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Events! The Good, and the Not-So-Good
Xenthos
Shadow Lord
Events
here are one of the main things that I absolutely love about Lusternia,
because they force you to react out of your "comfort zone". Unexpected
scenarios, completely new situations, and you have to actually be invested
in the things... there's a reason that I show up whenever an event is
happening.
Players (and the administrative staff, especially the volunteers else they'd not be volunteers) are exceedingly invested in this game- some perhaps in monetary terms, but more importantly, we are all emotionally invested. This means that we are all going to take things personally at times.
What this does not mean is that we don't want to participate in events (or want any particular individual to avoid participating)! These are the things that give Lusternia amazing depth, since they build off of the histories and the lore.
It's easiest to post long things detailing what you felt went wrong in an event; just from many years on these forums, it's pretty common for people to post more often about the things that they did not like instead of what they did. Again, this does not mean that the event itself was disliked, or that everyone wishes it had never happened.
I feel like a thread that discusses events, not just focusing on the negatives but also the positives, would be beneficial; it will allow us to inform the volunteers who are driving things of what we especially liked as well as what we would like to see done differently (not that it necessarily will be, but there's always going to be a desire for some constructive criticism; I mean, none of us are perfect whether we are running events or participating in them).
So, in no particular order, I have some comments on the most recent event(s):
Positives:
1) Xynthin. I mean, oh my god. Before the end of the event when he went crazy (I'm really sad about that, by the way, I thought there was so much potential there for something greater / enduring, even if he became something else), it was obvious that the person/people playing him had put a lot of time into investigating the role / building up the personality. There were just so many little things that leaped out at me as we spoke / I read the logs of other people (especially Tacita's) speaking with him.
2) Shikari. Xenthos (rather obviously) was going through a significant identity crisis. I feel like the Gods were being pretty absent on an actual physical level to let the event go forward, but there was all kinds of NPC interaction, and Shikari's NPCs were supportive when he sought them out.
3) Rowena. What the bleep. I am supposed to HATE HER. She's supposed to be the hag that nobody likes, who spits on people on a regular basis. Then she goes and pulls a Shazbat-bomb and wipes out a horde of 80+ dominators, after running around with us and murdering them on a one-by-one basis. This is so darned unfair. But so full of awesomeness.
4) The visions from the Wheel. !!! <-- This is not enough, but I don't really know how to say in text just how well-crafted these things were. There were well-known people in the visions, there were less well-known people, but they were all players and it was giving us a view of what 'could be'. This helped make the whole thing seem more real. This was a grind-event done Right- the reward was more the visions than the actual curio pieces (for most people involved). Plus, on top of that, there were the visions of the past that gave more insight into how things occurred, bridging a few gaps in the histories. Just... this was a completely inspired idea, and it was done perfectly from my standpoint (though I feel the vision with me would not quite have happened that way <_<).
Dislikes:
Really, I dislike that Crow is always ineffectual, but that's pretty much just how he is at this point. I'm pretty used to it by now, but I can understand that people who haven't seen it before would take it hard when they're all oriented around how Crow is "Great Crow, Mighty Crow, grovelgrovel".
Players (and the administrative staff, especially the volunteers else they'd not be volunteers) are exceedingly invested in this game- some perhaps in monetary terms, but more importantly, we are all emotionally invested. This means that we are all going to take things personally at times.
What this does not mean is that we don't want to participate in events (or want any particular individual to avoid participating)! These are the things that give Lusternia amazing depth, since they build off of the histories and the lore.
It's easiest to post long things detailing what you felt went wrong in an event; just from many years on these forums, it's pretty common for people to post more often about the things that they did not like instead of what they did. Again, this does not mean that the event itself was disliked, or that everyone wishes it had never happened.
I feel like a thread that discusses events, not just focusing on the negatives but also the positives, would be beneficial; it will allow us to inform the volunteers who are driving things of what we especially liked as well as what we would like to see done differently (not that it necessarily will be, but there's always going to be a desire for some constructive criticism; I mean, none of us are perfect whether we are running events or participating in them).
So, in no particular order, I have some comments on the most recent event(s):
Positives:
1) Xynthin. I mean, oh my god. Before the end of the event when he went crazy (I'm really sad about that, by the way, I thought there was so much potential there for something greater / enduring, even if he became something else), it was obvious that the person/people playing him had put a lot of time into investigating the role / building up the personality. There were just so many little things that leaped out at me as we spoke / I read the logs of other people (especially Tacita's) speaking with him.
2) Shikari. Xenthos (rather obviously) was going through a significant identity crisis. I feel like the Gods were being pretty absent on an actual physical level to let the event go forward, but there was all kinds of NPC interaction, and Shikari's NPCs were supportive when he sought them out.
3) Rowena. What the bleep. I am supposed to HATE HER. She's supposed to be the hag that nobody likes, who spits on people on a regular basis. Then she goes and pulls a Shazbat-bomb and wipes out a horde of 80+ dominators, after running around with us and murdering them on a one-by-one basis. This is so darned unfair. But so full of awesomeness.
4) The visions from the Wheel. !!! <-- This is not enough, but I don't really know how to say in text just how well-crafted these things were. There were well-known people in the visions, there were less well-known people, but they were all players and it was giving us a view of what 'could be'. This helped make the whole thing seem more real. This was a grind-event done Right- the reward was more the visions than the actual curio pieces (for most people involved). Plus, on top of that, there were the visions of the past that gave more insight into how things occurred, bridging a few gaps in the histories. Just... this was a completely inspired idea, and it was done perfectly from my standpoint (though I feel the vision with me would not quite have happened that way <_<).
Dislikes:
Really, I dislike that Crow is always ineffectual, but that's pretty much just how he is at this point. I'm pretty used to it by now, but I can understand that people who haven't seen it before would take it hard when they're all oriented around how Crow is "Great Crow, Mighty Crow, grovelgrovel".
15
(c) Iron Realms Entertainment 2012.
Comments
I agree so hard with Xenthos's likes:
1) Xynthin/Veiled God: Brilliant, beautiful, the most interaction I've ever had with an admin character and I loved it so much. The amount of effort put into engaging people in the Glomdoring on an individual and group level was amazing.
2) Lhiannan (since I don't have anything to do with Shikari). Thank you, to whoever was controlling Lhiannan and chose to talk to Eliron. I was so giddy with glee that I turned into a stammering fool, but seriously. I would love this conversation even if the world had ended and Kethuru had devoured us all.
3) Rowena: Rowena. Babe. I never thought I would say this. Give up the Nightshade and come to Shee-Slaugh.
4) The Wheel Vissions: So amazing! I was included in one as a Time Dame's zombie-puppet that was exploded, and it was brilliant. Just from that I had great rp thanking Celina for murdering me when I needed it and some fun family rp too! And that's just one out of so many awesome visions!
5) The whole time travel aspects, especially since Hallifax and Gaudiguch came back through time and we have the Institute mucking about with things now. I love that the implications that having time-travel plot devices and mechanics (why the cities didn't exist until we're ready for them, the skillset) have world-changing counterparts
I am seriously looking forward to the next events with a lot of anticipation and excitement, because there has been so much effort and build-up put into them so far with some already amazing payoff!
Dislikes:
1) Xynthin stating that he did not need Glomdoring for his plans (since he only needs Night and Crow) and that Glomdoring could not help its ascendant (since that's between Xenthos and Xynthin). When the Court still expressed doubts, Crow then came to sit on Xynthin's shoulder. Finally, Crow and Night joined Xynthin, with Mother Night accusing the Glomdoring of failing. To me, it felt like being told we were irrelevant, then being shown we were irrelevant when we still tried to play a part, then being blamed for being irrelevant.
I don't know very much about how the Blacktalon operates, but is there not some way you can spindoctor it into either 'we have failed Crow, we should have been able to repel Stepasha' or 'Crow has a plan, it may have seemed like he was hopeless, but it is all trickery and part of his scheme to bring new, more powerful abilities to the guild.'
The event with the wheel and Xynthin looked pretty awesome - at least from afar, My biggest gripe was being forced to watch from the sidelines or wait for logs to be posted from people who aren't actually enemied to Glom and were allowed to participate. I understand we can't all fit in the spotlight, and being Xynthin it made sense it was all (mostly) happening in Glom, but it would have been nice to be able to enjoy more than killing spill over zombies.
I really can't wait to see what happens next, my interest has definitely been caught, and the prophecies gave a lot of talking points which spurred more spontaneous RP. A big win in my book.
Regarding Crow:
I kind of feel like there is some notation out there for how Crow is supposed to act, and it has never, ever, ever, ever been edited. Ever. It's still the same from when Glomdoring was a bashing ground to get extra silk and wood from, and Crow was just some smob people could raise to piss off Serenwilde. Everything that has happened since then is not included.
I also feel like the structure of the Epic Quest rather breaks with how Crow is generally interpreted and handled. For the Epic, you actually get some pretty in-depth imagery directly from Crow, and it certainly feels like you are building some truer, deeper connection with him. But once you finish the Epic, that is it. And as soon as the next event rolls around, you'll be stuck in the same relative position of talking to Crow as if he is Lassie.
I imagine that this could have hit some newer players especially hard.
@Qistrel, while you could do those things, the fact of the matter is they are not fun. They also need to be done constantly. If the White Hart turned into the Heavy from TF2 every time there was an event pertinent to him, or he caught a sideways glance from Crow, I imagine that the Hartstone would have issues with this (though, I do suppose there would be some who would love that).
I don't think it is a great coincidence that the BT has often had struggles or that most families in Glom try to "out-Night" each other as opposed to "out-Crow". Even the differences between Rowena and Brennan during this event fall pretty squarely into the Night >>>>>> Crow camp. (Not that I mind myself. I'm finding empowerment in being able to look at Brennan, throw up my hands, and say, "Well, no one expects dignity to run in the family anyways".)
Oh well!
And, well, I've only been a Crow follower since he first came out and the BT opened, so I may have some strong feelings on this subject, as evidenced by my posts in the other thread. So I feel that I must reiterate my original post in this thread; this is one aspect of an event which rubbed an already raw spot for me, and players do often tend to talk more about that end of things instead of the positives. All of my raves in the first post here still stand!
For the record, I don't recall Night ever blaming Glomdoring or accusing us of failing. When she was in the Court, she very plainly blamed Xenthos alone for failing to become the savior/messiah/whatever of Glom she had hoped he would be. It was not "Glomdoring failed." She seemed in despair because all the people of Glomdoring, she even specifically mentioned her coven, would no longer exist and she would reign over nothing. As a character it was easy for me to shift blame from Mother Night pulling him from the wheel to Xenthos failing to accomplish her plans and being too weak in will. Mother Night isn't omniscient, she saw a possibility, trusted one of Glomdoring and rescued him, and then he was corrupted by the power he was imbued with. As a mortal, he simply couldn't handle the full power of Glomdoring and went bonkers. Which cements the idea that we are all undeserving of Glomdoring's power.
I think a lot of the Crow v Night stuff ends up in Night's favor because
1) The way the respective guilds are. The Coven is very dark and glamorous and ALL HAIL THE QUEEN...but the BT roll around in muck and dead things. I think one is just typically more appealing.
2) Night can talk. Crow can not. Simple but it's hard to worship something that just caws at you. You can emulate another humanoid fairly easily, both in mannerisms and how you speak. It's a bit more difficult to emulate a one eyed bird. Nyir always did it amazingly well though.
3) Crow does seem to get his ass handed to him quite often. I mean, even in this event, he was impaled randomly by stag and had to be rescued. That's not to say Night doesn't show weakness, she has. She has been set on fire and had to run to Nocht.
4) Politics. It's a bit convoluted, but I think the short of it is while BT has had some awesome leaders like Nyir and Emar that really defined a lot of the guild and crowishness, the SDs have tended to have higher profile leaders. Part of it, I think, is just the nature of being SD GM vs BT GM. It's a culture thing. Personally I view the BT/stormcrows as the heavy lifters of the forest, and Night/NS/SS as the glamorous, cunning leaders that keep the gears oiled. One obviously gets more recognition, but they are both equally important. The heavy lifters probably more so.
5) Brennan tends to be the butt end of the Rowena jokes.
Dislike:
After Eliron clarified it a bit for me, the whole "Screw you guys, I just need Night and Crow," was a little blah. I kind of wish Xynthin required Glomdoring to somehow acknowledge him. I do think the whole purpose of the Court was diminished in that some dude busted in and decided he was king and there was nothing we could do about it. We were definitely steamrolled in that aspect. the Court got some lip service but in the end, I can understand why some people felt that we were the illigetimate representitive of Glomdoring. It was especially hard for people that RPd that the Glomdoring/the Wyrd is some sort of mysterious sentient overmind that makes its own choices and plans. Which is something they'll have to resolve with their RP, and don't really fault anyone for.
My final thing is I think players sat on their hands too much and were resigned to OOC feelings about how events naturally progress. I feel as though the admin were around enough and attentive enough that the actual middle part of the event could have been more spontaneous and fluid. However, discussions I've had since the event, players were very stuck on start and finish. They felt railroaded, and they probably were to an extent, but I feel as though there was a lot of opportunity for freedom in the meaty middle part that is generally the most enjoyable part of an event. Could have come up with a ritual, summon a shadowshell around glom, tried to fight him off. I could be wrong entirely, but that's what I suspect.
But that is also why all the other Xenthosii were going nutty when there were multiples of them spawning at the wheel.
Speaking for myself, that was the Night part that bothered me. "Pull him from the Wheel, say that he is our only hope to survive the Dames, go dormant and then return to castigate us for something there is no way we could have known she wanted to be done just before giving up entirely and saying there is no hope". But that is more of a one-off thing rather than an endemic problem.
Edit: If this had been told to us, it would have given us something to do / decide (before he went crazy), and thus would have at least offered the illusion of choice. It would've added more to the middle part of the event at least, where instead we were told to wait and see (because Xynthin was going to Handle It All). I am unsure how that would have gone over in practice, though. As it was, we didn't really have an actual decision to make; he didn't need us or our agreement.
Again, I think you're thinking too linear. "He said, she said," is just not how I RP my particular brand of duty/fanaticism/whatever you want to call it. Some people do RP absolute adherence to what is specifically being said. Which is fine. Kind of iffy in an org that leans so heavily on mysterious darkness and hidden meanings, but I do understand it.
I got the impression that Night, as well as Crow, and many players, viewed Xynthin and Xenthos as one in the same. Your failures were his failures, so when she talked you and Xynthin were pretty much interchangable. It was a long event, so it's hard for me to pinpoint when things happened or when I started getting impressions, but well before the end there was a feeling that you two just weren't going to work out. Someone had to go. I'm not sure if it came across as an either him or me situation, or just that Xynthin was nuts and we just needed to remove him, but I don't think it was as impossible to forsee as you make it out to be.
Like I said, I never felt punished or blamed by Night. She was very much finger pointing at you. Kind of like Estarra was.
And all the conversations with Xynthin included us "working out" the temporal discord...after he had done his thing. It was obvious that there were problems with us both being in the same timeline, but a loosening grip on sanity leading to his downfall entirely due to there being two of us wasn't really part of it.
I do feel that we were intended to keep guessing and be unsure throughout, and they.certainly did that well.
Eh, I think I figured out he was nuts from the moment he revealed how he came to be. People glossed over the whole reason for his existance repeatedly. I was a definite divergence from the typical Glomdoring mindset that one guy should benefit and get godhood by sacrificing the entire Glomdoring. It was something that didn't get brought in serious conversation up until later when he went off the deep end and he no longer felt any guilt about it. It was all part of the "Big Plan." Then suddenly people had issue with it. I do think the players (or maybe characters, I'm not sure) kind of borked that one up, everyone got a little doe eyed over him at the start...myself included.
ICly, I don't think Night knew how he came to be. I remember her saying she just sensed his power and saw a possibility.
It wasn't ever spelled out for me, but it certainly gave me the feeling that he needed to go from fairly early (and I think you are right as far as Celina's IC statements and beliefs go). In the end, RPd it out, and really enjoyed coming up with my last big post to the Commune about failures and duty and faith. I kind of got chewed out for it by you and some others, but I think it kind of resolved the issue for Celina.
Mm RP.
The Hallifax snub in the event post afterwards didn't exactly help things.
Yes, this is off topic, but it's my topic gosh darnit.
It should be noted that there had been more earlier communication on the part of the Invisible College and the Conclave [I got it talking once right before the Veiled became Xynthin and I think Lawliet got it talking a second time], which lead to some further action on the Board's part interacting with some Gloms [read Shee-Slaugh] about the whole matter but it did end up feeling more like a bunch of loose ends over involvement [which I do chalk up to both Admin being busy and at least me being busier those weeks too, so no hard feelings]. There had been talk by the Conclave of affixing Xynthin and interferrence and figuring out major players, but it all sorta fell silent. Still a really awesome quest [and has produced a lovely amount of timey-wimey talk] but from my perspective it looked like we might have had another option, but then we went along and completed the main quest as written >.=.>
NARF!
Usually events are in 'prime' time though, because that's when our free time tends to be, as well.