3/21/16 Update Discussion Thread

[Armaddict]

Regardless, I stand by my statement.  Those elements may be the half-elven stepchildren of Armageddon magick, but they're still children.  They've been part of the game for more than 15 years and in my opinion the roles do add something to the world.  Give them at least something to be played as, rather than stuffing them in the closet entirely.

To paraphrase what you're saying here is that once something goes into the game it should never get looked at again - and if something makes it into the game, it can't ever be altered in any significant way.  

I think he's more saying that if you have a recipe for a certain type of food that a lot of people are enjoying, messing with spices and additions and sideplates is safer than changing a portion or preparation step or whatever about the main dish.  Like changing an ingredient for ye olde reliable white bread into a different kind of flour, and then saying be patient and the new dish will grow on you, but you needed to do it because you wanted that particular component of the recipe to have more of a signature kick.

[Rathustra]

This change is not being retconned in. The changes you encounter in-game will be in-game phenomena. How your PCs react to this should be based on their IC motivations, understandings and attitudes.

[seidhr]

I'm not sure I really get the recipe analogy.

[Jihelu]

This change is not being retconned in. The changes you encounter in-game will be in-game phenomena. How your PCs react to this should be based on their IC motivations, understandings and attitudes.

What he said.




That being said, even though if you bother to read what I type (Why would you) I see to be against this.
I'm not though.
I am /sad/ about never being able to be a Nilazi. Though maybe they will come back in some crazy way or I'll be able to finally make my evil zombie character some time in the future, but I need to focus on the now more.

[Armaddict]

I'm not sure I really get the recipe analogy.

That's probably because I think I'm great at analogies but actually terrible, by judgment of the reception of them.

I think the statement being made was that it's been there for 15+ years because it was a winning element (pun!) of the game, otherwise it would have been withdrawn soon after going in due to not being received well.

Of course...that doesn't seem to go over well.  So maybe you're actually fixing something everyone hated at the time.  But that's from before my time.

[manipura]

I'm not sure I really get the recipe analogy.

I think the gist of the recipe analogy is that Colonel Sanders would risk an uproar and some really, really unhappy customers if the secret spices were suddenly changed, but it would maybe be a safer choice to add a new combo meal if he wanted to play around with different tastes.

Edit: I don't even eat chicken.  I don't know why the first thing that came to mind was the Colonel and his chicken.

[Marauder Moe]

Regardless, I stand by my statement.  Those elements may be the half-elven stepchildren of Armageddon magick, but they're still children.  They've been part of the game for more than 15 years and in my opinion the roles do add something to the world.  Give them at least something to be played as, rather than stuffing them in the closet entirely.

To paraphrase what you're saying here is that once something goes into the game it should never get looked at again - and if something makes it into the game, it can't ever be altered in any significant way.  

Come now, you know that's not what I'm saying.

I get that change sometimes has to happen.  You had clear reasons for closing Tuluk: staff resource and player consolidation.  Your justification for this seems to be just "they were a mess when first added to the game".

[seidhr]

Come now, you know that's not what I'm saying.

I get that change sometimes has to happen.  You had clear reasons for closing Tuluk: staff resource and player consolidation.  Your justification for this seems to be just "they were a mess when first added to the game".

The justification for this is more just that they don't fit with the vision of what elementalists should be, now.  As has been stated numerous times, we hope to bring some particulars of what made them loved back in one form or another.

As an aside, there was a huge outcry and a lot of the same sorts of arguments from some of the playerbase when Tuluk was closed - you may recall.

I had a lot of fun, personally, playing a Tan Muark back in their hey day when they had the waterslides and the margarita machines in the Blue Jug, and a big part of me was sad to see them go - but the goal state for the game is a moving target.  Break eggs to make omelettes, back to the recipes, eh?

[Beethoven]

I understand why you're being vague, but I wish we could at least know whether you're planning to make new mini-nilazi/drovian/elkran subguilds, or if you're going to roll these spells into the subguilds you've already created, or create something entirely new that incorporates some aspects of these guilds but is different from anything we have seen before or are likely imagining.

[manipura]

  Break eggs to make omelettes, back to the recipes, eh?

...I have an egg intolerance and don't eat them either. 
Food analogies are stupid. 

[Marauder Moe]

The justification for this is more just that they don't fit with the vision of what elementalists should be, now.  As has been stated numerous times, we hope to bring some particulars of what made them loved back in one form or another.

I don't see any parts about your vision for what elementalists should be that seem particularly incompatible with those elements.  Is there more to it?

Also, again, they aren't loved because of "particulars".  They're loved because of a theme.

[wizturbo]

Some additional thoughts, now that I've at least allowed myself to consider character creation opportunities...  This is going to have a massively opposite effect than what people think.

Magick is going to be more important, and more overpowered than ever.  

Mundane classes have actually always been the counter to magickers.  A ranger with their bow is just about any mage's bane out in the desert.  The assassin in the city is the same.  Now that paradigm shifts, and instead magicker versions of a mundane class will just be at an entirely different level than their mundane counterparts.  No mundane warrior will be able to match a Warrior/Rukkian.  No Assassin will ever be better than an Assassin with magick at their disposal.  Magickers are now super mundanes, rather than mages.

The power economy of the game is being completely re-written, if you don't have magick, you need to tremble in fear because you're a second class citizen even at your own profession.  In many ways, elementalists are now super charged Templars in terms of their coded power, albeit without any of their social or political authority.  It's going to be absolutely nuts how dangerous some of these combinations are, and how easily they'll be able to remain concealed seeing as the main sources of magickal espionage are now gone.  

I guess magicker hatred will finally be well founded, as they'll be superior to a mundane in every way when it comes to power.

[CodeMaster]

I don't think it's safe to speculate about what will or won't happen... everyone thought pickpockets getting unlatch was going to result in a veritable "Armageddon" of thievery and new paranoia about thieves (me included), but it never did.

I'm interested about all the open questions here.  If subguild elementalists become more common, will templars be able to detect them?  Will it be harder to live in the city as one of these characters?  Will there be an explosion in the gemmed population, or an exodus from Allanak?  Who can say??

[RogueGunslinger]

Uhh. Mages were already better than the mundanes wherever their skill sets matched up. Now they're just a different kind of better. In some cases, losing the diversity of spells actually makes them worse at certain things than they were before...

[CodeMaster]

Also based on my limited experience with the spice in the game, you could make a lot of the same arguments about the overpoweredness of someone walking around with spice to snort.

[BadSkeelz]

I'm interested about all the open questions here.  If subguild elementalists become more common, will templars be able to detect them?  Will it be harder to live in the city as one of these characters?  Will there be an explosion in the gemmed population, or an exodus from Allanak?  Who can say??

Find out IC

[Miradus]

I confess to being strangely drawn to click on any thread in which BadSkeelz was the last comment.

[Majikal]

I confess to being strangely drawn to click on any thread in which BadSkeelz was the last comment.

Because he's the asshole we deserve, he's the one we need right now. So we'll read him. Because he can take it. Because he's not a mage lover. He's a text-based guardian, a watchful poster. A dark asshole. He's Bad Skeelz.

<3

[Bogre]

We are looking to cycle in the spells from the drovian/elkrosian/nilazi trees into the game in compelling and thematically interesting ways.

This response misses the mark in a way that surprises me, coming from staff.

It's not a fondness for the spells.  It's a fondness for the roles.  The flavor.

Even if you took away that one spell that defines Drovian's usefulness, I'd still want Drovians.  Even if Elkran sub-guilds were basically just copies of another element sub-guild, I'd still want Elkrans.  Even if Nilazi were split/nerfed to the point they'd never really be a threat to a city, I'd still want Nilazi.

+2 MM

Heck - even my GDB avatar is a Nilazi - need I say more?

+ 3. As character hooks, they provide a lot. There has been a lot of stuff in game revolving around Nilaz plots, demons and history. Why...eliminate all that?

If Drovians had less utility than other mages, than I think the answer is to develop them, not erase them.

Elkros - sounded pretty awesome. But a lot of overlap with whira. But dark is not just the absence of light and has a place in the elements.

[Rokal]

Some additional thoughts, now that I've at least allowed myself to consider character creation opportunities...  This is going to have a massively opposite effect than what people think.

Magick is going to be more important, and more overpowered than ever.  

Mundane classes have actually always been the counter to magickers.  A ranger with their bow is just about any mage's bane out in the desert.  The assassin in the city is the same.  Now that paradigm shifts, and instead magicker versions of a mundane class will just be at an entirely different level than their mundane counterparts.  No mundane warrior will be able to match a Warrior/Rukkian.  No Assassin will ever be better than an Assassin with magick at their disposal.  Magickers are now super mundanes, rather than mages.

The power economy of the game is being completely re-written, if you don't have magick, you need to tremble in fear because you're a second class citizen even at your own profession.  In many ways, elementalists are now super charged Templars in terms of their coded power, albeit without any of their social or political authority.  It's going to be absolutely nuts how dangerous some of these combinations are, and how easily they'll be able to remain concealed seeing as the main sources of magickal espionage are now gone.  

I guess magicker hatred will finally be well founded, as they'll be superior to a mundane in every way when it comes to power.

I think this is seriously the wrong way to look at the whole situation, I mean, I -understand why-, but still.

i've said it several times, it should be looking at the theme, and what fits. I -hugely- support this change for all sorts of thematic reasons, and concept reasons, the capacity for more character concepts that thematically work with zalanthas is now -huge-.

its also stated that this is the beginning - im pretty certain adjustments will be made, and we also have to remember that karma is a mark of staff trust - and if people do things that show that trust isn't founded..well yeah.

Seriously people, see these new subguilds, possible mixtures, as a part of a -storytelling- tool and Roleplay tool. Worrying about the power and one character being better then another? im pretty sure thats what has made the whole idea of 'omgs, magicks is better then mundanes!'
Every character will be unique in one way or another and have abilities others may not have, its important to stop looking at power and strength -yes, theres going to be some ridic combinations, and theres nothing stopping people from doing stuff with them.

but for heaven's sake, we're roleplayers. Lets focus on making this fun instead of fretting about the power, i mean.

its starting to feel like NO one trusts their fellow player on arm. wtfs up with  that?

[BadSkeelz]

Large numbers of people throwing cantrips or a few spells around no better fits the Armageddon theme than a slightly-lesser number of people throwing many more spells around. The fear is that this change will make magic common in the world, dilute its scariness and mystique, and eventually erode the social constraints that have been placed on it (which just feeds back in to making it more common).

This is conjecture. I'm afraid it might be true in the short term as well as the long term, but we won't really know how its affected the game for weeks.

[MeTekillot]

Maybe we're going back in time to Tor warriormages.

[Jihelu]

Finally, Tor will be restored to full power.

[wizturbo]

If Elkros, Drov and Nilaz were somehow out of place as full elementalist guilds, why couldn't they have a home amongst subguilds and be put together with "more oversight"?

It should be pretty easy to do a subguild cut of each of these guilds, and have some cool and terrifying combinations.  The idea of a mundane mixed with Nilaz is even more scary than normal Nilazi, which I like.  And the same is true for Drov and Elkros to some degree as well.

[Warsong]

Uhh. Mages were already better than the mundanes wherever their skill sets matched up. Now they're just a different kind of better. In some cases, losing the diversity of spells actually makes them worse at certain things than they were before...

No. They had more power than mundanes in a general kind of way, but magickers were not just across-the-board superior at very individual thing. If you wanted to be the best swordsman or archer or thief, the answer was not "mage." Now it is. Now that's the answer to the best of anything. They're now mundane+1 characters, it's pretty self-evident.

Being a mundane is now objectively inferior where game mechanics are concerned, and it also seems to have become infinitely easier to avoid the social ramifications of being a mage because it can much more readily be kept secret, so the pariah aspect of it is probably also much reduced as you can easily go through life without being sussed out as you don't rely on magick for little everyday things. That's not a bad thing as such, but it certainly is a thing that makes the social stigma of playing a mage less perilous.

The best assassin in the city, he's gonna be a magicker. The best ranger in the region, that's a wiggler. The best thief around, it'll be a guy who's a pickpocket with an agility buff. Mages are #1 in every field now and appear to have become much easier to fit into any and every aspect of the game because they get to also be full realized versions of any given guild.