3/21/16 Update Discussion Thread

[LauraMars]

guys just wait, this isn't even our final form

[Kryos]

Guys, look at it from this perspective.

It is what it is.

You can't change it, you just have to live in the world with it.

I personally would have LOVED to play a Nilaz, but eh, shit happens.

I also personally would have LOVED to play a full sorcerer.  But shit happens like a year ago or whenever that happened.

Look for the positives and not the negatives.  You literally went from WATER, STONE, LIGHTNING, SHADOWS, VOID, FIRE AND WIND. -only, with the chance of some shitty half assed subguild options-.

To literally massive combinations of abilities and talents.

If you look at it at it's basest number, that's 6x4=24 options, then you add in the differences that can be had and you're at petty staggering numbers of potential combos.  WAY less chance of two mages being cookie cutter.

The problem here being, with the existence of ESG, cookie cutter went out the window a long time ago.  Factor in the new sub guild and revamped ESG, and its even less possible now.  Keeping the existing guilds and ADDING the sub guilds I suspect, would have met near unanimous support I'm betting.  This however, is already demonstrating that its upset/alienated a lot of players, and did so without so much as a warning.

[Molten Heart]

I like the change, it makes sense for a low fantasy setting for the magick to be less. At first there will be more magicker roles being played but after the novelty wears off, I think it'll slow down.

I will miss the elementalist guilds that were removed. While I think the shadow and lightning elementalist abilities could be merged into the other elementalist guilds,  think the nilazi elementalists guild could easily be made into several subguild aspects. I'm wondering if it was a design/playability decision not to have nilazi or if it was a thematic decision.

I like the nilazi guild and will miss it.

[BadSkeelz]

Unless they add a Fuck-Magick subguild I don't see much point in taking a mundane sub on a warrior anymore.

[Khorne8]

Can't you just let me worship Khorne in game and grant some magickal immunity or something.


Also the "you" was not you, Rath. Just in case you thought it was. Sorry.

I approve.

Fuck it

Change objective: BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD

Also, this.

[Molten Heart]

I think it's a legitimate concern that magick might get out of hand, unbalancing the game world. However I'm not that concerned because of the various social stigmas that make playing a magicker an isolated role. I don't see playing a caster being any less isolated. They will be more viable options as to the places they can play, go and do, with less visibility and more suitability, they'll still have to be either secret or gemmed with the limiting restrictions that come with each.

[Rokal]

Guys, look at it from this perspective.

It is what it is.

You can't change it, you just have to live in the world with it.

I personally would have LOVED to play a Nilaz, but eh, shit happens.

I also personally would have LOVED to play a full sorcerer.  But shit happens like a year ago or whenever that happened.

Look for the positives and not the negatives.  You literally went from WATER, STONE, LIGHTNING, SHADOWS, VOID, FIRE AND WIND. -only, with the chance of some shitty half assed subguild options-.

To literally massive combinations of abilities and talents.

If you look at it at it's basest number, that's 6x4=24 options, then you add in the differences that can be had and you're at petty staggering numbers of potential combos.  WAY less chance of two mages being cookie cutter.

The problem here being, with the existence of ESG, cookie cutter went out the window a long time ago.  Factor in the new sub guild and revamped ESG, and its even less possible now.  Keeping the existing guilds and ADDING the sub guilds I suspect, would have met near unanimous support I'm betting.  This however, is already demonstrating that its upset/alienated a lot of players, and did so without so much as a warning.

im not suprised a lot of players are upset, but we also have to remember that this is the first part of a complete overhaul of all the guilds, theres parts of this i absoutely love, and parts of it I dont like.

I think a lot of you people should stop looking at the viablity of what this or that is, or how OP this or that is, and looking at theme and RP, and focusing on making fun, believable characters that can bring the rp to life with these new character opportunites.

I think thats what these changes are going to be about, making the guild/sub guild have a lot of thematic weight to it.

Its going to be a bumpy ride, and so far, personally, im excited to see what else comes.

[Chettaman]

When I think on it, it would of been just as good to actually keep the main magick guilds. Or make them their own subguild.

Anyone with enough karma can be trusted to play those roles. Good points Lizzie.
And true, Kryos. Warning would of been nice.

I support the tribe mentality.
(Also, Blood for the blood god! - I thought I was the only one who shouted this!)

[wizturbo]

One step forward with the elementalists subguilds, seven steps back by amputating seven entire guilds from the game.

I wrote a lot more, but decided it wasn't worth investing too much energy in this.  FantasyWriter's post resonated strongly with me.  

We'll see how things play out.  But my current emotion is disappointment, and a feeling of loss as a player.

[Jihelu]

I think I said a while ago something like "Make magick subguild" or some shit and all the replies were "But warrior/-insert any magick class here"

I predicted this.
Am I a wizard

[BadSkeelz]

I think a lot of you people should stop looking at the viablity of what this or that is, or how OP this or that is, and looking at theme and RP, and focusing on making fun, believable characters that can bring the rp to life with these new character opportunites.

I think thats what these changes are going to be about, making the guild/sub guild have a lot of thematic weight to it.

Its going to be a bumpy ride, and so far, personally, im excited to see what else comes.

Personally I find magick to be a garbage theme, with my one consolation being it had some serious coded and social disadvantages.

The code disadvantages have been lessened. If enough magicker PCs enter the game, the social disadvantages will begin to degrade as well.

Stand firm, sponsored leadership roles. Suffer not the witch to be in your clan.

[Armaddict]

guys just wait, this isn't even our final form

Statements like that frighten me more than settle me down, when things move in this direction.

People keep saying 'Oh, there will be a bunch at first, but it will settle down.'  Historically speaking, that's not...really the case.  They'll likely try each one, which is where you think it'll settle down?  No 'Try that again' mentality, you think?

The moment that people start getting denied because 'Sorry, there are too many magickal characters currently in the game' is where you'll know something bad was done.  There is pretty much no incentive to go purely mundane.

However, the idea of these roles having a "cost" to playing them is accurate in one sense. By picking a magicker guild, you're giving up a way your character could be versatile in another manner. Bearing in mind that no guild is completely good at everything, any guild+magicker_subguild combination is going to have weaknesses. That will at least partly blunt the concern of magickers becoming overpowered, and will be addressed further during the guild revamp.

Weaknesses in what way?  Because I'm guessing that exploiting said weaknesses will get you slapped with bad notes for abusing knowledge of the game, and the promise of weaknesses to them points out the weaknesses of the mundane more than it did before: A true mundane is now truly at a disadvantage, aside from the versatility of making their own crafts.  There is magick in place to do pretty much any ESG better, which makes the subguild combinations very heavily weighted, as far as advantage, towards the magickal.  Likewise, there is the promise of monitoring the play 'like a hawk' to make sure this goes well...the monitoring going on as is isn't that great, but we're being told to settle down because of the pledge of -more- attention on it, when attention seems to already be spread thin as it is.  

I'm a little confused at what the -actual- accomplishment made here was.  Make magick ambush us harder, when it was one of the more controversial items on whether players wanted it or didn't?

Edit:  Holy shit, 7 replies I haven't read yet.

[Nergal]

Keeping the existing guilds and ADDING the sub guilds I suspect, would have met near unanimous support I'm betting. This however, is already demonstrating that its upset/alienated a lot of players, and did so without so much as a warning.

Perhaps, but if we avoided doing things out of fear of alienating the playerbase then we would stop doing things. Instead, we saw a problem - magicker guilds weren't fully people, lacking a basic set of mundane skills that would be realistic for them to have, and the newer elements were relatively messily thrown together - and sought to correct it completely instead of getting it done halfway. A warning for a change of this nature would've caused people to apply for main-guild magickers before they were no longer available, and then we'd be forced to store everyone. We sought a way to place this change into the game more gradually.

[LauraMars]

So I guess the only things that make me scratch my head so far (now that I've had a chance to sit down and review everything) are the inability to craft things as a mage without going full merchant/mage.  I liked the mage/crafting subguild thing. But I guess that'll probably be addressed in future updates to guilds.

And nilazi, well, I don't actually care they're gone too much. I always found the skulls'n'blood'n'Nine Inch Nails place those roles tended to wind up to be impossible to take seriously (no offense to anyone that's ever played a Nilazi, I'm sure YOU were the exception   ). BUT I did like them for their elemental-neutralizing skillset. Again, I guess we'll see if that comes back in some form later on.

[Asmoth]

As they said.  They are gonna be watching it like a hawk, to make sure that people aren't going apeshit and upsetting the balance of the world.

I doubt they are going to allow someone to walk in and start killing templars willy nilly with their ungemmed warrior/krathi.

(Though I do sorta wish they would die so I could Role App one).

If anything the people who twink out or go apeshit and do something game breaking, are going to be perfect for the game, because the staff will be able to twink skillsets, starting skills, skillmaxes and all sorts of things to make it less abusable.

[BadSkeelz]

Keeping the existing guilds and ADDING the sub guilds I suspect, would have met near unanimous support I'm betting. This however, is already demonstrating that its upset/alienated a lot of players, and did so without so much as a warning.

Perhaps, but if we avoided doing things out of fear of alienating the playerbase then we would stop doing things. Instead, we saw a problem - magicker guilds weren't fully people, lacking a basic set of mundane skills that would be realistic for them to have, and the newer elements were relatively messily thrown together - and sought to correct it completely instead of getting it done halfway. A warning for a change of this nature would've caused people to apply for main-guild magickers before they were no longer available, and then we'd be forced to store everyone. We sought a way to place this change into the game more gradually.

I do appreciate Staff not deciding to immediately store or change any PCs in light of this change. Thanks!

[FantasyWriter]

Guys, look at it from this perspective.

It is what it is.

You can't change it, you just have to live in the world with it.

I personally would have LOVED to play a Nilaz, but eh, shit happens.

I also personally would have LOVED to play a full sorcerer.  But shit happens like a year ago or whenever that happened.

Look for the positives and not the negatives.  You literally went from WATER, STONE, LIGHTNING, SHADOWS, VOID, FIRE AND WIND. -only, with the chance of some shitty half assed subguild options-.

To literally massive combinations of abilities and talents.

If you look at it at it's basest number, that's 6x4=24 options, then you add in the differences that can be had and you're at petty staggering numbers of potential combos.  WAY less chance of two mages being cookie cutter.

You are failing to take into account that some players LOVE playing rangers as they they have been for years. Some people LOVE playing Merchants as they are as they have been for years. Some people LOVE playing Warriors as they have been for years. AND some people LOVE playing Magickers as they have been for years.

Hypothetically: How are Warrior players going to react to having to choose between being weapons masters and brawling (kick, bash, subdue,e etc.) masters? Or rangers can't have the ability to survive in the wild (desert quit/forage food) AND be able to be master trappers (archery/skin/tan).  Merchants may now only have these two crafting banches, or those two crafting branches?  Because as said before, no one masters everything.

[Delirium]

The back-to-front and twisted nature of nilaz was actually a very, very interesting concept to explore in game. I really can't go into much more detail than that, but the skulls'n'blood stuff was honestly the smaller part of it, and just sort of matter of fact and par for the course, which was part of the fun of playing the guild. You saw death very differently.

I never got to play one, but I got to interact heavily with a brilliantly played one, and got to explore the theme of nilaz in other ways, and man.... I'm gonna miss it.

[Iiyola]

Goddamnit.

[Asmoth]

You are failing to take into account that some players LOVE playing rangers as they they have been for years. Some people LOVE playing Merchants as they are as they have been for years. Some people LOVE playing Warriors as they have been for years. AND some people LOVE playing Magickers as they have been for years.

Hypothetically: How are Warrior players going to react to having to choose between being weapons masters and brawling (kick, bash, subdue,e etc.) masters? Or rangers can't have the ability to survive in the wild (desert quit/forage food) AND be able to be master trappers (archery/skin/tan).  Merchants may now only have these two crafting banches, or those two crafting branches?  Because as said before, no one masters everything.

Wait what?  I played a merchant a few years ago and I was a master of a SHITLOAD of stuff.

None of it had to do with my subguild.  Or has that changed and I just didn't notice because I don't Merchant much.

[Rokal]

I think a lot of you people should stop looking at the viablity of what this or that is, or how OP this or that is, and looking at theme and RP, and focusing on making fun, believable characters that can bring the rp to life with these new character opportunites.

I think thats what these changes are going to be about, making the guild/sub guild have a lot of thematic weight to it.

Its going to be a bumpy ride, and so far, personally, im excited to see what else comes.

Personally I find magick to be a garbage theme, with my one consolation being it had some serious coded and social disadvantages.

The code disadvantages have been lessened. If enough magicker PCs enter the game, the social disadvantages will begin to degrade as well.

Stand firm, sponsored leadership roles. Suffer not the witch to be in your clan.

This whole concept of 'if enough PC magickers enter the game' the social disadvantages will be gin to degrade as we'', seems so.. im sorry, but BS.

Compared to the world of zalanthas, the player characters are a SMALL PERCENTAGE(like, not evne one percent)  of inhabitants of the known, just because you interact with PCs most of the time during your play time doesn't mean your character is interacting primarily with them - characters have familys, other minions to order around , vnpcs to interact with when off screen (logged out)

Its just matter of RPing upon the fact that gickery is rare and not allowing one to relax into it being common place.

im a huge fan of magick, and I support the fear and hatred for it, and i'll personally get on the case of anyone who starts treating it as the 'common' thing.

The social disadvantages become nothing if the player base lets that happen - and then, the virtual world will kick in and knock people back in its place, as it should be.

Just my thoughts on this.

[wizturbo]

AND some people LOVE playing Magickers as they have been for years.

That's me.  I loved playing them.  And the fact that I now have to use the past tense is really depressing to me.  I'm sure I'm not alone.  

[Bogre]

Keeping the existing guilds and ADDING the sub guilds I suspect, would have met near unanimous support I'm betting. This however, is already demonstrating that its upset/alienated a lot of players, and did so without so much as a warning.

Perhaps, but if we avoided doing things out of fear of alienating the playerbase then we would stop doing things. Instead, we saw a problem - magicker guilds weren't fully people, lacking a basic set of mundane skills that would be realistic for them to have, and the newer elements were relatively messily thrown together - and sought to correct it completely instead of getting it done halfway. A warning for a change of this nature would've caused people to apply for main-guild magickers before they were no longer available, and then we'd be forced to store everyone. We sought a way to place this change into the game more gradually.

I personally think this may have been better solved by having magick guilds able to have extended subguilds.

AND some people LOVE playing Magickers as they have been for years.

That's me.  I loved playing them.  And the fact that I now have to use the past tense is really depressing to me.  I'm sure I'm not alone.  

I'm with you. I tend to switch between mage/mundane/mage/mundane.

[Nergal]

However, the idea of these roles having a "cost" to playing them is accurate in one sense. By picking a magicker guild, you're giving up a way your character could be versatile in another manner. Bearing in mind that no guild is completely good at everything, any guild+magicker_subguild combination is going to have weaknesses. That will at least partly blunt the concern of magickers becoming overpowered, and will be addressed further during the guild revamp.

Weaknesses in what way?  Because I'm guessing that exploiting said weaknesses will get you slapped with bad notes for abusing knowledge of the game, and the promise of weaknesses to them points out the weaknesses of the mundane more than it did before: A true mundane is now truly at a disadvantage, aside from the versatility of making their own crafts.  There is magick in place to do pretty much any ESG better, which makes the subguild combinations very heavily weighted, as far as advantage, towards the magickal.  Likewise, there is the promise of monitoring the play 'like a hawk' to make sure this goes well...the monitoring going on as is isn't that great, but we're being told to settle down because of the pledge of -more- attention on it, when attention seems to already be spread thin as it is.  

I'm a little confused at what the -actual- accomplishment made here was.  Make magick ambush us harder, when it was one of the more controversial items on whether players wanted it or didn't?

Edit:  Holy shit, 7 replies I haven't read yet.

A warrior that takes a magick subguild isn't going to be able to:
- ride hands-free or trample anything
- have direction sense
- craft anything beyond cooking
- use stealth skills
- scan
- backstab or sap
- and more...

Whereas a warrior that takes a mundane subguild will be able to do one or more of these things. There are similar issues with picking a guild + a magick subguild. There is a trade-off in ways that there wasn't previously. And yet the power of a magicker is still maintained. Each aspect was designed with a theme in mind as well as playability. Yes, magickers are powerful, but fully mundane characters are still going to be desirable to play in their own right.

[Rokal]

The back-to-front and twisted nature of nilaz was actually a very, very interesting concept to explore in game. I really can't go into much more detail than that, but the skulls'n'blood stuff was honestly the smaller part of it, and just sort of matter of fact and par for the course, which was part of the fun of playing the guild. You saw death very differently.

I never got to play one, but I got to interact heavily with a brilliantly played one, and got to explore the theme of nilaz in other ways, and man.... I'm gonna miss it.

I too was personally looking forward to one day playing a nilazi, and im sad that probably won't happen now.

You saying this makes me wish I had the chance even more. :<