Recommended Playing Time 10/3 at 6pm EST

Eukelade

The following post is a public service announcement!

The Storyteller team can neither confirm nor deny that players in the Starmourn sector may or may not see, hear of, or participate in events of interest to them on the 3rd of October at 6pm EST, especially if those players are citizens of the Celestine Ascendancy.

It's possible nothing will happen. OR WILL IT? Well, it might not. BUT WHAT IF IT DID THOUGH?

So if you have time, log in! Or don't. (But definitely log in.)

This has been a public service announcement.

Sammy

🤔

Alright, I'll try to get out of bed. No promises. 

Cubey

Is this EST or EDT?

Usually I wouldn't ask but I had too many negative experiences when someone said EST or PST but they actually meant EDT/PDT/whatever.

Eukelade

I didn't even know there was a different, to be honest. I think it was EDT, though - sorry about that.

But basically - yeah, this was a lot of fun. Thanks to everyone who participated - and stay tuned, because it isn't over!

Sairys

There's a handy tool here https://inyourowntime.zone/ that helps It generates a link that just shows whoever clicks on it the info in their local time.

RocketCat

Had a great evening. Thanks for the work you put into this, team. Definitely didn't expect our new immigrants to be a swarm of ST morts ;D

Soren

Thank you to all of Celestine (and everyone else who participated!) and to the players of the T'rath dynasty for a great event!

Cubey

Not a fan.

Soren

Cubey said:

Not a fan.

That's okay! Not every event is for every person. You're allowed to not like it! But if you'd like to give some constructive criticism, a little bit more information about what you don't like would be useful! 

It is also good to keep in mind that while the Storyteller team is overseeing this, the T'rath dynasty has actual players who are having fun with their personal RP - it's okay if someone's personal RP is not your thing, but let's keep that in mind!  

And don't forget, if you have any great story ideas for the Ascendancy that would be more your speed, please feel free to send them to the Storytellers. That's what we're here for!

Cubey

My constructive criticism is that I don't like events where players have limited ability to influence what's going on, being either passive observers or reacting to what's happening but without being able to change it. You can't give everyone that ability, yes - this is why when Song had its event about the faction leader being kidnapped, it's Song people who were major players in the event.

But now we have a Celestine-centric event and I feel like I have no ability to influence what's going on even though my character is a Celestine leader. It's good that T'rath has their personal RP going, but it feels like the whole of Celestine got entangled in it without our permission or even knowledge until it actually happened, and we're only being passive recipients right now while it's the dynasty players who actually control the event's direction.

Or maybe I'm wrong and the whole thing was talked over and agreed on with other faction leaders and I simply didn't know at the time, since I got Guardian like 3 days ago and I missed the memo. Either way I wish someone told me in advance.

As for story ideas, I don't have any - I lack the time and resources to properly engage with an ongoing storyline. My lack of appropriate IC response to what's going on right now is pretty self evident. That's not the event's fault though, just my own limitations.

Flipilaria

Cubey said:

My constructive criticism is that I don't like events where players have limited ability to influence what's going on, being either passive observers or reacting to what's happening but without being able to change it. You can't give everyone that ability, yes - this is why when Song had its event about the faction leader being kidnapped, it's Song people who were major players in the event.

But now we have a Celestine-centric event and I feel like I have no ability to influence what's going on even though my character is a Celestine leader. It's good that T'rath has their personal RP going, but it feels like the whole of Celestine got entangled in it without our permission or even knowledge until it actually happened, and we're only being passive recipients right now while it's the dynasty players who actually control the event's direction.

Or maybe I'm wrong and the whole thing was talked over and agreed on with other faction leaders and I simply didn't know at the time, since I got Guardian like 3 days ago and I missed the memo. Either way I wish someone told me in advance.

As for story ideas, I don't have any - I lack the time and resources to properly engage with an ongoing storyline. My lack of appropriate IC response to what's going on right now is pretty self evident. That's not the event's fault though, just my own limitations.

Yeah, you're just straight-up wrong. I've seen a *lot* of player decision making in this event.

Also, I don't think faction leaders need to sign off on world events happening to their faction. It's a living, breathing world. Stuff happens.

Cubey

Flipilaria said:

Also, I don't think faction leaders need to sign off on world events happening to their faction. It's a living, breathing world. Stuff happens.

Are you familiar with the term jobbing? It comes from wrestling, and it means losing in a scripted manner to make you look weak, and by comparison make your opponent look strong.

Celestine is jobbing right now. I don't mean the bombings or other clandestine actions (that's how terrorists operate), I mean the event where T'rath took on faction guards in a straight fight and murdered them all (except two they missed). It wasn't an actual fight, it was the storytellers snapping their fingers and making the guards go away in a puff of smoke and godmoding.

Not only did the faction lose 225k marks in an instant - the guards had sentimental value, being ICly veterans who were stationed on Crossings for over a decade and personally fought off Nykara's Sorrow Company when it tried to raid. And last but not the least, it's jobbing. It makes Celestine look weak and incompetent, like their own military can't even handle a few cultists.

To bring up Nykara again, if they had a suggestion of an event where Sorrow Company is so badass that they obliterate all the factions' guards (not through ingame pve or pvp mechanisms, but as an emote), or if I set up a "Ren's Happy Friends" dynasty and suggest an event where that dynasty persuades all the faction guards to lay down their arms and give up a life of violence forever - would the storytellers have gone through with it? Or would it appear like the person suggesting the event is trying to throw their weight around and appear more powerful and influential than they are?

It's one thing to give a small group of people their own event, another to make another group of people get dunked on without their agreement or cooperation, like they're collateral damage to make the first group look cool and important.

Oh, one more thing. Being a bunch of bleeding hearts that they are, the Celestine guardians officially acknowledged Eckin as sapient people for a long time now and supported efforts to free the one in Scrapston's cage. That support was both IC (news posts, faction talk) and OOC (I talked to the previous Celestine storyteller about it, back when I still had motivation to do so). Nothing came out of all of it, and only now the Eckin is free but only as an afterthought, basically by accident after the bomb blew up his cage. I find that resolution very underwhelming and it makes me feel like nobody really cared about what Celestine players want event-wise, only what other people (in this case the T'rath players) do.

Also, seeing an Immortal refer to an Eckin as an "animal" is OOC. Immortals replaced the Redeemers because the latter were corrupt and treating the underpriviledged as non-persons, so seeing a member of a supposedly reformed organisation follow the old one's patterns makes me think the storytellers didn't care.

Flipilaria

225k is not a lot for a faction. Or it shouldn't be. If that's really your concern, seems like CA is doing it wrong.

Regarding the "Veteran Guards." Sentimental value is irrelevant. This is a game. The guards are just made up NPCs. That's not a real loss. React in-game accordingly - It's a loss in game. Don't bring RP emotions to the forums and expect it to have the same meaning.

CA is finally involved in a world event after a long time of not getting any and with players being vocal about that. Seems like you're just finding reasons to complain though. It meets your history on the forums, so at least you're consistent. Sorry your Guardianship doesn't give you the leash over the game's RP that you want.

Cubey

I'll be taking 225k marks from Flipilaria right now then. It's not a lot so it shouldn't be a problem. Likewise, if you think what happens in game has no meaning on OOC emotions then you are delusional. It's not "just a game". If I griefed you repeatedly and said "it's just a game, deal with it", I'd be perceived as a bully - rightfully so.

Getting dunked on to make another player faction look strong is not a fun event. It'd be different if the dunking on came through established ingame mechanisms - like, I fought Leilana recently and lost, but that's fine. That was a pvp duel and I lost it because I suck. But if I lost my character because a storyteller decided "well, it's time to show how powerful the new bad guys are so they'll kill a player character permanently!", that would be not fine. Super not fine.

I'm done talking to you. Soren asked for constructive criticism and I voiced my opinions as such. Apparently that's me wanting to have a leash over the game's RP.

Flipilaria

You're not providing constructive criticism though. You're just yucking on others' yum for two reasons: Because you think the plot is railroaded (which it is not) and because, of all things, guards. Which is a shoddy reason to complain about CA's first event in a long time.

You're not providing solutions or alternatives or anything constructive. You're just shitting on the event.

Ilyos

Okay folks, let's be civil here please!

Sairys

Flipilaria said:

Regarding the "Veteran Guards." Sentimental value is irrelevant. This is a game. The guards are just made up NPCs. That's not a real loss. React in-game accordingly - It's a loss in game. Don't bring RP emotions to the forums and expect it to have the same meaning.

It's an RP game though and events are ultimately an RP experience where a story unfolds. So during an RP event, a group of mobs with RP and story connections were killed off. Sentimental value is actually pretty relevant.

"Guards are just made up NPCs" is a view more in-line with non-rp games, especially when, as it appears, those guards were involved in past story lines.

The fact that people care about these guards beyond being just npcs means that the admin who gave them that meaning obviously did their jobs right.

Flipilaria

Sairys said:

Flipilaria said some stuff

It's an RP game though and events are ultimately an RP experience where a story unfolds. So during an RP event, a group of mobs with RP and story connections were killed off. Sentimental value is actually pretty relevant.

"Guards are just made up NPCs" is a view more in-line with non-rp games, especially when, as it appears, those guards were involved in past story lines.

The fact that people care about these guards beyond being just npcs means that the admin who gave them that meaning obviously did their jobs right.

Okay yeah when you word it like that, fair point.

Kirin

As mostly an outsider in this series of events I think it is amongst the better run events.

As a player base we need to realize that jobbing is part of the RP scenarios. It is virtually impossible to code and support more than a couple different outcomes. 

Further, RP needs of different people will almost always be left wanting by the very nature of events. 

What this does however tell us is that more such events are welcome to cater to a varied audience in different capacities.

Sairys

Kirin said:

As mostly an outsider in this series of events I think it is amongst the better run events.

As a player base we need to realize that jobbing is part of the RP scenarios. It is virtually impossible to code and support more than a couple different outcomes. 

Further, RP needs of different people will almost always be left wanting by the very nature of events. 

What this does however tell us is that more such events are welcome to cater to a varied audience in different capacities.

Jobbing seems like it's not really the most accurate term, mostly because the people involved in "jobbing" all know what the deal is, what parts they're there to play, and they're all consenting to that scenario because that's what their "job" is. Which isn't really the case with an event.

@Cubey's comments read to me that it's more along the lines of tropes such as "Curb Stomp Battle", "Hopeless Boss Fight", and maybe "Failure Is The Only Option". They are tropes that can be played on either side but to me the goal would be to try to make the outcome as positive as possible for the victim side. (cause really, the winners cause won)

For example, as part of the conclusion of the event maybe play up the deaths of the guards and have an uprising of citizens that replaces the ones that were lost, potentially even expanding on the story lines Cubey mentioned about that group? You could also drop some MacGuffin that has intriguing implications that opens up or advances a story line?

Cubey

There were players involved in the event who worked to make the outcome more positive. I'm aware there have been several RP discussions between T'rath members and celestine players, discussions that had productive and satisfying outcomes (probably because people involved were actually good at RPing and getting their point across, i.e not me). I don't have issues with that. I have issues with how a specific part of the event was handled by the devs/storytellers.

This post was originally going in a different direction, but I decided to try something different. Let me ask you all a question. Let's say I'm running a game and I want to introduce a bad guy into my storyline, and to show off how powerful and dangerous he is, he will appear before one of the player characters - not even the strongest character, just a character, and mercilessly beat them to death.

This won't be arranged with the player beforehand, it will be as much of a surprise to them as to everyone else. Also it won't be an actual combat encounter, with dice rolling and mechanics - I'll just narrate the player character dying to the new bad guy's assault and the player won't have any option to stop it.

Now the question - even if the rest of the gaming table enjoys the event, how do you think the player whose character will suffer such a fate must feel? Do you think they'll find this treatment fun?

Right now I feel like that player. And you could say "this is totally different, this isn't about a single player but a whole faction!" - but I disagree. A faction is a collection of players, many of whom are heavily invested and put a lot of effort into making sure their faction is strong and successful. Seeing their efforts get (partially) undone, not even as a result of ingame pvp or other conflict mechanics but simply because an RP event decided it must be so? It feels unfair to me. I'm not having fun with this. And when I bring up how I'm not having fun, I'm told to shut up and stop ruining other people's fun, and how every RP event needs someone who jobs anyway (even though it's untrue even in Starmourn - we didn't see Ry'nari conspirators destroy the Song military, nor the Bushraki gangs curbstomp the marshalls stationed on Reynolds. It's only Celestine military that got squashed, even though realistically there's no way a huge planetwide nation's military force would get obliterated by a bunch of cultists, on the former's home turf especially).

Anyway, that's my tl;dr. It's not my intent to pick at this any further, only to make my stance more clear.

ArquenTavas

Wasn't really around for the events so basing my observations entirely off this thread, however, your analogy seems slightly off to me. No players were permanently killed in the event as far as I'm aware. Using  your gaming table example, wouldn't it be more like having established npcs who are important to the players killed off in a shocking fashion by some big bad who is attacking a faction/city in an attempt to make the conflict with said enemy more personal and engaging to the players? The killing of important NPCs seems like an incredibly common story telling technique which allows the story teller to create stakes without actively harming the players' character.

As I said, have very little visibility of exactly what occured, so take my words with a massive heaping of salt, but it feels like the loss experienced by Celestine in this instance was a perfect opportunity to drive RP for the faction and get players invested and involved.

Cubey

I mean, if the game master killed an important NPC I was invested in, without the players being able to do anything about it, just for shock value? I'd be pissed off too. I don't need this kind of Game of Thrones-esque storytelling at my gaming table.

Now, since you weren't there then let me be clear and say what part I object to: the T'rath launching an all out assault on the Crossings and murdering all faction guards stationed there, not using ingame mechanisms or actual T'rath dynasty players to take out the guards, but as an emote. That's what I object to, the whole setup with T'rath doing their terrorist attacks and skulking around Litharge is fine.

Why do I think this is equivalent to killing off a player character? I didn't mean kill off permanently, many RPs have ways of bringing dead characters back (sometimes even casually, like in DnD), but it almost always comes at a cost and a consequence. This is what we have here, a cost and consequence for the players.

The cost thing: 9 dead guards is 225k marks + some commodities. It's not a lot for a faction, no - not even 10% of Celestine's account. But guess what? All that money has to come from somewhere. It came from players, who either worked for it or just outright donated it to the faction to see it put to good use that their faction, and in extension they, can benefit from. And since this money will now be used to replace the guards instead of for anything more constructive, the players (who would otherwise benefit from that more constructive thing, whatever it may be) are the ones who are suffering for it. In my opinion, causing a loss of 200k+ marks to a faction is the same as causing it to a player. It doesn't matter if the faction can afford it or not, just as it doesn't matter if the player is a newbie or an ingame millionaire. It's the same.

The consequence thing: in my example, the player character who gets beaten up by an NPC ends up looking weak and unable to defend themselves. This is especially true if the player prepared for this kind of thing and had a significant chance to win if the encounter used actual game mechanics instead of being fully narrated (which is why the reason the bad guy managed to kill the PC is because the plot demanded it, hence jobbing). The thing I objected to did the same to Celestine: the guards were setup in a way to be virtually unbeatable by raiders, unless the raiders came in strength and numbers that are frankly impossible with the number of active players this game has right now. If you took all the T'rath players and had them raid the Crossings at once? They wouldn't be able to kill a single guard. The game has no mob vs mob mechanics but if you took 10 cultist mobs of the same strength as the ones that roam around litharge now, and had them face off against 5 faction guards? The guards would handily win. There is no way the guards would lose - both mechanically and in a making ingame sense way. The only reason they died is because it wasn't an ingame battle but an emote.

As a consequence, Celestine now looks weak, like it can't even defend its own borders against a group that doesn't (or shouldn't) have the sheer military power that a faction has. And guess what? Players from a faction perceived as weak and ineffectual are considered by others to be weak and ineffectual too. Especially the leaders: they should have seen this kind of thing coming and taken steps to prevent it, but they didn't so they suck. Except, you know what? They actually did. For a long time now, Celestine players were big on safety and preparing the faction for things that can go wrong. But in the end it didn't matter, because if ingame precautions get in the way of a plot the storytellers came up with, then they must be removed with mod powers.

And yes, I know the guards were killed off to give T'rath players access to the faction territory (which is why they weren't replaced yet, because I am 90% sure that if new guards appear, the mods will just kill them off again) - but it was unnecessary. The players already have a way, and an RP justification, to access Litharge and bypass the Crossings. It was done for no reason except possibly because Celestine is doing too well so it needs to be taken down a notch.

Maybe "here's you getting your shit kicked in, aren't you glad you're finally getting an RP event? why are you complaining about this?" is a good opportunity to get involved in the game for some, but personally I find my investment waning and I spend less time ingame than I did before the event. I don't think I'm the only one either - I saw significantly lower Celestine player numbers for the last week than before. It could be because I log in at European times, but that's my impression nonetheless.

Sairys

ArquenTavas said:

As I said, have very little visibility of exactly what occured, so take my words with a massive heaping of salt, but it feels like the loss experienced by Celestine in this instance was a perfect opportunity to drive RP for the faction and get players invested and involved.

I've been on the receiving end of too many of these sort of events elsewhere and it seems to rarely turn out this way. Including the comments from others that the losing group should be appreciative of having an event they're directly involved in.

One reason seems to be that events like this aren't even really about the losing group, they're about the winning group. So the losing group can be left to deal with the fall out while the winning group basks in the glory of victory.

And, as seems pretty clear just from here, being portrayed as a victim or a failure really isn't the most fun thing. Negative portrayals in events might spur some rp but they also make people question being on the losing side which can pretty easily negate any benefits.

Flipilaria

@Eukelade @Soren @Ferenzi @Tallulah
I'm having a lot of fun RPing around this event. Thank you for running it!

Ilyos

Thank you all for your feedback on the ongoing event. The key word here is ongoing, so please don't count your wins and losses just yet...

Xiru

Ilyos said:

Thank you all for your feedback on the ongoing event. The key word here is ongoing, so please don't count your wins and losses just yet...

I was gonna say, this event only spurs Xiru's desire to return to Celestine. Well kinda. Currently he's sitting around drinking about how he's too pathetic to help out rather than being proactive. But as a player, it spurs my interest! 

I love conflict to spur up rp. Unless I'm mistaken, this is one losing RP event? I mean, if the admin was like HAHAHA that's all you're ever going to do and then we'll send Song out to trounce you, then I'd see an uproar. And it's ongoing, evidenced by the newfound residents on the streets. And that's a reason for a rallying cry, and if you can't immediately solve the issue due to the event nature of it, there's room for closed door sessions, huddled away as private as you can get it, talking about how to rid yourself of this crazy death cult. 

There's room for suspicions, is anyone else involved, keeping a lower profile? There's room to try (and probably fail as there's limited storytellers/admins involved) to have minor conversations with the cultists, see if any of them will tell you more about why they're involved or even how they got involved.  

There's room to mourn the loss of the guards.

The only way to really lose is to be mad you've lost and leave it there. 

Soren

Xiru said:

Ilyos said:

Thank you all for your feedback on the ongoing event. The key word here is ongoing, so please don't count your wins and losses just yet...

I was gonna say, this event only spurs Xiru's desire to return to Celestine. Well kinda. Currently he's sitting around drinking about how he's too pathetic to help out rather than being proactive. But as a player, it spurs my interest! 

I love conflict to spur up rp. Unless I'm mistaken, this is one losing RP event? I mean, if the admin was like HAHAHA that's all you're ever going to do and then we'll send Song out to trounce you, then I'd see an uproar. And it's ongoing, evidenced by the newfound residents on the streets. And that's a reason for a rallying cry, and if you can't immediately solve the issue due to the event nature of it, there's room for closed door sessions, huddled away as private as you can get it, talking about how to rid yourself of this crazy death cult. 

There's room for suspicions, is anyone else involved, keeping a lower profile? There's room to try (and probably fail as there's limited storytellers/admins involved) to have minor conversations with the cultists, see if any of them will tell you more about why they're involved or even how they got involved.  

There's room to mourn the loss of the guards.

The only way to really lose is to be mad you've lost and leave it there. 

Thank you all for your input!

And yes, of course, if any of the members of CA (or anyone else!) wish to contact the Storytellers about any plot they want to run regarding the cult in Celestine, they are more than welcome to, and as Ilyos mentioned, the event is far from over.

Also, I can personally attest to the fact that if anyone attempts to talk to a cultist NPC, if I am around they WILL get an answer. And I am around a LOT. You can even feel free to send me a message (or a tell, but I'm usually invis) to let me know you're going to in case I accidentally miss it! 

Rylek

As someone who walked into the event, I feel like it was more flexible than complaints have listed. I really enjoyed being able to arrive at the scene of the bombing, look around, and react as my character would have IC. Was able to secure all their bombs, and help kill their leader. Which I'm sure was either Flip pivoting on plans after realizing I was in the locked room with them, or Flip just decided to involve me. Fun either way. Then I was able to include my Dynasty's Rp by helping deal with the issue in Celestine.

Overall I thought it was a good, fun event that was flexible enough to allow wildcards. I'd call that a win for any Event team. So, hat's off and props to the Event team!