Baldur's Gate : The Sword Coast Chronicles : NWN2 Persistent World

NWN2 doesn't have a great influx of new players, my guess is that the community of NWN2 as a whole is losing more members each month, than it's gaining. It's an old game after all.


Personally, I'm reclining on a sunbed in my garden when I get off work - enjoying the fantastic weather!

I hope some of you guys are too.


In my experience, we always see a drop in activity around summer. It'll bounce back up Again.

At the risk of sounding negative... No, the reason is not "the summer", you people need to stop deluding yourselves. I've seen population oscillations over the last 2 years and I always knew things were going back to your usual 70+ players every evening eventually. But this one doesn't look like something that will go away on it's own, and it's not something that can be fixed by the DM team either, it needs to be "fixed" by the players who still play. You don't need 75/75 with a fully active DM team to have an active RP environment, but you do need players willing to create RP for groups of people and drive it forward. Someone once said (Karond I think) that in guilds it's usually 1-2 people putting in work and driving it forward while the rest are "followers" who jump where the activity is. Well, the server seems to be filled with followers right now. The ones who create and drive RP forward either lost their motivation or they are gone.

Also, in regards to OP:
IIRC, this happened once before. Hack, then new server. I heard rumors some server pulled that dirty trick long ago.

I'll try not to rack anyone off this time, but I would like to say that generating a purely player driven environment is an extremely hard task given the instabilities such game systems tend to present. It would not be trivial to code such a thing nor allow it to remain stable despite 75 people messing with it on a nightly basis.

I also think one or two people here are underestimating their impact on the server. I am a relatively new player and their characters "legends" are very well known to mine, completely in character.

Since this turned into some sort of stagnation thread again I will offer a few thoughts.


As another player pointed out about guilds, but in all fairness it concern all of us, there are too few true leaders on the server.
What we have is a quite a few player playing casual audience, ever willing to jump in with their fun thing in every situation possible to entertain them.
This goes for all of us to some extent btw.
Worst case being:
Screw what has been carefully built up for months or possibly years.
"Those guys seem to have some fun making conversation at the fireside, lets bust it and get some PvP.
I am here now HAHA."


Thus we get less playerdriven roleplay since the organizers burn out/get fed up, which is a bad thing since what we need is more playerdriven roleplay.

A few days ago I encountered a player whose toon wanted to raise a mercenary guild, the toon acting the part and my toon hiring him for protection.
I imagine we both players had a good time adventuring through the graveyard and hilltop ruins, at least I did.
But the point is there was a somewhat new player willing to give something as supposed to want something.
He did not just claim his toon to to be something, he did it, spending his invaluable time doing it.
We all want things, most give, a few give a lot.
Those few are not getting any younger by the hour.


How can we then create a more positive environment where more players are willing to lead and sponsor entertainment for all?
Well, act like it yourself if you feel able.

If you know the rp tools share what you know to new players.
Teaching a player how to add a quiver to his archer or how to assume a relaxed sitting position take maybe two minutes. It is worth it.

If you know current or past server lore concerning something that is not canon lore or server related by other ways:
Share it within the roleplay when the opportunity arise if it make sense.
Worst case explain it in OOC when a need arise, but share.

Want to sponsor a certain activity?
Make it happen on the server, do not sit on the forum and whine about wanting it.
Expect little or no support unless you involve others in your tale.

Respect the server rules, respect the other players and respect their toons.
Even if what you see is apeshit in your eyes.
All things need nurture and time to grow.

If you find yourself is something organized by other players give them credit for organizing things, even when what eventually befell was less appealing to your own taste.
Give positive feedback on what was decent, good or even great.
If you must bemoan something, try to be constructive about it.
Can we? Would it be possible to? I think it might be even better if e t c.

Inspire trust in your fellow players, entice them to dare, to challenge themselves and their toons while feeling comfortable doing so.

If you want more maps or other props, ask nicely or why not spend some time in the builder tool yourself?
There are builders to ask when in need of advice.

Do not whine on the forum about your own lack of creativity while telling others to spend time making things or activities for you on the double.
Just because we crave things does not mean they will leap into our laps.
Remember, a NO is also a service.
Someone took the time and effort to consider your request and give a reply.

If you find something in roleplay not to your approval concerning your or other toons, first off tell the player that causes your issue in a calm polite manner.
Reach agreement, listen to the other side, cooperate.
If all things fail report it.
Do not:
Begin by whining to others about it spreading slander on what usually are cases of miscommunication, or message spam the other player about how much you hate what happened and so on.

That said:
Prepare to let your toon take the consequences of what you make it do.
This is not your story of awesome fun/hilariousness, this is a community effort of fun for all.
Act like it.
Not that it should not be fun or hilarious when appropriate.

We are not customers here, we are a community of roleplayers, storytellers, builders and grinders doing this on our own free time.
Each and everyone of us fullfilling the needs of the community in some way.

Some of us have a lot of time to spend here, others very little.
There are as many perspectives on roleplay, mechanics, grinding and aesthetics as there are players logged onto the server and forum.
Trying to cater to all is not easy, yet the attempt is made every day.
I like it.


As for the negative feel of the forum, well it is not a rocket science to find the most negatively charged repeat posters.


See you ingame.


/M

God that's good. Well said Storm!

NeOmega wrote:For example, recently a DM offered to give players the custom models of their choice, as long as they did the work to make them. Everybody was like, "Oh, DM, you're so cool!" and, yes, that was cool, But it would have been a hell of a lot COOLER if people had to EARN custom armor looks. It would be a hell of a lot cooler if most looks were mundane, and getting the super black shiny bad-ass armor took crafting or components or even gold (but gold is so cliche) to make and have. then people would look and, and go, whoa, that guy did something, all I got is this flat gray full plate.

There's appearance changing plugin called xp_craft.
It allows people to modify appearance of any armor and color any item (including its parts).
I've wasted some time last year investigating plugin for memory leaks and in the end I've concluded that you could just already plug it in and that wouldn't even increase server memory usage (plugin uses same function for storing items in order to modify them that is used by Kemo_Auctioneer).

It has been a year, and still nobody bothered with it.

Deathgrowl wrote: How would crafting make player driven quests more viable? Players should still not be able to give XP, and with the current economy, not many people really care about gold.

Frankly, if you ever saw trading market stalls on sigil, you wouldn't be saying this.

For myself, besides the forum drama that can seriously be found on every server, it is more about timing.

I picked up NWN2 after 2 years of not playing, and BG was the most active server listed. I had played before on BG, so I figured I'd give it a try again. My old PC might even have been sticking around - and Luna was awesome enough to find Lyra for me.

Playing on Baldur's Gate again was great. The RP had come a fair way from where it ended up 6 years ago when I changed servers.
I was starting to get into a guild, with full intentions of jumping in and being completely active as I always am, so I feel now that I've let a few people down as I can't login so much now.

Why? Well playing with you guys brought back so much nostalgia that we ended up talking about resurrecting another server for the fall, and we've been busy since >.>.

I do love playing Lyra though so I'm hoping I still get a chance to play her a bit more before that time, but there are only so many hours in the day .

chambordini wrote:

Xanfyrst in chambordini's mind wrote:... feeling unappreciated by chambordini ...

Xan I told you my heart belongs to someone else!

Lmao chambordini: 1, Internet: 0

"28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes, 12 seconds. That is when the world will end." ~ D.Darko

Aye, laddies and lassies - the Apocalypse is upon us. Relax and enjoy it. Embrace it. The world won't last forever. Until then, look about and make friends with the new comrades that fight by your side. I've found nothing but of late, and it's very fun to show no peeps about, all ICly of course.

Or you could set up a stand in BG and spout off about how the world is going to end.

Disclaimer: The following is intended to be feedback. According to a coworker, my messages are usually terse and, well, harsh. It's not my intention to bitch or moan. This is just feedback.

After being gone for a long bit, I came back a few weeks ago. In no particular order, the following are my views on this server:

1. The atmosphere in and out of game isn't as immersive as it once was. I can't put my finger on it, but I think it might be that the Underdark no longer has a lot of strong personalities. In fact, half the people down there have no personality and appear to avoid contact with other people and just solo. Are there any bad guys left?
2. The new classes may appeal to some people, but not to me. I stick to non-magical and non-buff characters. The ability to become essentially perma-buffed makes the game easier. I like challenges and one of the few challenges left in a mature server is to play a non-magical and non-buff character.
3. I stick to non-magical and non-buff characters because this server has ten million rules regarding casting, domains, roleplay lore, class combination, 3b20... I'm not spending my precious game time reading encyclopedias of information just to make sure that my twerpy toon doesn't break a rule.
4. I love to play the monster or oddball races and classes. Y'all added Tanarukk, but let's be honest, it's barely ECL 1 worthy. No Goblin or Kobold? No Underdark Shifter class?
5. The absolute requirement to stick to the FR timeline, lore, and setting is a draw to many people. It also has caused more than a few to be frustrated. What would have been wrong with having the server begin in the FR world and then chart it's own path as if it were in a separate dimension? Is my character also pre-destined? If so, why not just hand me a script when I log on?
6. There is almost no replayability. The answer, it appears, is to continually introduce new magic type classes and point at the RCR system.

I think the UD is coming along nicely right now. More mages, and they have loades of personality. It is growing too, and hopefully it will peak once more with cooperative roleplay.

chambordini wrote:

Xanfyrst in chambordini's mind wrote:... feeling unappreciated by chambordini ...

Xan I told you my heart belongs to someone else!

Chambordini <3

Absolute hero .

Agreed with Empoweredfan: there are a lot of old time UDers that are regularly playing there, and a group of stellar roleplayers who made new Drow characters that joined them. They are all doing an amazing job.

UD is in great shape right now. Looking really good, folks

Posting in a soon-to-be-locked thread

Of course it'll be locked. If anyone dares saying something is wrong, fingers are pointed and players blamed and Dms lock thread.