Why is the North so easy?

[Kalden]

Didn't Halaster say there are more Pcs in Allanak?

The only thing I could be bothered about is more PCs being attracted to Tuluk because it's easy, and if that's not the case, then it's all good.

I still would like to see Tuluk harder. Rougher. I've had over two shady characters that survived to like...30 days there, and didn't even particularly want to live. They were also bored out of their mind 90% of the time. *shrugs*

Just because you can't see them...

There is SOME small game near Allanak.

Kinda takes away the point, doesn't it? There's nothing for a newbie hunter to hunt.

I suppose, yeah, they can just join the Houses or the Byn...Armageddon is, after all, a House game when it seems to come right down to it.

I wish there was more competition for power among Houses.


(EDIT: Also, if anyone's played an indie hunter in Allanak from newbie onward could you post about it?)

[LoD]

I still would like to see Tuluk harder. Rougher. I've had over two shady characters that survived to like...30 days there, and didn't even particularly want to live. They were also bored out of their mind 90% of the time.

People need to understand what they are joining when they make a character in Tuluk.  They aren't joining a mature and full grown city-state running at one hundred percent.  On the contrary, I believe much of the area will be in a state of cautious rennovation on all levels for quite some time.

The populace has likely sharply declined since the war, and only one or two generations have had a chance to rebuild those numbers.  The city is still fresh with new buildings, roads, offices, etc...and everything is just beginning to settle into its own skin.  To expect the deep, dirty and ravenous beast that is Allanak in a battered northlands still showing a few economic and social bruises is going to leave you wanting.

Make a character with the setting in mind if you don't want to be disappointed.  My guess is that too many of the people that find themselves disappointed with the play in the northlands do so because they created characters with the intention of playing in a city and environment with the maturity of Allanak (the city, not its individual people).

-LoD

[marko]

I still would like to see Tuluk harder. Rougher. I've had over two shady characters that survived to like...30 days there, and didn't even particularly want to live. They were also bored out of their mind 90% of the time. *shrugs*

To further what LoD wrote.

If you had a "shady character" who survived over 30 days and was bored of their mind 90% of your time - you weren't doing a lot were you?

Tuluk has a significantly different culture -and it is still in a nascent form that is taking shape.  There is a lot of room for new organizations and even for people to make a significant impact on the future of how Tuluk will take shape.

One of the interesting aspects of bards is that they are shaping Tuluk's culture with every moment that they are logged in (be it for the better or worse).  There are other artisans in Tuluk who have left lasting legacies behind even after their characters die.  Some other long lived characters have managed to leave buildings behind... others have streets named after them.

If you have a character and you are 'bored 90% of your time' - honestly, I suggest finding a way to die and fast - and who knows, maybe in the course of trying to die you'll have some fun.  Clearly the role you thought up isn't right for the environment and it is time to move on.  Bored characters lead to more bored characters because they are so damned boring to interact with.

I do not believe that Tuluk needs to be 'rougher' per se - I just think it needs to have it's "scary" factor notched up a few degrees.  Tuluk has a dark side that rarely surfaces and I, for one, would like to see more of it.

Tuluk will continue to grow and mature and as it does so, we'll see what shape it takes in the end.  Now is the best time to get in on the molding of the future citystate if you have an interest in leaving a lasting legacy within the game world.

[amoeba]

I do not believe that Tuluk needs to be 'rougher' per se - I just think it needs to have it's "scary" factor notched up a few degrees.  Tuluk has a dark side that rarely surfaces and I, for one, would like to see more of it.

Tuluk will continue to grow and mature and as it does so, we'll see what shape it takes in the end.  Now is the best time to get in on the molding of the future citystate if you have an interest in leaving a lasting legacy within the game world.

Yours and LoD's posts are a couple of the more interesting and reasoned ideas I have heard in a time in all this "I hate Tuluk" debate.  Especially the last paragraph here.  Good food for thought.

[Kalden]

If you had a "shady character" who survived over 30 days and was bored of their mind 90% of your time - you weren't doing a lot were you?

Neither was anyone else. I was available for what I could do, and hardly anyone was hiring.

I can't be a one-man army when I'm playing a pickpocket or burglar. With an assassin, yes, but it so happened that there were no capable assassins during either of these times(the Templarate kept wanting to hire burglars and pickpockets to assassinate people - doable? perhaps). I know this - my characters knew plenty of what was going on(I have no compunctions against shadowing people into their apartments, especially when I'm that bored), and I can tell you that it wasn't much or it was EXTREMELY well-covered up.

Tuluk has a significantly different culture -and it is still in a nascent form that is taking shape. There is a lot of room for new organizations and even for people to make a significant impact on the future of how Tuluk will take shape.

Do you play in Tuluk?

There was nobody to play off of, and normal characters don't have enough power to really start shit, especially alone.

[Savak]

I'm still a little uncertain precisely what is meant by "easier" in this particular thread.  Some have suggested it means the hard-coded available combat opponents are relatively few and usually non-lethal to the inexperienced -- and readily destroyed by the modestly skilled.  Others have suggested it means relatively few "powerful" PC's messing with you.  There are likely a couple of other possibilities.  Still, PC's seem to die "up there" about as often as "down yonder" in/around Allanak.

The area around Tuluk IS relatively fertile, water is relatively accessible, and small (usually non-lethal) critters are relatively common -- compared to the inhospitible desert around Allanak.  On the other hand, there are virtually the same number of "dangerous" critters and humanoids in the vicinity.

The "powerful" PC's in and around Tuluk are not usually the bumbling in-your-face bloody screaming hack'em'ups (DON'T HURT ME) that are more common in Allanak -- but this is by the intended nature of those two political landscapes.  Tuluk has also had fewer numbers of "powerful" PC's in the grand cycle of things, true.  They go about things in a markedly different fashion on the surface -- though very similar beneath.

The "seedy side" of Tuluk is less well defined in terms of location and expectations, though I think that is both developing and has room to develop further.

Overall, though, what I'm hearing is that Tuluk is in fact -harder- to play in, if in some ways easier to survive in.  To me that smells of a challenge.

-Savak

[Manhattan]

I played an indie hunter in Allanak. This is what I did.

I rode my kank to the Tablelands, Red Desert, gortok canyons, and even the grasslands. Yes, I was an ALLANAKI, but I did not limit myself to the desolate Vrun Driath.

I pulled in animals from all across the known world. I even got rich!

So my point is, if you play an indie hunter in Allanak you don't have to limit yourself to scrabs all the time.

Some tips I can give you guys is taking advantage of Luir's as a reststop. The ride from your southern home all the way up to the Gol Krathu is pretty excruciating. Make good use of daylight. If you rode up there and stabled your kank and it's still early morning, then you've just wasted 20 stabling sids when you could've been out in the grasslands hunting. "Rest" your kank. Carry plenty of water. Make sure you actually have a coded home in 'nak to store your countless possessions (yes, as an indie, I had way too much stuff.) Ride quickly and efficiently. If you dawdle, you'll find yourself lost far from home. Think of hunts up in Gol Krathu as fast business trips: you head in, do your shit, then leave.

Lastly, don't dawdle in Tuluk. Remember, you are only up there for a business trip. Don't harrass the locals or you'll find yourself...lost far from home forever.

[jhunter]

I like both for their differences.
I don't really see one as being "easier" than the other. And I disagree with what someone said about all the pcs in Tuluk being the same, I've seen just as many different and colorful characters there as I have in Allanak.
The statement about folks just having to "keep their heads down" and they won't be bothered is entirely untrue.  I've had just as many pcs that tried to avoid trouble get dragged into it in Tuluk as I have in Allanak.

I like to switch around alot though. I play Tuluki, 'Nakki, 'rinthi, tribals, and all sorts of shit. Still have yet to play a Red Stormer though, probably because I fear ending up solo-rping more than I have with some of the others.

I think those who have some certain picture set in their heads about one city-state or another and only play in one for the most part need to toss aside their misconceptions and "really" give the others a chance.

This is the sort of feeling I get from some people:

"I played in <insert city-state here> once and everyone was the same/I missed out on the conflict/got picked on excessively/don't like the quality of rp (because we all know the players who prefer one aren't as good of roleplayers as the other)/it was too easy/it was too hard/etc... so I -know- that is the way things are and I'm never making pcs there."

[Armaddict]

Hooray for easy travel!

I hate it.  This is derailment and I apologize, but I'd like to see traveling that far be at least a -little- more of a deal than spontaneous decisions to go out and find suitable hunting game.

A hunting trip?  Plan it out!  Sweet, I'm going to take a ride to Luir's, stay the night, and then hit the tablelands.  I heard the hunting there is exquisite.  I'll be back in a week or two.

What I'm saying is...code-wise, travel like this is easy, but really, I'd rather see it be more of an obstacle or a role-play booster rather than a "I can't find scrab and my kank can go anywhere" sort of thing.  Most hunting 'trips' into other regions don't even really require any preparation or foresight, which makes it more boring to me.

Just my opinion, sorry for the derailment.

[Maybe42or54]

It is all very misleading in the north.

Sure, you get tired of killing Tembos and all these little things so you think you are awesomely skilled and you go against something a little bigger than a tembo and suddenly you scream, "Oh my gawd! It's tearing my stomach open!"

You walk to close to a few trees and you die.

You see Santa Gith's Helpers, you die.


All very misleading.

[Agent_137]

all this advice on how to be a successful indie hunter from allanak

:cries.

That's so . . . not twinkish . . . but . . . hack and slashy.

Uhg. Makes me feel icky inside, just thinking of it.

I play a different game, but I won't go so far as to deny you your game.

[FiveDisgruntledMonkeysWit]

I read the original post as talking about the two different enviroments, and how Tuluk seems to be easier from the perspective of an indy hunter. I don't think the OP's entirely off-base, if that was indeed what they meant. The Northlands simply have a better-developed ecology, full of little game for newbie hunters to go after. The area around Allanak, on the other hand, seems to populated only by a bunch of man-eating super-beetles whos only sustinance is newbie corpses.
Vrun Driath wouldn't suffer from a more realistic food-chain.

[Yokunama]

I said I don't really care, but I would like to see Tuluk made harsher or Allanak given some small game to hunt after (besides scrab ... and tarantula).

There is some smaller game in the south.

[Jarod550]

There is some small game in Allanak to hunt, but I feel Allanak could use a upgrade in terms of the ecosystem around it.  Not necessarily to make it a hunter's paradise or anything like that, just a little more interesting ecology, i.e., more small creatures mixed with the dangerous ones, and a more interactive environment.

It's a desert.... how much crap is supposed to be around it?

:?:

Jarod

[jcarter]

There is some small game in Allanak to hunt, but I feel Allanak could use a upgrade in terms of the ecosystem around it.  Not necessarily to make it a hunter's paradise or anything like that, just a little more interesting ecology, i.e., more small creatures mixed with the dangerous ones, and a more interactive environment.

It's a desert.... how much crap is supposed to be around it?

:?:

Jarod

Several moderately sized creatures around Allanak will hunt down and kill humans. These creatures eat meat, and maybe even vegitation, although there is a lack of it. Unless these animals are living off people who wander into the desert alone, there is something smaller that they are actively hunting and eating. Most people would like to see this food chain represented better: more jozhal around that act as prey to tarantulas and other small creatures.

[Larrath]

What Allanak really needs is gigantic leeches.
And leaping beasts of doom.

Vrun Driathian anakores that leap out from under the sands with scythes and decapitate.  Animals that make kanks go crazy.

In return to keep things balanced, Tuluk's halflings will start employing heat-seeking missiles.  And anyone not killed by these is clearly a magicker which the Templarate will subsequently put to death.
Brilliant!

[YellowCactus]

 Indie Hunters are my favorite character type.  There are more hunters in the north, perhaps because those hunters are specifically focused on hunting game animals.  
    I would point out though that Southern hunters do have certain topographical advantages to make up for they're lack of trees and furry critters.

-There's a huge sea to take your skimmer out on.
-Obsidian, Glass, Salt and Spice, and other more rare materials are avaliable to the industrious grebber.
-Arrows, bows and a plethora of craftable items can be gathered from the land.
-There are quitsafe rooms spread around for the the most adventuresome waste dwellers.
-Weather IS a factor, and must be considered an ever present threat to survival.
-Yes, you can Roast Ocotollo in the southern sands!

Yellowcactus

[Mental Case]

I don't know...