clain promised us. He did, after all, say that he needed all of us to aid him in retrieving the stone or it wouldn't work. By that he really meant he needed eight to ten (however many of the pressure plates there were) of us to stand on pressure plates so he could enter the room and take the stone. I thought once again that the shadow entity would play a role in making the event, well...eventful, but it proved to be a non-threat that only posed a problem because Clain walked slow enough for it to 'catch up'. After we waited for Clain to finally leave the mountain and head towards the boats, we returned to the Crossroads. There I thought we'd do something cool with the stone and have some sort of pay off for the two hours of RP, but Clain said he'd hold onto the stone and that without the others it was useless. This is not a major complaint, I'm just adding it because it disappointed me a fair bit.

On the topic of Clain, I'd like to speak of him. I really do believe he's the weakest part of the entire campaign thus far. He still lacks any real depth or personality and serves only to tell us where to go while sort of kind of not telling us where to go anyways. His appearance still feels very random, awkward and out of place and I think as a dungeon master character he's extremely underwhelming. His presence puts forth that he's sort of the leader of the expedition (he's the exalt of the forgotten gods after all), but he lags behind severely and doesn't really actually help. This isn't a problem neccesarily, but it's very awkward in-character and makes little sense to me. "I know where the stone is, it's here. But I also have no idea lol. Oh hey guys it's the stone you did the work to retrieve let me take it and then hobble out slowly while not knowing where the exit is saying 'We must leave!'." He's also proven to be very hard to trust or follow in-character, making it hard to justify doing certain things or even showing up to the events - but that's a personal problem, really.

To sum it up, it really feels there was no reason or need for us to be there and we didn't really accomplish anything at all. We kinda just...walked around and stood on some pressure plates for three hours.

 

[Readij]

Apologies to all. The initial maze was built a long time ago and was designed to completely disorientate and drive you insane, hence the lack of lighting and no obvious land marks to guide yourself off. When building it, I never thought it would be used for so many players at the same time, and even when this event came up and the decision was made to utilise it, the thought that such a large number of players would use it still never occurred to me which was poor planning on my behalf, and I'm sorry that this obviously detracted from the event.

I did want to try something new (for me) with the cavern pressure plate puzzle (team work, non-fatal) but again, was not expecting the numbers and looking back, should have done something perhaps more challenging skill-wise and dangerous as opposed to a mental puzzle - something that felt more rewarding and gave a sense of achievement. Sorry guys.

 

[Somnastra]

Readij, you don't have to apologize at all. I know that I appreciate that you worked so hard to adapt the maze as you could. None of us expected 60+ people, so don't take that all on yourself.

It's just stuff to take stock of and move forward with. Without your ice cavern as it was, I'm fairly certain the atmosphere Antilogy and the other DMs were hoping to create would have fallen flat.

 

[Rygan]

The cavern was the best part of the entire event, Readij.

 

[CaptnBluebeard]

I liked the Locale and the builds that inhabited it, although it felt a bit overwhelming with the large amount of players within a small space, and although there was some impending risk with the Shadows, they felt in my opinion, simply a foreboding thing for future events, and not much in terms of threats, perhaps there could've been some dangerous pitfalls or falling ice, or perhaps some mobs, although this is my first event so I can't really say I hate it outright, just felt a bit new to me, perhaps in the future numbers can be used for a different advantage.

 

[Archbishop]

Expectations almost never meet hype, just remember that.

I only wish I could've gotten to go.

*shakes fist at work*

 

[Smurf]

I really liked the event, in general- that could be because it was actually decent, or because we haven't had one in a long time. Of course, the amount of players in the small space made things hard, and about half of those there were RPing scaling a mountain without ropes in 3 minutes. Adding on to what Rygan said, players didn't really get to interact... At all. Of course, it is only the first act. I really liked the huge cavern. It was beautiful- compared to the first half and middle of the event, the ending was great. The buildup in the cavern/finding of the stone/crazy shadows made everything great. Even if it wasn't perfect, nothing ever is, and it was definitely better than nothing.

 

[SpartanDory]

to be honest, nothing happend, I mean, I had some fun RP with friends, but that RP was causual RP that could have happened anywhere. but my main complaint was that it was too dark and too unorganized.

 

[Centurion]

For a setup event, it wasn't by any means bad. I hope there is more of an imminent threat in a later act. Something that can be combated or at least communicated with.

 

[Balatro]

Thank you everyone for your kind words and honest reviews.

Nothing is going unheard and We will take all of these notes into account going forward with the campaign. I will make dedicated effort that we are always striving to be more immersive and Interactive and I know the rest of the team and our coordinators will do the same! Keep the reviews coming guys we really wanna hear your thoughts. it will shape this and all events going forward.

 

[Ced]

Unfortunately you're never going to please everyone with such a large participation group, because different people look to get different things out of their RP. Some just want to raise the body count of the character, others are just along to see supernatural stuff and naturally some are there because they want to be the hero. Probably quite a small amount (I only say this because I only saw a small amount of people doing this), are there for the joy of RPing in an unusual place. We scaled a mountain, delved inside curiously formed thermal ice caves, traversed crooked, ancient looking bridges and explored a vast, beautiful grove of underground ice trees. During the event I had Ced stick with people who I knew would be RPing similarly to me; in-depth and 'hardcore'. If you're one of the people that held down sprint till the end and then complained that nothing happened, that's because you didn't uphold your half of the RP. The staff aren't performing monkeys. I'd suggest it's as much our job as it is theirs to make the events interesting.
That said none of this is meant to directly oppose what's been said in the thread, just another thought I wanted to tack onto the end of my first post ^^

 

[The Courier]

>muh immersion

That's a big majority of what I'mma be writing about in here. I scaled the mountain as I had when Glados , Gregor , Ace19 , Woolsey , Scardrac , and myself with others had scaled the one behind the Cathedral. Whilst I was emoting out having to slam ice picks into the side of the cliff and move slowly upwards I'd have people just seamlessly bound alongside myself up this mountain. The amount of people easily traversing a good most likely thousand or two thousand feet [As there is a sky box in MC and the world map can only go so high] it would break my immersion mid climb. As well, people hardly payed mind, that I saw, to the cold and the fact their sweat in that low of temperature would freeze their bodies to death. Of course, I did what Ced did and encompassed myself with a group that would RP the way I'd like to RP, that being a survivalist 'hardcore' squad. My point of this is more so for the actual players in the event. Try to take some time to realize what we're going up against and not abusing MC mechanics.

Now for what I'd like to see!
Like a majority of people here, I want to see that danger Clain was talking off. We did practically fumble through a cave for a bit and get yelled at by hissing steam before standing on pressure plates and running from the 'boulder' after removing the ancient artifact. I was honestly hoping for the ice leaves of the trees to start collapsing onto people as others ran atop them. For this frail beautiful structured area to end up collapsing under the wake of eager adventurers. This would have slowed down a bit of the immersion breaking brusqueness of other players as well as made it seem like we really stumbled upon something we never should have. Perhaps more environmental dangers, much like Elz did with her Riseport events. It makes for an ease on the DMs part, as the signs with roll numbers on them can be self-explained, and it lets people not need to pester them constantly in the event.

The cave was BEAUTIFUL. I cannot express just how AMAZING it was to come out of that small cramped space into just this spacious amazing frozen cavern. I was in TS with a group of people at the time and hearing all of their reactions one after the other as they slowly made their way towards the cavern was beautiful. It really was striking and just props truly to whoever had made that wonderful mystical place. That's the type of fantasy I adore, just those amazing breath taking shots. The incentive to explore the cavern was grand as well, as we did need to actually work together for once instead of maybe two or three people leading the charge forwards. However- This lead for more frustration then it did cooperation. It involved about six of us moving around and shouting to each other while a good fifteen other sat in front of the door so they'd have the ability of just rushing in as soon as the rest of us would get done. That was just a bit annoying. Yet hey- That's what they'd do as characters.

The Blackness. I dunno what to call it, but it was definitely interesting. I loved how at the ship we'd just stare back and see this intense black fog covering te mountain, holding a thunder cloud appearance. That was just beautiful to imagine, it reminded me of the silent way GOT ended an episode near the end of it's most recent season. [Refusing to spoil] It was a very cinematic ending, and I enjoyed it thoroughly. Although I was hoping perhaps it'd have swarmed down the mountain, chasing us even to the boat but I understand how that'd have murdered about half the expedition at that point since most were back on the mountain top.

The chat system. Alas,no matter how good something is, you do need to get past all of the chat and the yelling. I believe using the [Announcement] chat would be great for the really important event things. Such as dialogue or a major cataclysm happening. It's just a way of making sure it all runs smoother and people can easily see what's happening without needing to strain their eyes through a sea of yellow. [Gross]

Appreciation
I'd love to just tell everyone who worked on this event I fully appreciate it. I wasn't expecting a lot when I went in, as I have been admittedly dower in mood and enthusiasm lately, but it was just fantastic to have that thrill of fantasy and exploration once more. It made me feel as though we surely were in a fantasy element and that the world was greater than just our characters and their in-fighting. The aesthetics, the builds, the looks, and the atmosphere was all just absolutely incredible and you all did fantastic presenting it. I cannot wait for another Act and this will certainly give some interesting conversations and debates to be had.

 

[Cymic_]

Sexy event. Adrenaline pumping race to the finish.

But i suggest not jamming 50 people into a small cave.

Though it took a long time to hit the plates so maybe not.

This event must have took ages to create, thank you.

 

[Sadko]

What I'd love in the next act is more combat, danger, interactions with foreign entities/beings, and groups getting separated.

 

[Immerael]

I'm on my phone so apologies for spelling and grammar errors but I figured I weigh in. I want to lead this off with I throughouly enjoyed the event. Thank you to everyone who did everything. I'm also grateful for lack of parkour because those of us on potato tops struggle with parkour on normal days much less when 70 people are in the immediate area.

These are things I wish had been done. Ice crevices in the walk to the mountain. Azure expected this as he has some expiernce mountain climbing and tied a rope between himself and Nireth for the trek and mountain climbing bit.

Multiple ways in and out of the cave to the main body at least. I was trapped for a good 10 mins it felt like trying to get past folks IC and not be pushy while others ignored people and walked through avatars.

I enjoyed the maze immensely actually. Even if I was one of the secondary groups to reach the main cavern I thought it was fair. I enjoyed the small hidden paths I just wish it was even larger and more spread out. Perhaps a path guided by glass but there would be many false paths with other glass and you have to figure out a riddle to know the correct path.

Then something to encourage folks to be useful or follow RP correctly. Alec and I had our characters find a pressure plate and sat for a good thirty minutes. I have the lowest visibility but by all accounts there were ton of folks at the gate unwilling to assist. Which is whatever if that's how they would RP but if something similar happens again why not reward those who assist with the plates in some manner or some sort of danger/trap trigger on those who simply sat around the gate.

The escape I ended up leaving via something ICly and OOCly I didn't care for. To me it's a dirty term due to its use in arguments but my immersion really broke with this. I had to escape across the trees because the top of the tree was so crowded and I didn't see a way up with base mechanics. I could have used fly to simulate the climb but I felt like we weren't supposed to since not everyone could and I don't want to think we made a challenge that would stop folks based on OOC permissions. I also didn't see a path of wood logs that could be used to escape. There could have been a way out but there were so many bodies in one place I couldn't see anything.

Again want to end with how I began. I enjoyed the event a lot. I just think the above could make it better.

 

[Cymic_]

Did anyone else ICly contemplate killing a few characters off? A nice little murder mystery would have been interesting but would have distracted the main quest, but i wanted to push a few people off.. eheh, i will just rule that off as cave madness, claustrophobia, and the chilled weather.