In Serenwilde it's only the Shofangi that seem to be suffering from empty guild syndrome these days. They seem to get a decent amount of novices, but very few of them stick it through, and I can't blame them. Another result of this is that lore isn't getting passed down. I've made it a point to ask Shofangi I run into if they know about the altar of Old Man Bull, because they usually don't. Druids shouldn't be teaching guild lore to monks, but, what can you do?
We're working on that.
is dead like the dodo
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Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
Our covenant has been awkward. Turns out the anti social SDs are, in fact, anti social. It's nice having people around all the time to great the lowbies. I have seen a marked increase in novices and new people.
The old folks just eyeball the Nekotai and gossip about how loud they are on gts.
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EveriineWise Old Swordsbird / BrontaurIndianapolis, IN, USA
I think it'd be nice if at the appropriate time, a novice could go to a room, trigger an NPC, and have a nifty little interactive sequence play out for them before kicking them to the appropriate guild rank.
Um. Also, any chance of reviewing how the whole guild favor/rank system works? Guild covenants have the option to favor, which may or may not raise someone a rank, but as it is most guilds I've seen have a rigid "you must do this to be at this rank" setup so we can't go about throwing favors for minor tasks without upsetting someone. And when someone does advance, it can take two or three different people to bump someone up that rank.
We'd actually fully designed a ritual that could have done this, have the GR1 person trigger a cool sequence with some fighting and banishing. We didn't design it to bump them up a rank because we never thought of that, but I"m sure it could have been done. Of course, the ritual we actually got in no way resembled what we designed, discussed, and paid for, and is much more difficult for someone who just came out of novicehood to accomplish, but oh well.
The only people that put restrictions on when you can favour are the guilds themselves. The Serenguard have as few of those as possible. Once you graduate novicehood, however long that takes, you are GR1. Then you must take a test, say an oath, and boom, GR2, your mandatory advancement is over. After that, start raking in those favours as quickly or as slowly as you want.
Everiine is a man, and is very manly. This MAN before you is so manly you might as well just gender bend right now, cause he's the manliest man that you ever did see. His manly shape has spurned many women and girlyer men to boughs of fainting. He stands before you in a manly manerific typical man-like outfit which is covered in his manly motto: "I am a man!"
Daraius said: You gotta risk it for the biscuit.
Pony power all the way, yo. The more Brontaurs the better.
If the conversation is still relevant, it's not really 'dead', nor 'necro'ing. It's more like starchanting resurrect – it's living, not undead. So yes, you're pretty far off topic – because, contrary to your later comment, this is not a six month old thread about "necro"ing.
I think Zvoltz covered anything relevant that I could add, re the post that sparked some conversation.
And to Everiine's comment, guilds (and cities) are not allowed to design and buy quests as they will be immediately turned down or considered suggestions; I'm sorry if you feel it was unfair, though. It's long been the policy that things like quests are purely under the purview of the administrators and anything submitted by players is considered a suggestion; we usually won't even tell players they're getting a quest or agree to give them one. Rarely do we even allow orgs to buy quests directly at all (usually they're thrown in as a bonus to a much, much larger purchase), but I'm to understand the Serenguard wanted something symbolic as an initiation ritual, so that's what they were given (one much more rich in background, flavour and history, as I recall).
To guilds in general, I think Everiine put it pretty well – it's up to the guilds to restrict or not restrict advancement as they want. It seems like a poor decision, to me, to forcibly redesign entire organizational structures because some guilds use them in one manner and others do not; I usually have the same thoughts about changing the nature of the Ambassador position, though.
I think it'd be nice if at the appropriate time, a novice could go to a room, trigger an NPC, and have a nifty little interactive sequence play out for them before kicking them to the appropriate guild rank.
Um. Also, any chance of reviewing how the whole guild favor/rank system works? Guild covenants have the option to favor, which may or may not raise someone a rank, but as it is most guilds I've seen have a rigid "you must do this to be at this rank" setup so we can't go about throwing favors for minor tasks without upsetting someone. And when someone does advance, it can take two or three different people to bump someone up that rank.
We'd actually fully designed a ritual that could have done this, have the GR1 person trigger a cool sequence with some fighting and banishing. We didn't design it to bump them up a rank because we never thought of that, but I"m sure it could have been done. Of course, the ritual we actually got in no way resembled what we designed, discussed, and paid for, and is much more difficult for someone who just came out of novicehood to accomplish, but oh well.
The only people that put restrictions on when you can favour are the guilds themselves. The Serenguard have as few of those as possible. Once you graduate novicehood, however long that takes, you are GR1. Then you must take a test, say an oath, and boom, GR2, your mandatory advancement is over. After that, start raking in those favours as quickly or as slowly as you want.
Should be possible. I hear that you can go up in order rank in Eventru's godrealm by doing quests... not sure if that's true or not, but I hope it is, because that sounds really nifty. I'd imagine the Order rank mechanics work similarly to Guild ranks...
I think it'd be nice if at the appropriate time, a novice could go to a room, trigger an NPC, and have a nifty little interactive sequence play out for them before kicking them to the appropriate guild rank.
Um. Also, any chance of reviewing how the whole guild favor/rank system works? Guild covenants have the option to favor, which may or may not raise someone a rank, but as it is most guilds I've seen have a rigid "you must do this to be at this rank" setup so we can't go about throwing favors for minor tasks without upsetting someone. And when someone does advance, it can take two or three different people to bump someone up that rank.
We'd actually fully designed a ritual that could have done this, have the GR1 person trigger a cool sequence with some fighting and banishing. We didn't design it to bump them up a rank because we never thought of that, but I"m sure it could have been done. Of course, the ritual we actually got in no way resembled what we designed, discussed, and paid for, and is much more difficult for someone who just came out of novicehood to accomplish, but oh well.
The only people that put restrictions on when you can favour are the guilds themselves. The Serenguard have as few of those as possible. Once you graduate novicehood, however long that takes, you are GR1. Then you must take a test, say an oath, and boom, GR2, your mandatory advancement is over. After that, start raking in those favours as quickly or as slowly as you want.
Should be possible. I hear that you can go up in order rank in Eventru's godrealm by doing quests... not sure if that's true or not, but I hope it is, because that sounds really nifty. I'd imagine the Order rank mechanics work similarly to Guild ranks...
It's not currently possible, code-wise, for quests to 'rank up' an individual in a given org. We've discussed it in the past and maybe even in this thread (setting it so you can get gr3 simply by grinding quests, should your guild not be very active and traditional means are unavailable), though. You do need to complete certain sets of quests to advance through Eventru's order, yes – that's all player-handled, though. E.g., you can't pass out of the Outer Circle unless you've completed the first Honours Quest (Path of Devotion), and a second Honours has been added which will likewise be connected to a rank-up in the order. It's no secret in my order that I've always intended for the order to be largely self-ran in that regard, with questing being a suitable – even primary – method of achieving rank in it. Still, someone has to 'pull the trigger', so to speak – it's as simply as saying, "Dear Lady Aison of the Pretty Red Hair, I've completed my Path of Devotion task. I would ever so much appreciate knowing what next I do to enter His Glorious Radiance's Order proper. Hugs, love and kisses, Celina." And then, poof! You're brought to the next order level.
Covenants seem like a great idea to me. People just need to be wary of thinking they will solve everything on their own.
If you want your Covenant to work for you, you're gonna need to put in some work short-term to organize things between the two guilds and gain benefit long-term.
I do think it would be nice to be able to mark certain GHELPs as "covenant shared", or have a COVHELP syntax, to aid in that organization.
And if the two guilds just dont mesh well together culturally, change covenants! I don't think there'd be any shame in doing so when the idea is so new.
Also, maybe three-way covenants? With 5 guilds for each org (besides Hallifax and Gaudiguch), there'd be one left out.
This thread has spurred some thinking on how to utilize my guild's covenant a bit more as well.
As a slight tangent, I wonder if we could get some hard-coded scrolls for each guild listing things that are easily "forgotten" when leaders move on and don't pass on information; guild related quests/upgrades like the Spiritsinger's cabinet for novice packs, or the wall-doors for the Geomancer leaders' offices, or even a listing showing upgrades to their guildhall, and so on. Things like this, or minor quests like the Spiritsinger's sundial quest are easily forgotten if leaders don't write them down.
Everiine said: The reason population is low isn't because there are too many orgs. It's because so many facets of the game are outright broken and protected by those who benefit from it being that way. An overabundance of gimmicks (including game-breaking ones), artifacts that destroy any concept of balance, blatant pay-to-win features, and an obsession with convenience that makes few things actually worthwhile all contribute to the game's sad decline.
I'm sorry that you had a negative experience on your first try, Gesiah. I think you're mistaken, however. Estarra specifically created Guild Covenants to help with the population issues in smaller guilds. If you give the game another try, let us know what you think about the new covenants!
I will most definitely not be doing that and you can thank Llandros. I was tempted after yours and Allyrianne's posts but I read Llandros', laughed and realized that's not a population I want to be a part of. *********************
You'll have to excuse Llandros, he's old and bitter, and has diseases from listening to necroscream irl.
I'm not online to honours you or see what guild you are in. I can assure you that no matter what guild you've been in, I can likely rouse a member awake in it and work with you for a bit to get you advanced. If there's a particular guild you wanted to try but couldn't get into, @Gesiah, let me know here in my inbox. We'd love to have you stick around.
Everiine said: The reason population is low isn't because there are too many orgs. It's because so many facets of the game are outright broken and protected by those who benefit from it being that way. An overabundance of gimmicks (including game-breaking ones), artifacts that destroy any concept of balance, blatant pay-to-win features, and an obsession with convenience that makes few things actually worthwhile all contribute to the game's sad decline.
As a slight tangent, I wonder if we could get some hard-coded scrolls for each guild listing things that are easily "forgotten" when leaders move on and don't pass on information; guild related quests/upgrades like the Spiritsinger's cabinet for novice packs, or the wall-doors for the Geomancer leaders' offices, or even a listing showing upgrades to their guildhall, and so on. Things like this, or minor quests like the Spiritsinger's sundial quest are easily forgotten if leaders don't write them down.
Or, you know, guild founding songs? That'd be nice >>
As a slight tangent, I wonder if we could get some hard-coded scrolls for each guild listing things that are easily "forgotten" when leaders move on and don't pass on information; guild related quests/upgrades like the Spiritsinger's cabinet for novice packs, or the wall-doors for the Geomancer leaders' offices, or even a listing showing upgrades to their guildhall, and so on. Things like this, or minor quests like the Spiritsinger's sundial quest are easily forgotten if leaders don't write them down.
Are players unable to write scrolls and shelve them on a guildhall bookcase or write then into a ghelp?
As a slight tangent, I wonder if we could get some hard-coded scrolls for each guild listing things that are easily "forgotten" when leaders move on and don't pass on information; guild related quests/upgrades like the Spiritsinger's cabinet for novice packs, or the wall-doors for the Geomancer leaders' offices, or even a listing showing upgrades to their guildhall, and so on. Things like this, or minor quests like the Spiritsinger's sundial quest are easily forgotten if leaders don't write them down.
Are players unable to write scrolls and shelve them on a guildhall bookcase or write then into a ghelp?
Completely, but there's also some things that you might not necessarily want as public knowledge, even if you don't want it lost if the leadership just vanishes, for whatever reason.
Mayor Steingrim, the Grand Schema says to you, "Well, as I recall you kinda leave a mark whereever you go."
As a slight tangent, I wonder if we could get some hard-coded scrolls for each guild listing things that are easily "forgotten" when leaders move on and don't pass on information; guild related quests/upgrades like the Spiritsinger's cabinet for novice packs, or the wall-doors for the Geomancer leaders' offices, or even a listing showing upgrades to their guildhall, and so on. Things like this, or minor quests like the Spiritsinger's sundial quest are easily forgotten if leaders don't write them down.
Are players unable to write scrolls and shelve them on a guildhall bookcase or write then into a ghelp?
Completely, but there's also some things that you might not necessarily want as public knowledge, even if you don't want it lost if the leadership just vanishes, for whatever reason.
Of course, though I think you can write in the GA Tomb artifact, or at the very least can write it in a clan help in their guild leadership clan (everyone has one, I don't doubt). Or they can put a bookcase in their guild admin's office (again, I know you have one!), which are usually locked.
It just seems silly for us to have to code in new scrolls/update old ones in an obtuse location every time we add something a guild buys – particularly when there are a dozen ways for them to do it on their own.
What's a tomb artifact? I'm only aware of the ledger, and it's not a ledger you can write in, that I recall.
Though yeah, a private leadership clan/bookcase could solve a lot of the same issues (and some others!). Not everyone has one, but that doesn't mean they couldn't. Those are good ideas, too.
Mayor Steingrim, the Grand Schema says to you, "Well, as I recall you kinda leave a mark whereever you go."
What's a tomb artifact? I'm only aware of the ledger, and it's not a ledger you can write in, that I recall.
Though yeah, a private leadership clan/bookcase could solve a lot of the same issues (and some others!). Not everyone has one, but that doesn't mean they couldn't. Those are good ideas, too.
I hate when autocorrect changes a completely valid word to something completely random.
There's a reason I turn it off as one of my very first actions on a device.
I do one-handed blind texting fairly often (last night was a pretty big display of my mastery of this art, even after I'd had a few at the bar – for the first time in quite a while – 99% of my texts were error free), and autocorrect usually grabs it. Unfortunately, less common words do sometimes get swapped, but how often do people usually use "tome" in a conversation, compared to tomb or time (which is what it wants to change it to now). Especially with the "I" and "O" right next to each other.
/But I digress./
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EveriineWise Old Swordsbird / BrontaurIndianapolis, IN, USA
And to Everiine's comment, guilds (and cities) are not allowed to design and buy quests as they will be immediately turned down or considered suggestions; I'm sorry if you feel it was unfair, though. It's long been the policy that things like quests are purely under the purview of the administrators and anything submitted by players is considered a suggestion; we usually won't even tell players they're getting a quest or agree to give them one. Rarely do we even allow orgs to buy quests directly at all (usually they're thrown in as a bonus to a much, much larger purchase), but I'm to understand the Serenguard wanted something symbolic as an initiation ritual, so that's what they were given (one much more rich in background, flavour and history, as I recall).
Oh, what we designed wasn't a quest--it was, as you said, an initiation ritual. I was saying that if having it be a quest was possible, it would have been fun to consider.
My major complaints about the ritual were:
1) It looks nothing like what we designed,
2) We had to resubmit it twice because the admin kept going inactive and losing it,
3) It took over two years to get the ritual after we paid for it,
4) What was supposed to be a rather short ritual for people just out of novice hood is instead a quest that takes an hour or more to complete and requires the lowbie to hunt for essence on the elemental planes,
5) It's not an initiation ritual--it's a quest that must be completed every RL day, because if too many RL days go by without the quest being done, armaggedon gets unleashed. Therefore, everyone needs to do it repeatedly instead of it being saved for when an initiation is taking place.
So in short, instead of a short, fun initiation ritual that we designed and paid for, we got a long, tedious burden that we are forced to repeat over and over. I appreciate that players requests don't mean that that's exactly what we are going to get, but it was frustrating to take months to design a ritual, receive no feedback for years, then finally get something that is nothing like we hoped and, instead of being fun, is a chore.
Everiine is a man, and is very manly. This MAN before you is so manly you might as well just gender bend right now, cause he's the manliest man that you ever did see. His manly shape has spurned many women and girlyer men to boughs of fainting. He stands before you in a manly manerific typical man-like outfit which is covered in his manly motto: "I am a man!"
Daraius said: You gotta risk it for the biscuit.
Pony power all the way, yo. The more Brontaurs the better.
Okay, I wasn't sure what exactly we were talking about here. I agree with Everiine if it's THAT quest.
I wasn't aware it added any lore of note to the Serenguard (or really Serenwilde). We just have another one dimensional skeleton in our closet, promising to rain doom on us like the rest of the world.
Really? I'd happily take a guild quest, even if it wasn't what was 'originally intended'- just need to change your perceptions of what it was supposed to be and mesh it in with what it actually turned out to be.
I've long been envious of the Harbingers and their Voice quest.
I like that the quest adds purpose but it really is way too long for something you need to do every day, and it suffers from some design problems in places where you need to wait for respawns. The essence thing is a problem too, not only for novices but also because the amount needed is still too high. If some of these things got tweaked a little to make it more smooth, it'd be great...
But back to population issues and the topic of automation, I was wondering how much of a fix that really is? While it's true that novices want to advance in their guild, how meaningful is it without people to share that with? For instance, Everiine already spoke about Serenguard advancement, and in large part what makes it so rich is having every member of the guild present to watch and congratulate someone in their oath-taking rituals. I think these kind of interactions are what keep people around...
LOVE the Jagrerox voice quest! I try to run people through it whenever I can. *cough*let it give honor lines*cough*
Voice lore is not as standard fare as a lot of other guild/org/god lore that most people know of. It does a great job of clearing that out and flushing out how awesomsauce he was.
Buying hard coded rituals is great. I'm very happy with the one Jael wrote and @Morgfyre helped make a reality. (greatest patron evah!)
The only thing is that these things require people who know how to do them which can be a stretch for low population guilds.
Sakr, had the idea of using the guild tutor to stand in for a member when trying to get the numbers to do a guild ritual which would be nice. Although I might just buy another ritual that can be done with just a few people.
Edit:
Also, people should consider using the theatre to create an into production for their guild. Let everyone know that if someone new comes in the guild and no one is around to sit them down and get a virtual welcome and introduction.
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EveriineWise Old Swordsbird / BrontaurIndianapolis, IN, USA
I'd buy another ritual if I knew what it was going to look like, too. They are generally really fun to do. A ritual like the centaur vision quest, which was part of an event but can still be done today, is a great, little ritual that requires one to gather two items and two other people--it's short, sweet, and full of lore.
Everiine is a man, and is very manly. This MAN before you is so manly you might as well just gender bend right now, cause he's the manliest man that you ever did see. His manly shape has spurned many women and girlyer men to boughs of fainting. He stands before you in a manly manerific typical man-like outfit which is covered in his manly motto: "I am a man!"
Daraius said: You gotta risk it for the biscuit.
Pony power all the way, yo. The more Brontaurs the better.
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Cyndarinused Flamethrower! It was super effective.
Are we allowed to write coded rituals with a responsive environment for a guild? I know Fain had several for his Order that were really engaging.
Comments
The old folks just eyeball the Nekotai and gossip about how loud they are on gts.
The only people that put restrictions on when you can favour are the guilds themselves. The Serenguard have as few of those as possible. Once you graduate novicehood, however long that takes, you are GR1. Then you must take a test, say an oath, and boom, GR2, your mandatory advancement is over. After that, start raking in those favours as quickly or as slowly as you want.
If the conversation is still relevant, it's not really 'dead', nor 'necro'ing. It's more like starchanting resurrect – it's living, not undead. So yes, you're pretty far off topic – because, contrary to your later comment, this is not a six month old thread about "necro"ing.
I think Zvoltz covered anything relevant that I could add, re the post that sparked some conversation.
*********************
You'll have to excuse Llandros, he's old and bitter, and has diseases from listening to necroscream irl.
I'm not online to honours you or see what guild you are in. I can assure you that no matter what guild you've been in, I can likely rouse a member awake in it and work with you for a bit to get you advanced. If there's a particular guild you wanted to try but couldn't get into, @Gesiah, let me know here in my inbox. We'd love to have you stick around.
Of course, though I think you can write in the GA Tomb artifact, or at the very least can write it in a clan help in their guild leadership clan (everyone has one, I don't doubt). Or they can put a bookcase in their guild admin's office (again, I know you have one!), which are usually locked.
It just seems silly for us to have to code in new scrolls/update old ones in an obtuse location every time we add something a guild buys – particularly when there are a dozen ways for them to do it on their own.
Maybe that's part of the problem. They are burying novices instead of helping them.
Well, maybe now it'll be added considering its suggestion.
NARF!
There's a reason I turn it off as one of my very first actions on a device.
/But I digress./
I wasn't aware it added any lore of note to the Serenguard (or really Serenwilde). We just have another one dimensional skeleton in our closet, promising to rain doom on us like the rest of the world.
I've long been envious of the Harbingers and their Voice quest.