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Comments
I definitely sympathise with the tired part of this. I think that is something we probably could've handled better - there was a lot of pressure on Cyrene in particular, since there was no barrier analogue for a breather.
Its the second part of this that I would like to address, however. I think people vastly overestimate the amount of interaction Targossas/Hashan got from Tsol'teth players. They just posted most of it to forums whereas most of what denizens discussed was sensitive information and naturally did not see the light of day for that reason.
Dunn tells you, "I hate you."
(Party): You say, "Bad plan coming right up."
I can't do more than tell you that the Targossas alliance was irrelevant where other plotline attention was concerned. You can choose to believe that or not, but the only people who suffered in terms of interaction from said alliance were Hashan (because the people handling the Tsol'teth shells had to then split time between the two orgs).
I am unsure why your denizens fell silent if they'd committed to plotlines, you can message me with specifics and I can look into it and see if there is an answer available.
I will tell you that no part of the event was written more than three days in advance. You can believe that the events were forced, but you are simply incorrect. Make of that what you will.
The soul of Ashmond says, "Always with the sniping."
(Clan): Ictinus says, "Stop it Jiraishin, you're making me like you."
What other special deathsights existed? With Hal getting unravelled and that special global message, were there ones for being Unwoven or killed in a particular way?
If you think I am lying to you there is no answer to your questions that I can give that will convince you otherwise. That's unfortunate, but if you don't trust our word then you don't trust it.
Dunn tells you, "I hate you."
(Party): You say, "Bad plan coming right up."
These were all custom. They were created in situations where it was appropriate. Nothing pre written, if that's what you're asking.
Are Tsol'teth hybridizations a possibility on the table for existing players? I don't expect it to give much of any benefit, but just cool flavourful meld messages, etc.
Will Hashan get to keep the Destruction Terminus to themselves, or will that be taken away (if it hasn't already? I wasn't here for sublimation).
What were some of the major War goals for raiding Targossas? Font/Sov/Guardian seemed to be a major goal, but I don't know how that plays in for people who's guardian was already processed.
Was Blu processed? I think the answer was summarily 'yes' due to some IC interactions. How did he survive, if so?
It felt like Ashtan and Mhaldor basically fended their respective invasions off, but that part still happened.
Ashtan was doing okay against Targossas (with us down Gattan'bahar), but I think there was some major leaning on "murder an entire room of enemies" that occurred at some points.
Then we went to Mhaldor to help Hashan, and it was kind of done-and-sealed.
I think interrupting them during their thing would have potentially caused a Chrono Boost Doom backlash, and probably murdered the Tsol'teth in question.
They absolutely defended their shrines though, so the full invasion didn’t happen. That damn worldburn was such a pain in the ass, then the Tide spread to the room and we couldn’t even go in anymore because of Tide creatures.
Penwize has cowardly forfeited the challenge to mortal combat issued by Atalkez.
Now, make no mistake. I don’t mind that any of this happened, but the absence of reward, direction, help, or literally any goal at all other than to try to surpass the seemingly Omni-present mute button hovering over our heads feels like you intended to directly punish our side of things for not doing what you wanted us to.
My only advice would be to consider both sides of events because all you’re doing is getting people who normally try to drive things forward, just saying, “meh” which kills a lot of the event for a lot of people. A little denizen interaction, a goal, and balanced pace for both sides goes a -long- way.
Good job, Coalition. I know it’s not much but you did a really good job at holding fragments, killing tsol’teth, securing tanks, and simply bashing tide. I appreciate what you all did, and I hope that you can see what you accomplished and developed in your characters during all of this.
Aegis, God of War says, "You are dismissed from My demense, Astarod. Go forth and fight well. Bleed fiercely, and climb the purpose you have sought to chase for."
It was basically shrine conflict. Gaining and holding sovereignty was what mattered to the Tsol'teth for this, but they're constrained by the same limitations as players. I'm told Mhaldor countered this well in their raid (but second hand, alas). It was definitely harder for Cyrene since they didn't have the one order bonus going for them, but there were also a lot of people who saw what was going on and I think just didn't communicate (either unintentionally or intentionally, its hard to say). If Cyrene could have locked them out of sovereignty though, that would've been game over. Anyone who thinks it wasn't an uphill battle is definitely kidding themselves - the litany was very much a huge dynamic shift and probably through people completely off their stride, but we did go in knowing we could fail if people realised what was going on and started aggressively raising shrines in other parts of the city.
There are players, myself included, that feel like the event was very much railroaded and that this final bit of the event was more or less an attempt to sweep it under the rug to try and carry on as usual. The problem is, there isn't an option to carry on as usual anymore for a lot of us. This event has changed and impacted a lot of the player base, and it did so in a way where several of us felt we had very little means to influence it.
You talked about how every event has a couple of win/loss conditions associated with it back when I first started being critical of the event. I think showing that documentation here to show where all the paths could have branched off would help. If you have to blackbox some of the outcomes for future events, fine, but showing the various outcomes will indeed show that there were options and might better guide players like myself to finding alternatives in the future to avoid this sort of conundrum again.
If there were player events or interactions that helped shaped those outcomes, throw them in too. Transparency really won't hurt here, will it?
Dunn tells you, "I hate you."
(Party): You say, "Bad plan coming right up."
Not something we're considering at this time - why would they? They are ultimately a very selfish people.
Destruction terminus was a temporary gift until the Wellspring could be unlocked. For good or for ill, it is once again no longer in the hands of players.
It would've been the same as Cyrene, a very aggressive push to claim sovereignty since it'd be a territory claim more than anything else. The litany would've probably been employed in some form (though Targossas had dismissed most of their guards in preparation, so this would've been to limited effect). There were a couple of other cards to play, but that was the general outline.
You'll have to find out that last one in game.
Since the whole y802 is being hosted by the Tsol'teth thing, I'd wondered how the admin were going to wrap this event up. It seemed to have written itself into a narrative cul-de-sac.
I wasn't as invested in the event as some others, I think. So I'm not feeling like super rage or anything. This is just my overall feedback as a whole in as neutral a tone as I can manage:
I don't think that player expectations were well managed in this run. As someone who has worked in customer service for a long time with some of the most demanding and often unreasonable clientele (angry and anxious parents), managing expectations is a very tricky job.
I know it takes a lot of time to get on denizens and tell us to bugger off, but it probably feels more reassuring to have the denizen outright tell players that 'no this idea will not work' rather than being met with radio silence.
The other thing is of course, making players feel reassured of your neutral position as admin. The Tsol'teth shells were interesting... but I think they also impaired both player and admin ability to keep things separate. There's no way you guys weren't having fun, and to players it can look like you're having a bit too much fun. It definitely coloured how players viewed the situation.
For my part, even though I had to deal with all the 'omg you're the golden admin child' backlash, I can say that I went into that event feeling completely unassured that it was going to work. Up until the city flooded and the guards died, I was paranoid that you were going to pull the rug from under me and then tell me 'yah well you should've done X'.
And when everything worked out, I felt bad that I could not find it in myself to trust you guys to give us a fair go, so I'm sorry for that. I wish that I hadn't felt that way, but that sort of feeling doesn't just spring out of nowhere.