The Bal'met event

Azor

Maya was saying she'll have a mortal life--is there going to be a mortal Maya char or denizen or something? Or do we just picture her quietly retiring in obscurity?

Kaevan

Azor said:

Maya was saying she'll have a mortal life--is there going to be a mortal Maya char or denizen or something? Or do we just picture her quietly retiring in obscurity?

I'd bet on the latter, personally. Having an IG denizen representation of Maya just spells messy plot lines along with people making pilgrimages to kiss her feet.

Iocun

Tanris said:

 Sure it was laggy, but you had over 100 people in one room at points spamming their bashing macro, you can't really expect anything else. 

Hrm, actually that sounds like an argument against how they did it. If they didn't expect that kind of lag, I have no issues with it. They planned an awesome event and it didn't work out perfectly from a technical point of view. But if they actually expected that to happen, they probably should have done the whole thing differently, with less player involvement.

The disappointing thing was that the epic potential of the event couldn't really be felt as such (at least by me), since it was deeply hidden behind all kinds of mechanical issues that obstructed it. There can simply be no real immersion in a story when the story appears in the shape of a broken gramophone record.

I however do not believe they anticipated quite those levels of lag, so I'm not blaming anyone. They could not have known how precisely it would turn out, since it's an event of a scale that's probably unprecedented. It was courageous of them to do something in this order of magnitude, for which I'm very grateful.

Veldrin

I'm just sad I didn't get to assist putting Tarah to rest and that I still don't have my House rebuilt (grumble). Also wondering where the heck SycsomethingfatherofdragonsIcan'tspellforthelifeofme

Yen

Epic!  Awesome!  Well I have to say I had a great time.  I originally wasn't going to come (I'm in the event starts at 4 am crowd), then I thought ... OKAY, bite the bullet, admit to the family that yes I really am going to wake up in the middle of the night for an online game, because I just have to see it with my own eyes.

And it was fun.  Great dialogue (I'll have to read the logs again, it was going so fast), and a chance to, just for a little while, taste a bit of power beyond our ken.  It was cool to play around, create my own spiritshields, phase ... likely the only time I will ever phase ...

And the honours line!  I thought that was fantastic.  Of course we can't stay demigods but it is nice to keep a tiny something to remember the event.  Thanks a whole lot to everyone who put it together!

Shunsui

Yea, only thing that bugged me about the finale was the absence of Sycaerunax, figured he'd be somehow involved. I also figured more gods would die than those who did.

Asmodron

Kaevan said:

Azor said:

Maya was saying she'll have a mortal life--is there going to be a mortal Maya char or denizen or something? Or do we just picture her quietly retiring in obscurity?

I'd bet on the latter, personally. Having an IG denizen representation of Maya just spells messy plot lines along with people making pilgrimages to kiss her feet.

Are we playing the same game O.o? If anything players would make a pilgrimage in an attempt to see if they can kill her and how much XP they get

Mathonwy

Reading over the complaints about the event, and while the event may have been written that way from start to finish and while the things you do during it may not matter from the perspective of a grand narrative, Achaea's 'grand narrative' has really only ever been a backdrop against which your character's personal narrative plays out (e.g., the game-world isn't going to end, but that doesn't mean Oblivion from an IC perspective isn't interesting or a fun position from which to roleplay). Nobody may have been given a moment of personal glory, but the reward you as a player and a character get out of these events tends to be exactly what you put into them-- I still had quite a bit of fun RPing with a few Shallamese and a House member or two, even if-- gasp!-- I didn't kill the crazed, evil Bal'met clone of Pentharian.

To Tecton, Maya, Sarapis, and the rest of the staff who reads over this: not that you need to hear it from a player, and not that you even need to read this sort of thing, being the stalwart and isolated islands of Hemingwayesque self-sufficiency that I no doubt expect you all are, but don't take the complaints of the Naminos and Nellaundras seriously. I've yet to see the sort of person who complains about events like this say absolutely anything positive in any meaningful way about Achaea anyway (backhanded compliments don't count). Your hard work was definitely more than appreciated, and I think it's a moment very few of us will forget as long as we're playing.

Ofra

ok so does anyone guess when a lot of these questions after the war will be answered like what about the refugees of Shallam?

Novak

Seeing how I was lost and couldn't get back into Nishatoba(sp?) because didn't know where the portal was at the time, I'm glad I got to be in a cool battle to save achaea from Bal'met.

Maethros

All in all, I thought it was a great finale.  Yeah, the lag MURDERED me and my future children, but I expected that when the battle started.  200 people in one place sending the same command? It's gonna happen.  And a few people behaving like asshats on the Gods channel and during the battle?  That's gonna happen, too.

This did what any great event should do: got everyone involved, gave them something epic to do, and - bonus - gave us a reward for it! Even with my limited experience, I got to fight with the Gods and wail on ZombiePentharian, ZombieTarah, and a crapton of Dala'myrr, with people from Mhaldor at my side, which is IC-crazy and OOC-awesome.  Probably the last time I'll be in a room with Mhaldorian characters and HELPING them kill something.  Y'know, unless it's little orc children, 'cause screw those guys.

And not a hell of a lot is going to beat being a Demigod: I've harvested, phased, have an Angel by my side, tried every wormhole I could find...it's awesome.

So, thank you @Sarapis and company!  This was a lot of fun!

Delphinus

Sarapis said:

With all due respect to @Nellaundra, that is exactly right. It's not reasonable to expect to be anything but one of hundreds in a large-scale event like this. There's simply no way for us to craft individual stories for each person. We'd love to, obviously, but we'd need every single player paying $25,000/year or something similar in order to hire staff up to make that happen. Not likely! That's really more in the realm of tabletop RPGs like D&D than it is in shared worlds with thousands of players.

Even in this, there was room for -- if not personal glory -- certainly some personal investment. I helped lay the shade of Kastalia to rest, for example. That's something that'll stick with my character.

Delphinus

Deserted ruins.
A stoic expression adorns the visage of the shade of Kastalia. The shadow of Keresis radiates fury around Her.
Exits from this room are:
Southeast  : Deserted ruins
Southwest  : Deserted ruins
Northwest  : Deserted ruins

Bedecked on shadows that writhe around Her ethereal form, the Goddess of the River stands with no glimmer of emotion in Her empty eyes. Dotting across Her forehead, pinpricks of light where jewels once sat spread an otherworldly illumination through Her smoke-like form, Her fingers curled into claws at Her sides.
 The shade of Kastalia does not even register your presence as a threat.
She weighs 0 ounce(s).
You see nothing in it.

You say to the shade of Kastalia, "My Queen..."

You have emoted: Delphinus clenches his fists, his body tensing.

You say to the shade of Kastalia, "My goddess was beautiful. Her radiance was unmatched in all the planes."

You say to the shade of Kastalia, "You are... a tendril of Bal'met's will."

You have emoted: Delphinus sighs deeply.

You say, "This and nothing more."

You spring forwards onto the shade of Kastalia, and maul her viciously.
(Lots of attacking)
(Lots of attacking)
(Lots of attacking)

The shade of Kastalia says, "Help... Me... '

(Lots more attacking)
(Lots more attacking)
(Lots more attacking)

You have emoted: Delphinus attacks with unthinking resolve, tears streaming down his stony face.

(Lots more attacking)
(Lots more attacking)
(Lots more attacking)

Student of Perseverance, Mariel, Crystalspinner says, "Wait!"

You say to Mariel, "I have to free Her, child!"

Student of Perseverance, Mariel, Crystalspinner says, "...All right."

(Lots more attacking)
(Lots more attacking)
(Lots more attacking)
(Lots more attacking)

Rugnar unleashes a vicious slash towards the shade of Kastalia before resheathing his blade, Vengeful Fireflies.
The final blow proves too much for the shade of Kastalia, who expires pitifully.
The shade of Kastalia has been slain by Rugnar.

You yell, "This is the final request of Your Oligarch, my Queen. Rest."

(Lots of Keresis-shade fighting in the midst of this)

You have emoted: Delphinus kneels where the shade of his goddess fell, his head low.

Great wisps of vapour ascend to the heavens as the shade of Kastalia, the once Goddess of the River, is finally laid to rest.

Sarapis

Iocun said:

Tanris said:

 Sure it was laggy, but you had over 100 people in one room at points spamming their bashing macro, you can't really expect anything else. 

Hrm, actually that sounds like an argument against how they did it. If they didn't expect that kind of lag, I have no issues with it. They planned an awesome event and it didn't work out perfectly from a technical point of view. But if they actually expected that to happen, they probably should have done the whole thing differently, with less player involvement.

The disappointing thing was that the epic potential of the event couldn't really be felt as such (at least by me), since it was deeply hidden behind all kinds of mechanical issues that obstructed it. There can simply be no real immersion in a story when the story appears in the shape of a broken gramophone record.

I however do not believe they anticipated quite those levels of lag, so I'm not blaming anyone. They could not have known how precisely it would turn out, since it's an event of a scale that's probably unprecedented. It was courageous of them to do something in this order of magnitude, for which I'm very grateful.

We definitely did not anticipate that kind of lag.

Sarapis

Shunsui said:

Yea, only thing that bugged me about the finale was the absence of Sycaerunax, figured he'd be somehow involved. I also figured more gods would die than those who did.

Yeah, that was kind of an oversight on our part, frankly. We had so much stuff to do nobody realized we had forgotten to write him in until after it was over.

Sarapis

Garlan said:

ok so does anyone guess when a lot of these questions after the war will be answered like what about the refugees of Shallam?

Not tonight!

Halos

Azor said:

Maya was saying she'll have a mortal life--is there going to be a mortal Maya char or denizen or something? Or do we just picture her quietly retiring in obscurity?

Deucalion said "Use your powers for good. Go raid." We raided. A bit clumsily, but it felt good getting out and abusing all those cool powers. We died quickly of course. Prayed.

Looks about the same. Maya still there. Huge. Dispassionate. Chatty.

Who is in charge now that Maya gave up Godhood and Sarapis has departed to watch over the Fire Behind The Flame (FBTF)?

Sarapis

Halos said:

Azor said:

Maya was saying she'll have a mortal life--is there going to be a mortal Maya char or denizen or something? Or do we just picture her quietly retiring in obscurity?

Deucalion said "Use your powers for good. Go raid." We raided. A bit clumsily, but it felt good getting out and abusing all those cool powers. We died quickly of course. Prayed.

Looks about the same. Maya still there. Huge. Dispassionate. Chatty.

Who is in charge now that Maya gave up Godhood and Sarapis has departed to watch over the Fire Behind The Flame (FBTF)?

Nobody. It's all Lord of the Flies up in that universe now.

Aktillum

Sarapis said:

Shunsui said:

Yea, only thing that bugged me about the finale was the absence of Sycaerunax, figured he'd be somehow involved. I also figured more gods would die than those who did.

Yeah, that was kind of an oversight on our part, frankly. We had so much stuff to do nobody realized we had forgotten to write him in until after it was over.

hope this means we'll see more of him in the future

Achilles

How long was is since Sarapis passed on the mantle to Maya... like 180 IC years ago?  Sarapis will come back in 2018

Favonius

It's no bad thing that this event has left some loose ends, as long as they get tidied up eventually (or rolled into another event).

In the meantime, it's all useful fuel for everyone's RP storylines!

At my count:

What will happen with the Xorani illness?
Where will the refugees of Shallam go?
How will Dragons be made now?
Will Lupus recover from his injuries?
Who is the rajamala from the stars that Apollonia keeps talking about? (OK, we may never know the answer to this one)
Where are the remaining pieces of the Sceptre of Divinity?
Will Prospero return from being squished and finally finish the bazaar in Delos?
Are the ormyrr ALL dead, or will they survive in some corner of Achaea?
Who do we pray for for salvation now?

Penwize

Favonius said:

Are the ormyrr ALL dead, or will they survive in some corner of Achaea?

Oh, if only.  A man can dream, though.

Jamethiel

The biggest detractor for me was the lag. I would enter something and some five minutes later it would happen. Yet some other people seemed to have no issues at all, or alternatively I was seeing their actions they wanted five minutes before.

Furthermore, because of the lag it was impossible to keep up with the group that I identified most with (i.e. the Cyrenians) and worse still I stood for a whole 10 minutes (possibly less, maybe longer) in front of 3 dala'myrr who didn't attack me but attacked everyone else in the room. I'm not sure what happened, but suddenly the dala'myyr realised I was there, and yeah, I died; strange as it sounds I'm thankful for that.

I liked the story, the whole weave of it. I understand the difficulty of getting technology to behave, complex code bases and such to do stuff they might never have been designed to do. I'm unsure if I could have done better - I'm certain I could have done worse, but:

1. The lag almost wrecked the event for me;
2. Having no clear direction or idea of what will become of dragons is even more, well, worrying - it's true that everyone's playing about with their omni-whatever skills but as far as Jamethiel is concerned, this event has suddenly devalued his character and his abilities (and don't yell at me but you're trans/fabled/whatever everything; that'd be fine if I knew I could keep it);
3. I don't know what is happening if anything at all with the Divine I worship, still

Actually, apart from the lag, the event was fine.

However, had I known it was going to be so horrendous and the issues so complex, I not would have bothered attempting to move about Nishnatoba. It was frustrating, I crashed a number of times, and I could not quit using 'qq'.

Summary: A good event dampened by circumstances that caused significant lag.

Katzchen

@Jamethiel I was getting a few seconds lag. Irritating, but not crippling for what we had to do. And I'm pretty far from the servers, though my computer is pretty decent. Not sure why I'd lag less than others really.

Athylea

My thoughts about the finale: 

First of all, I liked it over all. I was definitely glad that the event finally finished (even with lose ties). I was not even expecting  for everyone around to end up becoming demigods, nor the fact that Maya and Sarapsis left from the game. 

The lag wasn't exactly unexpected, since pretty much everyone and their mother basically logged in from the event and probably killed the data with the servers causing everyone to lag via commands/movements (seriously, I had to sit there do a command and wait for about five minutes before it was even displayed to me) 

I definitely look forward to seeing the ties straightened out eventually, although, I wouldn't be surprised if it took a bit of time. Since it seems like writing out events, emotions, dialogue, probably takes quite a bit of time and energy to get it written, corrected, and so forth. 

I was probably amused by the zap command the most (not necessarily when everyone decided to zap everyone..and yes I am guilty of this once, I was curious if we were able to use the different layers of zap..needless to say, I found out the hard way that it was not the case)..I always wondered how the command actually works and now I do! 

Very nice job on the event all together, I look forward to seeing what happens in Achaea in the months and perhaps even years to come. 

Katzchen

Does anyone have a total list of the Divine that died/left during these events, and who is left?

Terra

Katzchen said:

@Jamethiel I was getting a few seconds lag. Irritating, but not crippling for what we had to do. And I'm pretty far from the servers, though my computer is pretty decent. Not sure why I'd lag less than others really.

There were times where it took me about 10 minutes to get a single command through. So, I guess it varied.

Silas

Lag aside, this event from start to finish has been everything that's great about Achaea.

It's been said before, but it's just something you cannot repeat to have participated in the fight to put to rest the shade of your character's Divine Patron. The storytelling in this event has been better than anything else I've been a part of since I started playing, and the emotion at the end with Sarapis's departure was something I've not personally experienced since *clementius (RIP ) left several years ago.

That Achaea can still move people who've been playing the game for close to a decade is a testament to the work put in by everybody who helped make this event what it was. The Garden have been absolutely phenomenal in this. Looking back over some of the logs, this has really been storytelling at its absolute finest. I've not been this excited about the direction of the game for a long time.

To everybody in the Garden: hats off. Thank you.

Sohl

This has been a fantastic event with a suitably epic ending. The writing and storytelling were really top-notch. If it was made into a novel, I'd read it. Well done and thank you to all the admin who helped make it happen - you guys and gals are awesome. 

Playing around with all the skills afterwards was also really fun and a great bonus, so props for that as well.

Achilles

Great event, the ending today was good, some unexpected deaths (I thought Agatheis was going to make it), Sarapis and Maya both leaving was a bit of a surprise.  Being a temporary demi-god also a surprise.  

Just one simple request, don't drag whatever the fate of the refugees out much longer.  The last 10 days of being cityless has been super boring.  I started to notice a lot of the refugees spending increasingly less time around, just check messages and to see if another event was planned.  Shallam/Good needed a reboot, we got 2 active divine who just played the cool tag team role in this plot and presumeably good momentum from all that.  Don't let up.