What to do with Tuluk

[ghanima]

Is it time to revisit the topic of Tuluk yet? Should it remain in its present form? Is there something more that can be done with it, either by reopening the city or running it as an enemy NPC? What are your thoughts? Below are mine.

I think the concept of Tuluk got worked and reworked into oblivion and that didn't help. Different people over different periods of time had their own vision for Tuluk and often those visions clashed, resulting in what is an at times contradicting concept. But I also think Tuluk still has potential.

Despite the cries of many, I actually believe in the idea of player consolidation. I think there does come a point at which the population is spread too thin and that it does have an impact on the game. However, I still think Tuluk could work in such a way that large scale population thinning does not occur. On that note, I've always wondered why Morin's and other areas in the north are developed if Tuluk was a problem in this regard.

I also think Tuluk deserves a more clear cut IC explanation of what the heck is going on in there, even if we all know it was done purely for OOC purposes. So it's shut its doors to the outside world. Ok. A vast civilization still can't completely wall themselves out, especially since much of the resources they need come from outside those walls. Instead, there would be virtual populations visible to a lone rider in the distance. I've always felt Tuluk could be given proper representation through occasional animations. Imagine your lone rider is one room south of the North Road. He's skinning a goudra and watching north, in case anyone else rides past who might be friend or foe. Suddenly a veritable army of 12 NPC soldiers led by a single NPC templar march past. I think I'd poop my pants if I saw that, wondering what it was all about! Maybe it's a simple changing of the guard at an outlying fortress, or maybe there's a battle prepared. There's not a single PC in the game who would casually shrug something like that off.

One thing is without a doubt 100% certain. If it reopened tomorrow (in whatever form) the player population would jump up. At least for a period of time.

And before the naysayers erupt with fury, understand I'm not saying "do this". I'm saying let's discuss this. In my opinion, anything is better than just letting it sit there with what seems to be an extremely vague IC explanation as to its current form. I'm not badmouthing the decisions that were made, I'm saying let's revisit those decisions and see if it's time for a new one.

[BadSkeelz]

Just blow it up instead of leaving it in the half-assed limbo it's been in for the last couple years. Tuluk basically got stored, and we all know it's easier to roleplay around a corpse than a stored PC.

[ghanima]

it's easier to roleplay around a corpse than a stored PC.

Nice analogy. And I'm inclined to agree.

Blowing it up without a trace would just feel OOC and blowing it up with a trace would just be a repeat of the past. But whatever is to be done, I still think something should be done.

[nauta]

So this suggestion might fall flat on its face, but its a combination of three insights:

1. Player consolidation (at least city-based player consolidation) is probably a good thing.

2. The northlands (Gol Krathu) is such a beautiful and dynamic terrain --- from the rugged red deserts in the south, to the tablelands in the west, to the scrub and forests in the north and the grasslands in the east.  Not only is there a lot of diverse geographical regions, but the actual game-grid, so to speak, is dynamic: while in the Vrun 90% of the rooms you will encounter are omnidirectional (North, East, South, West, e.g., the salt flats, the deserts around Allanak), in Gol Krathu a lot of the game squares are not -- you have twisty turns, climb spots, holes and caves, ridges, cliffs, and so on.  It's just a lot of fun to play up there, whether it be an iso hunter, or a raider, or someone trying to escape a raider.

3. Allanak has a much more robust (if spartan) culture and history to it than Tuluk.

So the suggestion: One day, Tek gets bored and Muk retires, and Tek is like: let's fucking move this city, my citizens.  Poof!  Just like a volcano, Allanak itself lands on top of Tuluk, eliminating it entirely, and replacing it with Allanak!

Ok, so that's a bit silly.  But perhaps Allanak could slowly move into Tuluk (some calamity happened up north, the city was abandoned) --- merchant houses set up shop, noble houses (from the south) set up shop, and so on.  A kind of Allanak version 2.0.  And then, all of the sudden, something terrible happens to Allanak 1.0, and everyone is stuck up in Tuluk aka Allanak 2.0, a barebones simulacrum of the original Allanak.

Or, I guess, just close Allanak to play and open Tuluk -- I'm one of those who didn't find it /that/ weird of a place in terms of docs.  The only problem I had with it was that it was pretty sparsely populated by PCs.

[Fredd]

So this suggestion might fall flat on its face, but its a combination of three insights:

3. Allanak has a much more robust (if spartan) culture and history to it than Tuluk.

Completely disagree. As someone that has played right hand noble aides in both cities and learned a lot of history. I loved Tuluks flavor, culture and history more then i ever liked Nak's.
They had different feels.

Putting Nak where tuluk is not a good idea. The reason they chose Nak over the north, was danger, and scarcity of supplies. You HAVE to ride north for wood, hides, and other supples.
You have to ride south for....Spice?

No if they were gonna close one city, they chose wisely. But they did it wrong. Shoulda been a war, and they could leave the ruins of a city there filled with raiders and shit. It could be like a wildlands Labrinth

[evilcabbage]

obsidian is only in the south. mek hide, spider fangs, jakhals i think are only in the south.

all silt beasts are only in the south.

[Pale Horse]

obsidian is only in the south.

Was only in the south.  Tek dun goofed when he dropped a large producer of one of the South's only resources right next to his enemy/competitor.

[Fredd]

obsidian is only in the south. mek hide, spider fangs, jakhals i think are only in the south.

all silt beasts are only in the south.

I was being facetious.  But I have a point, and you know it

[ShaLeah]

 Tuluk was way more interesting when it was under Allanak rule. When rebels plotted and you didn't know who was who.  When under Tuluk was a necessity.

There is a reason characters in Tuluk lasted a long ass time. 

I don't mind it being open,  as a player I hated what Tuluk became but always appreciated it's beauty.  I don't think it makes ANY sense at all whatsoever that Tek would let that land go so easily after the war. No reason he hasn't gone back for it.

I liked the conflict.  Bring it back ya'll.

[Delirium]

Just blow it up instead of leaving it in the half-assed limbo it's been in for the last couple years. Tuluk basically got stored, and we all know it's easier to roleplay around a corpse than a stored PC.

Perfect analogy. It's very awkward as currently stands.

[LucildaHunta]

I think Tuluk had two big problems when it was open for play. First it had a really big perception problem and the second it had some serious design issues. I think it is still workable as a playable city though.

The perception problem always came down to Allanak is a hardcore gritty setting and Tuluk is this flowery, conflict free place. There's always been a perception that if you want to roleplay, have flowery emotes, frolic through the grasslands holding hands with nobles you play in Tuluk. If you want the "real" Armageddon experience you play in Allanak, Tuluk was viewed as Armageddon lite. While this was never true, that's pretty much always been the vibe you get from other players. The best thing about Tuluk was it was a place to get away from players that you might not want to be around, it was good alternative. Darksun had seven cities all of them had a completely different atmosphere. Tuluk had a much more fleshed out culture to me, but that led to the second problem.

As much as I enjoyed playing in Tuluk, I always had a hard time visualizing it. I think that was players' biggest problem with it, it was hard to understand the concept of the city itself. Was it a wooden city? Treehouses? For some reason I always imagined the Warrens like brownstones. I just never had a clear image of what Tuluk looked like, what it felt like. While Allanak borrows heavily from Darksun's Tyr, its very easy to visualize. If you asked several players to draw Allanak, you probably get similar drawings. I think if you asked players to draw Tuluk, you get wildly different pictures. I'm not quite sure which city-state Tuluk borrows from. Draj maybe? It just seems to have influences of all of the city-states and it just didn't come together well.  I just never had a clear image of Tuluk.

Still, I think a lot can be done with it. I'm still not sure what happened there even though I had a character that was right there when it closed down. It definitely could become the NPC enemy state sort of like the gith, the game's perpetual bad guy state. It could also be redone and opened for play. But this time choose another city state, Gulg maybe? Do I hear a Sorcerer-Queen? Whatever staff decides to do with it, start it off as an NPC city state then gradually open it up to players as a second city until it's playable again.

[ghanima]

Yeah the occupation was without a doubt the best time period for the MUD, hands down.

The trouble with retaking Tuluk is you don't want it to be a complete copy/paste of the past or it'll feel really cheap. Also just because it worked back then doesn't mean it'll work now. That doesn't mean I wouldn't enjoy a variation of the good old days, I'm just skeptical if it'll play out in a believable way rather than a Game of Thrones Season 7 sort of way

Whatever the case I think some sort of resolution is long overdue.

[Grapes]

Given I don't know what's going on behind the scenes and all, I, myself, wouldn't push too hard for a resolution, for all I know something big is in the works. That said I am deeply curious, I'd figure sooner or later some rumors would, find their way out of the city.

[gotdamnmiracle]

I don't care. I never got to play in Tuluk so I have no nostalgic attachment to it. Honestly, I think the second Tuluk get's popped open is the second we'll move on to something else to moan on about.

It still has soldiers patrolling. It still has fortresses standing. It still feels alive, if on life support. Right now all it is is flavor and I'm cool with that, I guess.

I think people should worry about making their own cool stories WITHOUT staff. If staff toss you a cool emote, neat. If staff reopen Tuluk, even better. Right now though, I've seen and heard nothing that will lend itself to suggesting that they have any plans to do that, open any of the other elf tribes, or bring back the other elements. Why waste breath?

[manipura]

Just blow it up instead of leaving it in the half-assed limbo it's been in for the last couple years. Tuluk basically got stored, and we all know it's easier to roleplay around a corpse than a stored PC.

This.  A hundred times, this.
It feels very awkward having this enemy state to the north that is -there-...but in a sense feels like it may as well not be, because it isn't accomplishing anything.  Even though the city is still there and there are soldiers and a fortress and whatnot, nothing about it feels alive.  Certainly not alive in any way that is providing meaningful conflict, which is sort of the point of an enemy-state.
 
I quite liked Tuluk, despite all the issues it had.  I'm not sure what would have been the best way to fix it, but 'storing it' (as BS described it) didn't seem to accomplish anything other than taking it out of the game.  Sort of.

[Sorry]

Honestly the most interesting thing I ever read about tuluk on the internets was a rumour that there's some really dark horror stuff going on in there (I don't know if we are allowed to repeat), that seems FAR more interesting than more of the same old merchant greed based politics http://metro.co.uk/2016/10/18/director-ken-loach-complains-tv-is-full-of-fake-nostalgia-thanks-to-downton-abbey-and-victoria-6199003/ and wildlife based dramas (which are definitely fun once but can't hold interest forever) that armageddon ends up for most people and then people post wondering why new people get bored? You can get involved in some interesting stuff a couple of times but then find that the rest is mindnumbing

I know it wasn't about Tuluk, but I really loved that log posted in the What happened to characters thread, of that Balthazar templar, Alisima and Alme (and posting logs like that seems quite rare, so many good stories probably just dying forever when people leave the game like tears in rain)

Most of us new people, that never knew all the in crowd of OOC cabals of people organising things out of game, probably find like me that the deep RP like that is so rare that in the end it's not worth the time investment for seeing if something, or someone interesting is around, because of the signal to emptiness ratio - even on the forums people only advertise events to people that already know what the events are, if you don't know people OOC it seems like armageddon was never interested in new players really and so it's shrink, die, or do something about that first!

[Molten Heart]

.

[icewindsong]

I haven't played in Tuluk myself, though I've looked at logs of it from when my sister played there.  I thought the mixed elements of city recovering from destruction, new construction, and old established areas was a fascinating mix.  Its much more eclectic than Allanak, with the templar/governing areas with streets paved in bone, to the country club estates feel of the noble area, the big city slums area and the medieval fantasy-rpg village commercial area, and finally the poet/music area that reminded me of a university campus.  And yes the caves of the french revolution below.  I didn't find it disjointed from all the things I read, it made me want to go there and explore the area more myself.

So what would I like to see there?  One option is as someone else mentioned, for Allanak's forces to put it back under control of the Black.  Then it would become Allanak North I suppose.  I don't know anything about the time it was under control before.  It might be nostalgic for those who were.

My own idea would be for the nobles and government to have reacted to all the destruction and built new walls around the eastern half of the city - the government buildings, noble estates, and resources like their farms and such  - and turtled up basically.  It would leave a much smaller area left for people to play in - the slums, commons, commerce areas, so people finding each other to rp would be easier.  So it would be a place people could go in the north, and gather between runs to hunt and greb for the Houses and merchants of Allanak.  People who want to give a try playing there would be able to, but would still be tied to the rp and plots and politics of the south with the Northern families holed up in their new fortress area.

My character is very much an Allanaki, but I would enjoy trying out play there when I go to a new character sometime.

[650Booger]

I would like Tuluk to be reopened.  I think it enables all sorts of cool plot opportunities.  plus it gives everyone an automatic enemy to fear.  right now, upper echelon PCs in 'Nak society have nothing to fear unless they intentionally piss somebody off.

[Aruven]

Yea I don't know how the nak fanboys are pretending like plotlines are deeper or more rewarding without the other third of the world bringing resistance to it.

I've pretty much got the vibe that Tuluk is done and apparently everyone secretly thought it sucked ass (which I was unaware of).

I always played city characters. So it was nice to be able to play in a different city between deaths. Maybe we don't have the player base for it to feel that different anymore.

There's plenty of meaningful roleplaying to be done with Tuluk.

There may have been problems inherently with some design mechanics of the north but it didn't need to be just scrapped.

Instead of fixing anything the staff just shut down a bunch of player initiatives in the north, ran a crazy complicated plotline that most players weren't even aware was an option in game that favored the south heavily, and started a long line of apocalyptic motions to close the city over a long period of time. The preface to this was to slowly makes each zone unplayable in the area.

Meanwhile, there's more nobles in a room than commoners at a given time in any one of Allanak's taverns so far as I can tell.

Not too sure about this one.

[Cind]

As an unaffiliated commoner in Tuluk around its closing, I was -harassed- about joining the 1% and had no peace. There were just too many clans open and everyone was trying to get folks to join theirs. Yes, it had problems. I don't think it needed to be closed, but maybe they're just figuring out a way to fix things and then coding it in, after they finish making that one thing they were doing for a different part of the game.

What if Tulukis just 'didn't say what they mean?' Scrap the 'always be pleasant' thing since no one understands how it works, but lying directly or indirectly, that could work with a few more other things, collected together to form the social system, right? Being obtuse, talking around the issue, that sort of thing. It would help give off the continuing vague idea that Tulukis are somehow more intelligent by taking longer to say things.

[Cind]

One option is as someone else mentioned, for Allanak's forces to put it back under control of the Black.  Then it would become Allanak North I suppose.  I don't know anything about the time it was under control before.  It might be nostalgic for those who were.

This would be awesome--- another occupation, except that staff don't have a preplanned endpoint for it. Just let it remain occupied and let people enjoy playing there as either nakis or Tulukis, and I think someone mentioned that the Occupation was hands down the best period of Armageddon they had played. I wish I could have been playing during that time.

[Bushranger]

Tuluk implodes! The strife in the city becomes so intense that most of the city is destroyed, it's citizens are pressed into fighting for the various factions and kill each other off and they few who manage to survive are feral and ferocious. Only the Ivory Pyramid survives intact surrounded by ruins. Occasionally Legionnaires come out from the pyramid and smack people around as they go out to various holdings of the Sun King or return from them but they no longer maintain order in the ruins. If any nobles remain they are secluded in the Pyramid as their crumbled estates are picked over by scavengers.

I really like the idea that Tuluk is like a labyrinth of the North. Morin's is the only bastion of civilized security that most people can access, maintained by the GMHs and some Legionnaires sent from the Pyramid. Tribes have established themselves as the way of live outside the logging village and hunt the grasslands or scavenge the ruins. The Sun King still rules, presumably, from the Ivory Pyramid but no longer has a civilized city so if Allanak tries to invade the ruins they will be met by remaining legionnaires and militia pulled together from the tribes. It's gritty and dangerous and awesome

[Refugee]

I loved Tuluk.  I always could find people to RP with, unlike in Nak.  It was easier to start a PC, that's true.  But there were always plots going on to get involved with.  Maybe that was a function of the PCs that were there when I was, I don't know. 

If they're going  to destroy it, I hope staff feeds a plot into some noble and we all get to blow it up together!

[Yam]