Recruiting New Players

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Deathgrowl
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by Deathgrowl »

Escronimu wrote: but to get the combo of RP and party adventuring is super hard, and maybe only happened 3 or 4 times for me.
This is a general issue I also have struggled with. The best way is to form some kind of group of regulars (guild or otherwise) or semi-regulars that you can RP and adventure with. I would love to see more RP adventuring going on, both as a player and a DM. It's so much more inspiring as a DM to start an event when you find a group adventuring rather than running circle-grinding.

When people actually walk and talk.
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Steve
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by Steve »

And I’d love to see more DMs online when my adventuring group is RPing, talking and walking!!

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Deathgrowl
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by Deathgrowl »

Steve wrote:And I’d love to see more DMs online when my adventuring group is RPing, talking and walking!!
I can certainly look into that! What times, usually?
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by Sun Wukong »

Monsters in a room... Thus you spam offensive AoE 'cloud' spells behind a door, after which you open the door, and monster come rushing out and die on the AoE, probably mostly stuck at the bottleneck of the door..
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Vogar Eol
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by Vogar Eol »

NegInfinity wrote:You'd need:
  • Nwn2: Enhanced edition.
  • A youtube channel.
  • Maybe a social media page.
  • Also to steal every good idea from Arelith and re-implement it here.
First of all, they are advertising in sneaky ways....
https://www.reddit.com/r/neverwinternig ... rn_server/

That could very much just be a happy player. What's much more likely is that's a media guy or someone trying to advertise. This subredit is a soundboard for anyone using nwn1, nwn2, or nwn:ee. We could very easily be doing stuff like this, or commenting stuff like "I tried there, but BGTSCC is just better and more friendly."
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Young Werther
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by Young Werther »

I tried there, but BGTSCC is just better and more friendly.
Yeah, get some Russian bots to handle this one.
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by Sun Wukong »

Have a look at the low hours of the server. You have bunch of low, mid, and epic level characters spread all over the server. While at FAI there are players who cannot be removed from there without promises of easy DM rewards.

The server already has 'encounters' in the form of Xvart village bear and its body guards, the bandit ambushes, etc. These have not encouraged partying up. If these pose a threat, these are easy to avoid by going around. If not, then they are just experience bags to claim.



As for role-play in a dungeon. Just turn on that Search/Survival mode and walk. If you are unable of it due to being an elven Ranger, just 'Shift' + Click to move around. There is more than enough time to chat and type. Not to mention that in a party you can often just steam roll with 'Next Target' + 'Default Action' and role-play with ease.
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NegInfinity
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by NegInfinity »

Deathgrowl wrote:
Escronimu wrote: but to get the combo of RP and party adventuring is super hard, and maybe only happened 3 or 4 times for me.
This is a general issue I also have struggled with. The best way is to form some kind of group of regulars (guild or otherwise) or semi-regulars that you can RP and adventure with. I would love to see more RP adventuring going on, both as a player and a DM. It's so much more inspiring as a DM to start an event when you find a group adventuring rather than running circle-grinding.

When people actually walk and talk.
It is a quest design problem, actually.

While waiting for my character to get approved (didn't get the approval), I played on arelith.
  • Quests are available daily.
  • 3 quests max per day.
  • Quest giver is an "adventuring company agent", and they're placed in taverns in major cities.
  • Quest is tied to your level. If your level is too high or too low, you can't get it. The requirements for getting quests are hidden and apparently can include alignments.
  • A quest typically corresponds to clearing a dungeon that can take from 1 to 2 hours to finish, and is quite tough. Some of them can wipe out a party. The dungeon is multi-level, can easily have 3 or 4 floors.
On top of that:
  • Scrolls of raise dead cost 10000 gold to create, and 50% piety. You can't stockpile them.
  • If you resurrect withotu being raised, you suffer stat penalties that gets worse with levels and require a long of time to wear off. Basically HD * 2 IG (not IRL) hours, with stat penalties being -HD/2, without dropping values below 7.
  • Monsters do not respawn in a location while somebody is present there. With a small number of exceptions.
Results? Well..

People seek companions to team up with and adventure together, because a task that pays more can kill you.
People interact with each other and hubs are densely populated.
There's no circle grinding. Because quests are more fun, and you still get combat xp during them.

And that's why I said you should steal all the good ideas from there.
Last edited by NegInfinity on Thu Apr 12, 2018 3:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Vogar Eol
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by Vogar Eol »

I get what you're saying Simian, but look at places like Cloakwood...

If it was a nwn1 area, it would be a simple matter to shape the whole thing into a large "S", "G", or "W" that made it much more linear, with scripted things that happen at certain points. You could even have spatterings of small sub-areas along the way, like rooms on a hallway.

Why is this advantage to a huge open area with much more randomized spawns? Party roleplay. Kind of hard to stay "in the rear with the gear" when spawns can come from any side. Can't push a Melee to the front, and an Archer to the rear either. So everyone runs in circles instead trying wack at spawns.

We could fix areas like the Cloakwood by creative use of non-crossable streams, large dirt walls, impassible vegetation, and/or ravines. A good example of an area that does this is the Troll Claws. That's a little more maze-like than truly linear, but it's still better for a traditional adventure party, and walking rather than running.
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NegInfinity
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by NegInfinity »

Vogar Eol wrote: That could very much just be a happy player.
You can click the guy's name and check his posting history. Doesn't seem to be a promoter.
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Vogar Eol
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by Vogar Eol »

I didn't intend to imply he was their "reddit guy". Doesn't mean he's not a DM, a media director, or someone encouraged to recruit.
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chad878262
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by chad878262 »

I like Chambordini's idea... So long as the mobs are equal in number, putting them in groups allows for a decent challenge and encourages parties, plus is more in line with design of PnP.

It's easy to argue you just set up for casters to throw AoE / DoT spells, but how is that different then today? Not exactly difficult to round up all mobs in an area and do the same thing. My opinion is the design should cater to those who WANT to play the right way. True grinders are going to grind in the most efficient manner they can find no matter what.

For those who like the idea of having a scout, coming up with strategies for a big battle, taking risks (but mitigating them with strategy) and in general playing as if they are sitting around a table rolling dice this could be a LOT of fun!

Not without issues, which I think Chambo did a good job calling out. Definitely would require some staff augmentation in the Area Builders group to at minimum make slight adjustments to area's such as where groups spawn, where treasure is located, where traps might spawn, etc. and hopefully even changing up the dungeon area's themselves now and again. Would keep things fresh and new, giving a very big reason for players to always be out exploring.

I have long wished there was a way to rotate out dungeons, for example:

Minotaur maze is cleared, they're all dead or moved on to avoid the slaughter, however, a sink hole has opened up not far from there and is overrun with all manner of Umberhulks whose tunnels likely caused the issue.

So in this scenario, the Mino Maze entrance is closed off and area is archived for the time being, new area for the sink hole is opened allowing for different enemies, dungeon design and treasures. Minotaur Maze can always be rotated back in later with a few tweaks to make it different (and make players have to learn a different path, maybe!) but this keeps things fresh!

So...um...anyone out there with area builder experience want to ping Lisa and sign up? :twisted:
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by Tsidkenu »

I'd like to see tougher dungeons that don't respawn while people are in it, thus making the adventurer longer/slower. Anything to get rid of the MMO-ish circle grinding would be a plus. The new random encounter system is doing much to alleviate that, which is promising, but it could go much further.

It's always been hard to keep players. There are far, far better MMOs out there than BGTSCC, even in the NWN2 scene (eg. Sigil) with far easier grinding, loot & crafting which is one initial, however temporary, drawcard. Those who stay, I've found, are the few RPers who catch the bug and end up enjoying the social vibe of our community.
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by TheAuthor »

Social media marketing, active discord presence, DM activity and various other things can indeed attract a lot of player to BGTSCC. The server offers a lot more than other servers do already which makes this server a winner in every aspect. I think the reason why these players do not necessarily linger for too long is due to the RP environment which is more RP lite than I have seen on other servers. Other issue is technical that is hardly the fault of the server but more the fault of a heavily bugged core game.

I think the only way to attract new players is to generally handle the technical issues with the game and maybe remove some of the RP lite aspects and make the RP environment more serious including some class/race enforcement, remove muling, RCR becomes request-only etc etc etc.

This server offers more than any other server does in every aspect. NWN 2 in general offers a lot more than other games in the genre. We also have to consider why the non EE NWN 1 still have double as much player or more (as per NWNList) even after the release of EE compared to NWN 2 which is supposedly better in everything and offers a lot more than NWN 1. NWN 1 simply doesn't crash in every 30 mins in average.
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Planehopper
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Re: Recruiting New Players

Unread post by Planehopper »

While I agree that RP levels are a factor (and have talked to a few newer players that mentioned that amongst other things), RP is as RP does. I dont think toying with RCRs, muling, and other aspects is going to change the RP environment we play in. A lot of great RPers that I've played with use those tools effectively without interfering with RP.

RP should be the focus, but Players need to do that.

There is no easy fix, either. We just all need to make sure we are doing all we can OOC to encourage RP, include, cooperate, and welcome all players old and new.
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