SEASONS FEEDBACK: How long will seasons be and what is the structure?

[MarshallDFX]

I'm creating a topic for each area of feedback that Usiku posted.  Please don't turn them all into "seasons is trash", that can go in the "how do we feel about seasons" thread.

Usiku wrote:

This is something we are undecided on. 6-18 months was our initial stab in the dark but this is not firm and we are open to ideas. One of the wonderful things about this concept is that it opens the door to so much creativity. So we were thinking that the persistent world timeline seasons would probably be 18 months ish and that short spin-offs (like distant past) seasons would be short, flash in the pan, high action and be more like 6 months. But we are absolutely open to ideas and we're currently discussing a format that would look more like 3 year seasons, broken up into acts with no player wipes between, but this would mean sticking to one focus area for the breadth of 3 years?

So I'm interested if that would be preferable to shorter seasons but then faster rotation of focus areas and clans?

What do people think? There was an idea from another mud that I might move into this thread. How can you have quite different seasons without a pwipe? But also pwipes suck.

[whengravityfails]

I'm far more in favor of three year seasons than the constant churn of six to eighteen months which will make any kind of long term goal pointless. I know I have no interest in playing in such an abbreviated time span which will likely only encourage more poor RP choices and really rub in the lack of permanence.

[papertiger]

I would like to see longer seasons because the amount of work it creates to shift everyone into a new portion of the game seems staggering. They don't appear to be merely focusing on different areas but rather are going to spend months closing them off, creating whole new systems for offering materials, and wading through floods of applications, role calls, and clan setups on season starts. Id rather not have months of shutdown time each time we shift a season - which could be as short as 6 months.

[CirclelessBard]

I think under this system, there is such a thing as a season going on too long, or too short, to be tolerable to play. I think it would be a mistake to commit to a specific range before the model has even been practically tried.

At the risk of sounding like a cop-out answer, a season should take as long as it needs to take to wrap up major stories and provide a bit of epilogue/debrief to them once they are done. I feel like 6-18 months is perfectly fine for some stories and that some will take longer. Others will not take that long.

I think what's most important is that seasons do not have a fixed end date. Rather, staff provide a soft end date to when they think they will be able to wrap up their story, and when we're about a month or two away from that end date, we have a player-staff meeting to discuss the end of the season and whether that date needs to be pushed out a bit more.

As for doing seasons without pwipes, plenty of stories have time skips that carry the same group of characters forward by a few years. It could also be a way to manage goals that are currently extremely long-term, like MMHs - promising players that after the time jump, they will see tangible progress on their PC's goals.

[Riev]

Assuming seasons are here to force a sort of "general plotline" of the game, I would think seasons end when that season's "established plot line" comes to a natural end.

If it takes 6 months because players were able to accelerate things by killing your big bad? So be it.
If it takes over a year because there are a lot of threads to string together? So be it.

[MarshallDFX]

Just for completeness, I want to share a few thoughts that were in the Q&A thread.

Already brought this up in the Discord, and a few people seemed receptive to it, so I'll post it in here.

Would you guys consider an 'alternation' pattern with the seasons? Rather than departing from the current gameworld entirely, have the game alternate between seasons and the normal setting. Another server I was on once did this method, and by swapping between the two, people didn't feel like they were giving up their characters- and the seasons could serve to give context to the normal setting. If we were constantly jumping between different eras and locations, I feel like it would be hard to 'ground' yourself to the setting.

I was told to post this here.

May I suggest something like Legends of the Jedi? They usually have 3 eras within a timeline (each era lasts 8-12 months) and no one gets wiped, but the next era starts with changes that the players made during that era. The end of the timeline is when it completely shifts into the future or past and everyone gets wiped. It gives players a lot of time to create changes within the era. I think that would satisfy both staff and players.

There's still a downtime between each era to set up for the next era but at least players know that they're characters will still be around and that the event of the era is taken into account for the next era is taken by staff.

Here's what happened in the last End of Era (I hope it's okay for me to post):

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Broadcasting Network [GNI Report]: [ Republic Clings To Pyrrhic Victory After Defeating Mandalore As Coruscant Lies In Ruins ] A massive showdown between the Galactic Republic and the Mandalorian Clans left a catastrophic trail of destruction in its wake. The Mandalorians attacked Coruscant with all their might and captured an Orbital Solar Energy Transfer Satellite to pierce the planet's shields as a fierce space battle raged on. Mandalore Adha herself lead an elite strike team to the planet's surface and attacked key infrastructure, allowing the rest of the Mandalorian forces to land. As savage battles raged in the Coruscant streets, Mandalore was seen on the front lines leading her troops when an enormous explosion took out the Mandalorian leader and several of her team. With the Mandalorian naval threat neutralized, the Republic Navy proceeded to bomb the planet Mandalore itself while Mandalorians on Coruscant rallied after their leaders' death and pushed on. Mandalorian strike teams used the Orbital Satellite to direct an intense blast of energy at the Republic's Complex, and most of Coruscant's capital district. What happened to Mandalorian forces on the ground, let alone the full extent of devastation to Coruscant is far from known. As the galaxy burns from this devastating battle, many are left wondering... what comes next? Only time will tell. Stay tuned to GNI.
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These were all done by the players within that era and they built the next era with that in mind. Players are happy and staff are happy.

These were all done by the players within that era and they built the next era with that in mind. Players are happy and staff are happy.

dope format!  LotJ would be so sick if there wasn't so much OOC

Yeah Malken, I actually like that format way better.

I was told to post this here.

So to make the comparison, you're saying a season divided into 3 chapters, each chapter lasting 8-12 months, making the whole season 24-36 months?  In the Jedi game was there a distinction made between the chapters/eras somehow to signify the changeover?

I was told to post this here.

So to make the comparison, you're saying a season divided into 3 chapters, each chapter lasting 8-12 months, making the whole season 24-36 months?  In the Jedi game was there a distinction made between the chapters/eras somehow to signify the changeover?

Yes. I played there for a bit, and the game is still very active to this day. This model is proven to work.

They do have distinct breaks in the chapters and chars are wiped without much fuss, because people are there for the plot.

If you want to take a look for inspiration, just google 'Legends of the jedi'

Their game system is way to... Meh for me. Like classic mud quests with rp thrown on top. Not my thing.

In LOTJ the change in "Era's" usually shifted the game forward by 5-10 years. And new factions/world changes would happen. They'd open up new planets or stations for players to visit and fight over. The timeline currently is soemthing along the lines of...

The Old Republic Faction against the Mandalorian Faction Agaisnt a smaller criminal faction. There were other factions apart of the world but they were minor, meaning for the most part, their change on the world as a whole did not matter too much. Then the next era comes along from what happened with the last era.

The Old Republic BARELY won the war against the Mandalorians, resaulting in the Republic's capital being glassed by an orbital laser cannon, but the republic managed to kill the Mandalorian leadership, which resaulted in the clans splitting apart and the republic ultimately come out on top. (This is still controversioal to this day because really the Mandalorian's won.) Anyway.

The staff in the game genreally give events or pushses in certain directions, but ultimately the players and the choices they make end up deciding the factor at the end of the eras.

As for the Era's themselves: It sorta goes from, early star wars where Tie Fighters and X-wings, or even Star Destroyers were not really a thing yet. The middling Era, where X-Wings and Tie-Fighters and Stormtroopers are a thing. Then the late era, with the Sith Remnants, massive Sith Capital ships and super fighters.

Things do change quite drastically through each era, however they allow people to keep their characters until the end of the timeline where everyone is wiped and the world is started a new slate.

EDIT: But this implies you survive to the end with said character. Most combat characters don't because space fights are deadly and if you don't get to an escape pod on your ship in time you're dead.

[MarshallDFX]

During the closure can we have like... a super super mini season?  We only get the sewers