Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Submit and discuss your ideas for the MUD.

Good / Evil Grouping restrictions should be removed

Yes (I am open to it/support the concept)
34
67%
No
17
33%
 
Total votes: 51
Valendhal
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Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Valendhal » Fri Aug 14, 2009 6:03 pm

Was just curious
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Shevarash
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Shevarash » Fri Aug 14, 2009 9:38 pm

Can the people who voted no supply a reason? Just curious.

PM's are fine if you don't want to post.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby amena wolfsnarl » Fri Aug 14, 2009 10:43 pm

reason #1
I'M SICK OF ELVES!
every zone group that ive been in for the past while is composed of 75% elves a barb shaman, a gnome or 2 and maybe a halfling or human. By allowing yuans or other evil races to group with goodies you'd see some diversity in the races.

On a side note DG elves at once!
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby dem » Fri Aug 14, 2009 10:47 pm

I voted no because my experience from Duris showed that every step taken to make the game easier for the players resulted, in the end, to dropping the pbase even more.

/Koxa
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Dalar » Fri Aug 14, 2009 11:35 pm

dem wrote:I voted no because my experience from Duris showed that every step taken to make the game easier for the players resulted, in the end, to dropping the pbase even more.

/Koxa


That's a PvP game and WoW came out.
It will be fixed in Toril 2.0.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Dalar » Fri Aug 14, 2009 11:37 pm

I voted yes. From my experiences in Homeland, grouping evils/goods before kits came out didn't change a damn thing.

Goodies get:
Dires
Squids (lol!)
Battlechanters
Yuan-ti clerics

Evils get:
Barbarian warriors (LOLOLOLOL)
Paladins (hahahah)


This game was "balanced" so either side didn't have a significant advantage. Duris was not right? Didn't goodies have less power but higher group caps?
It will be fixed in Toril 2.0.

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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Kegor » Fri Aug 14, 2009 11:49 pm

I voted yes aslo because I like the diversity, and because players should be able to group with whoever they want for whatever reasons they want. I think limiting a players choices is, simply put, just dumbing down the game. The only major conflict of interest I see to wide open grouping would be Rangers, since it is their sole purpose as a class to eradicate evil.

Would love to see grouping restrictions lifted. If that happened, I would also see the following become a lot more true:

Warning: As one of the six evil races on TorilMUD, they are
extremely difficult to play and face many hardships. Their hometown
has been specifically designed to make life hell and death waits
around every corner
. Evils will most certainly encounter situations
that would be deemed "unfair" to any of the non-evil races. We did
this to create a new challenge for those advanced players who have
"beaten" the challenge of life on the surface world and are looking
for something more difficult. You should NOT play an evil unless you
are a *very* advanced player and are used to the TorilMUD style of
MUDding, or are willing to face the hardships without complaint, as it
will NOT be easy.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Botef » Sat Aug 15, 2009 12:48 am

You mean Paladins Justin?

Grey will still be the casters
Dire might replace ranger because they are more fun
Yuan will be the new cleric race
Lich will shift towards Drow, but ultra will still keep drow/duergar from being all that desirable
There will actually be some variety in shaman choices
Some good competition between bard/bchanter
tower of iron will
and all of us who rolled human to group both ways will be boned (cept efhr)

Hell yea I voted yes!
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby grundar » Sat Aug 15, 2009 3:15 am

i voted yes because in no way will this make the game any easier in the gameplay sense, but it in theory should make it easier to form for a zone.
zone group damage will probably not increase, seeing as you're gonna have to give up a voker slot to bring a squid to drag all those dayblinders around and/or *gasp* goodie elementalists will actually have to scribe earth fog!
honestly top tank choices will remain the same, with an influx of troll tanks not because they're awesome but because everyone has one ,and mages will remain exactly the same as they are now.

biggest benefit i see from this is that more people will play squids in zones, therefore more complaining about how they blow could possibly lead to an actual squid fix. feh i'd vote 3 times yes if i could.

without the grouping restrictions dropped invasion code should go as well, but mobs in towns should still be aggro goodrace/evilrace.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Nilan » Sat Aug 15, 2009 7:21 am

Although it sounds real fun. I think although it is very hard to find evil groups these days, removing restrictions will pretty much have a negative impact on drow, squid, and duergar. I can't see zone groups taking these races along with them in groups due to the fact that they are day blind races. At least with evil groups these races were essential in the groups. If the grouping restrictions were dropped these races will prolly no longer be chosen for groups due to the dayblind inconveniece in zones.

I guess thats the one downside i see to the combined grouping.

just a thought
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Adriorn Darkcloak » Sat Aug 15, 2009 4:45 pm

I voted no because while it seems like a good idea now, in 3 months it'll have bad, unintended, consequences that weren't foreseen.

Let's do some simple ones, nothing fancy:

ZERO reason to play human, even for cleric and possibly even rogue. Race destroyed. Dwarves, halfings and half-elves too, but really...

The game was made to give evilraces more "power" or "strength" over goodraces, but making their game more "difficult" or whatnot. So, basically, allowing them to mix now will pretty much make people wonder why they should bother playing most goodraces.

Well, except elves, but elves can get to level 54 and can tank all evilrace players at the same time; oh and they have awesome (the best?) mem times. Hps? Shrug, their maxcon notch is set at 101 (would you believe it?!) so not really a factor for fighters.

RP atmosphere will receive its final, bloody stab.


What sounds like "opening" the game up actually is "closing" the game up to alot of races and classes and atmosphere. But hey, at least now I'd be able to play my evil ogre named Thug and doorbash. Cause, you know, evilraces are l33t and dark.

/negativity
Last edited by Adriorn Darkcloak on Sat Aug 15, 2009 4:47 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Sylvos » Sat Aug 15, 2009 4:46 pm

I voted no because I've always felt that the different sides gives Toril an identity that distinguishes it from cookie cutter MUD's. Its theme and atmosphere were supported by Faerunian based areas and the idea of different factions, that there are such things as irreconcilable perspectives as what evilraces and goodraces view as acceptable.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Gukov » Sat Aug 15, 2009 5:23 pm

I always hoped that more goodies would eventually roll some evils and it would be possible to run evil or goodie zones with the same pbase and essentially the same people participating. For whatever reasons... I'm imagining previously attained high level anti-evil eq and the annoyance of xp being some major factors... this doesn't seem to have happened.

I don't RP but I like the racewar atmosphere, and happen to prefer the atmosphere of the evil side a great deal.

I'm not thrilled with the idea of removing the grouping restrictions but I think it would be better for the game for the immediate future, and allow people to play whatever race they want without having to pick the good side if they want to do any zones.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Dalar » Sat Aug 15, 2009 5:51 pm

I don't think you guys realize there is no racewar.
Goodies already won because of low pbase.
Race balance issues can be fixed later.
It will be fixed in Toril 2.0.

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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby amena wolfsnarl » Sat Aug 15, 2009 7:37 pm

Sylvos wrote:I voted no because I've always felt that the different sides gives Toril an identity that distinguishes it from cookie cutter MUD's. Its theme and atmosphere were supported by Faerunian based areas and the idea of different factions, that there are such things as irreconcilable perspectives as what evilraces and goodraces view as acceptable.



If the dwarves of mithril hall and the everyone else in silverymoon can learn to get along with orcs why cant they get a long with everyone :P
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Sylvos » Sun Aug 16, 2009 3:39 am

amena wolfsnarl wrote:
Sylvos wrote:I voted no because I've always felt that the different sides gives Toril an identity that distinguishes it from cookie cutter MUD's. Its theme and atmosphere were supported by Faerunian based areas and the idea of different factions, that there are such things as irreconcilable perspectives as what evilraces and goodraces view as acceptable.



If the dwarves of mithril hall and the everyone else in silverymoon can learn to get along with orcs why cant they get a long with everyone :P


R.A. Salvasnore and the 4th edition D&D system in general homogenized the cultures in the game to a disgusting point. Drizzt Do'Urden is one of the worst things that have happened to magical fantasy. All we need now is somebody to put together a series about the kind, compassionate Uruk-Hai. /rant

And the cultures you mentioned, in the novelization I gagged down, learned to get along with orcs at the threat of an organized horde. Not out of any reconciliation of cultures.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Teej » Mon Aug 17, 2009 4:12 am

I voted no, but then again, I have left so my opinion doesn't matter to anyone but me. I feel that the goodrace/evilrace divide encourages the themes established within the zones, including hometowns. If trolls and elves and drow and halflings are allowed to all group, why can't that group well into Waterdeep, then shift over to Dobluth Kyor? Why can players group but the cities can't figure out how to all be happy friends with one another? Paradise is a firm example of zone theme based on the division between goodrace and evilrace. Removing restrictions ultimately changes the feel of the character races, dilutes the awareness of one's character AS a character.

All that aside, many people are arguing that without removing this barrier, then the next, then the one after that, that the mud will die. A big part of it already has, and it may be that all vestiges of individuality have to be purged for what's left to begin to thrive again. If this step is taken, please consider the general direction of the theme of TorilMUD, to ensure that there is one and that it can last.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby grundar » Tue Aug 18, 2009 11:05 pm

i'd agree with all your racewar and rp comments and all that CRAP if i hadnt for a long time seen the rp sphere ignore the racewars having drows grouping with dwarves and illithids and everything. so yeah, its fine go ahead and keep your abandoned evil side and keep wondering why you cant do anything other than kill lvl 35 mobs with a lvl 50 troll because you and 2 afk people are the only ones on that side.

best part of this poll is how many people that dont even play voted no :P
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Gukov » Tue Aug 18, 2009 11:15 pm

grundar wrote:best part of this poll is how many people that dont even play voted no :P


pretty much.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Valendhal » Thu Aug 20, 2009 12:33 pm

Maybe we can try it on weekends .. just to see how it goes :)
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby selshanar » Thu Aug 20, 2009 5:02 pm

A loud and resounding " NO " from me, not that my voice would weigh much I think.

Lately, I've seen the Gods make this game easier and easier. Or perhaps that is just experience playing in? Either way, this seems another step towards the goal of making life easier for players ... and is that really what you all want?

The racewar theme, while I would say neglected, has long been an integral part of Toril and is partially what has set the Mud apart from the first 50% of muds out there. The rest of its awesomeness is what makes it a top mud _in my opinion of course_.
We don't have silly races, hell in theory we even have rules governing the naming of each race which is, I think, unique! It shows that there was some thought behind each race and by removing the divide, I think Toril will ultimately lose a part of its " integrity ".

Also, the loss of pbase isn't because goodies and evils can't group together. Evil and goodies grouping won't increase the pbase. Come on, muds are doomed to begin with and while a few outdated souls like me cling on desperately to this text based game, the graphic games began their siege several years back already.

Rant ended.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Valendhal » Thu Aug 20, 2009 7:04 pm

Guys .. wake up and smell the coffee .. "racewars" *whine whine .. "this is what makes toril unique" *whine whine ..

For one .. the racewars concept was abandoned long ago before Duris

There is no good/evil in Toril .. there is no evil at all .. its all goodie

So basically at the moment we have a mud with a ton of races, half of which have gone to waste and are dead. I don't know about you, but I don't enjoy playing a half-dead mud.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Botef » Thu Aug 20, 2009 8:41 pm

I'm not voting yes to improve the pbase, I'm voting yes to open up content that is going to waste.

The problem with evilraces is they don't offer what they were intended to. They are supposed to be a challenge with the trade off of more power. The logistical challenge is the only challenge - things like trying to form a group without a squid, or doing a zone with a rogue that is dayblind half the time. This makes them an incredible waste of time to play when we are talking about zoning. All the rest is a hinderance, or an annoyance - not a challenge. In addition there is absolutely no incentive gear wise to play one. Infact, there is considerably more top tier good align gear in game. That is one reason we saw a trend of troll tanks adjusting their align to good to take advantage of it before the evil pbase made the exodus to good. The racial advantages are also minimal...Drow have what, 5 strength over a grey? Big woop!

Removing the grouping restrictions won't make the game easier, and much of the evil-only content like Hyssk/DK would remain the way they are.

What it would do is generate a great deal of interest in xping and playing evil chars. Maybe, some time down the road, the races will be viable on their own again and restrictions can be put back into place.

If people are really against removing the restrictions than lets look at what we can do to make evils playable, like changing how ultravision works.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby grundar » Thu Aug 20, 2009 10:36 pm

selshanar wrote:Evil and goodies grouping won't increase the pbase.


where they might not increase the overall pbase it would stop splitting the pbase in 2 which means at any given time instead of a 25/5 pbase we get a 30 pbase. even a monkey can figure that one out.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby spunionring » Thu Aug 20, 2009 10:52 pm

with the new align quests, we could shift to an alignment based group restriction right? That way its still RP friendly, but also enables all the races in the mud to be played equally.

Also, in general adventurers are mercenaries / treasure hunters, and would thus often choose to group with anyone because it serves your own purposes.

My idea: Make only Lawful aligned chars have racewar group restrictions. Basically, they become the 'racist' of the mud, because even though it may serve their purposes to accept other_race help, even though everyone else of that race will group with other_race people every so often, you just can't get rid of your old torilmud prejudices, you stick to the old law :P
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Kegor » Thu Aug 20, 2009 11:10 pm

Nilan wrote:Although it sounds real fun. I think although it is very hard to find evil groups these days, removing restrictions will pretty much have a negative impact on drow, squid, and duergar...


More negative an impact than collecting dust in the inn? I take mine out to get them rejuved once or twice a year, not sure why, but I do. Wormhole is nice for humans, not much use for evil race characters, since there aren't any playing. Evil races can be nice for an occasional solo, chatting, talking to mobs, or whatever you are into, but what they are not good for anymore is playing the mud as it was meant to be played, with other people.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Naled » Fri Aug 21, 2009 6:45 am

I voted no for much of the same reasons Adriorn mentioned. I don't think lifting the group restrictions will fix anything, other than a number of people will be able to use their evil characters where they now use their good characters. Basic result is that other races will be condemned to the inn.

Best way to get evils working is to make content for them. When faang was introduced, suddenly there were a lot of evils xping to do the zone. If there is a enough evil-only content worth doing, there will be evil zoning.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby selshanar » Fri Aug 21, 2009 11:05 am

It would stop splitting the playerbase? Don't make me laugh, we don't have a split playerbase, you know damn well that the likelyhood of any evil online at any given moment has an equivalent goodie character that can be whipped out easily if required. There are a few exceptions, and I applaud those characters, but in reality the goodie side was consolidated when the playerbase started diminishing and spots started opening up.

I don't understand how come we can't just play BOTH. I mean, I keep seeing Shaiith, for example, push for evil SPOB (dunno if its a joke?) but no one seems to react really. Hows about instead of always worrying about how to be the biggest, baddest, bestests equipped character out there you decided hey, let's have fun and try zoning our evil characters?

The real reason you guys want to remove restrictions is because it allows you to become _more powerful_ at some infinitissimal small aspect of the game that'll allow you to tweak something more easily or to blaze through a zone 5 mins quicker. Which is really sad.

On another note, I agree with Valendhal that it COULD BE FUN in as much as its something different to have a weekend without group restrictions. I just wouldn't like to see it become permanent.

Rant ended,
Selshanar.

Oh, btw, thanks for calling me a monkey Grundar, I much appreciate it.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Valendhal » Fri Aug 21, 2009 6:58 pm

I have thought about this some more, and I can show all of you how and why racial grouping restrictions are absolutely asinine. [Though all along for the past 10 years or so it seemed pretty logical to me .. if you really think about it .. its not]

The main Q is .. does Toril Mud follow/is based upon AD&D .. lets look at it from two angles.

A. Toril Mud follows AD&D rules, concepts, etc. very closely:

Possible alignment choices are: Lawful Good, Neu Good, Chaotic Good, " Neutral, True Neutral, " Neutral, " Evil, " Evil, " Evil

I used this page as reference [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alignment_%28Dungeons_&_Dragons%29#Good_vs._Evil]

Some creatures such as angels are inherantly good, some such as demons, undead .. inherantly evil

Evil sticks together, they are mostly the villians, monsters, etc... Good sticks together, they are mostly the heroes, protagonists etc.

**NOTE: Toril Mud allows Evil Aligned Barbarians to group w Good Aligned Paladins .. but not an Evil Aligned Troll [boggle? ... is the Troll like .. more evil or something?]

SO .. based upon AD&D rules, it is entirely feasible for an evil aligned creature to cooperate with a good aligned, or neutral aligned being under this system

Toril Mud does not allow this to happen .. so maybe its safe to assume angle B

B. Toril Mud is only loosely based upon AD&D, Forgotten Realms etc.

Ok fine. So why does it matter .. I want to be creative and dream up a Lawful Good aligned Ogre Warrior .. he is too dumb to know any better, he may be destructive but he likes people, he wants to be your friend .. maybe you will have pity and tolerate him because you could REALLY use his help during a raid, knocking troops and doors down left and right. OR perhaps you use him as a dispensible tank .. let the idiot die for all we care, its a good plan right?

OR .. even better .. A bunch of "goodies" wish to raid a section of the Underdark, they could use a guide ... I wonder if there would be a Drow willing to betray his brethren .. I bet there are a few of these pitiful scumbags around. I am sure there will be a price however.

So .. why do we restrict group based upon race again?????

Heh

ftl

Guys & Gals .. look, this mud is ALL about creativity .. that is why us, the players don't really need fancy ...

(QUOTE SHEVARASH, our FORGER himself)

... "graphics, or 3-D sound effects, but with solid gameplay in a rich text-based environment, all designed to stimulate the imagination" ... we are able to draw ourselves into ... "a complex world of heroism and magic!"

So why do some of us go against the reason we are truely here anyway?

Why put a damper upon creativity?

I rest my case.
Last edited by Valendhal on Fri Aug 21, 2009 7:22 pm, edited 7 times in total.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby kanenan » Fri Aug 21, 2009 7:02 pm

I think if we choose no to evil/good grouping.. we should still stoke the evil side..
Add items with frikken ultra or perm dayblind cure. The biggest argument to not zoning evils is the time it consumes vs goodies due to this.
A quest to enhance, or darken or something.. spell.. bleh. It would help, and it's very simple.
stuff.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Botef » Fri Aug 21, 2009 8:08 pm

Its been suggested countless times.

Make ultravision work like infra does.

You see the shadowed outline of a *HUGE* creature here.

Still need a squid/ele/fog to see properly but at least your not totally incapable of doing anything for 12 minutes. I suspect ultravision works the way it does because the mud was intended to have an underdark the size of the surface world, but that never happened.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Adriorn Darkcloak » Fri Aug 21, 2009 9:16 pm

Botef wrote:The problem with evilraces is they don't offer what they were intended to. They are supposed to be a challenge with the trade off of more power.


And that, my friends, is a perfect summary of why evilraces are crap. Yuan might be the exception.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Kegor » Fri Aug 21, 2009 10:34 pm

selshanar wrote:The real reason you guys want to remove restrictions is because it allows you to become _more powerful_ at some infinitissimal small aspect of the game that'll allow you to tweak something more easily or to blaze through a zone 5 mins quicker. Which is really sad.


Seems to me you have absolutely the wrong idea about why people want this to happen.

I really never thought of it as becoming more powerful, but I guess it would in the way of more alts that are useful to zone groups. Which in essence is helping to facilitate a stronger pbase for non-prime time zoning. The power increase the zone groups themselves would see would be very insignificant other than allowing more alts.

Bottom line is, I enjoyed my evil raced characters and the classes that I don't have the time to remake as goodrace. It would be nice to have the option without having to exp 8 characters again, cuz that sure as hell isn't going to happen.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Kegor » Fri Aug 21, 2009 10:43 pm

selshanar wrote:I don't understand how come we can't just play BOTH. I mean, I keep seeing Shaiith, for example, push for evil SPOB (dunno if its a joke?) but no one seems to react really. Hows about instead of always worrying about how to be the biggest, baddest, bestests equipped character out there you decided hey, let's have fun and try zoning our evil characters?


This has worked out occasionally in the past. Evil zone tuesday was fun while it lasted. But the real problem therein, is a lot of goodies, especially newer players, do not have an evilrace char, and therefore cannot go. Sometimes you just can't form an evil group in a guild raid situation either, because someone that wants to go, and that everyone would like to go, doesn't have one. So you go as goodie.

Complicating matters further, some people are very wary of leadership when it comes to evil zoning for infamous historical reasons. I would be willing to be there's only a very small handfull of people that could form it up even if the alts were present.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby amena wolfsnarl » Sat Aug 22, 2009 12:35 am

Kegor wrote:
selshanar wrote:I don't understand how come we can't just play BOTH. I mean, I keep seeing Shaiith, for example, push for evil SPOB (dunno if its a joke?) but no one seems to react really. Hows about instead of always worrying about how to be the biggest, baddest, bestests equipped character out there you decided hey, let's have fun and try zoning our evil characters?


This has worked out occasionally in the past. Evil zone tuesday was fun while it lasted. But the real problem therein, is a lot of goodies, especially newer players, do not have an evilrace char, and therefore cannot go. Sometimes you just can't form an evil group in a guild raid situation either, because someone that wants to go, and that everyone would like to go, doesn't have one. So you go as goodie.

Complicating matters further, some people are very wary of leadership when it comes to evil zoning for infamous historical reasons. I would be willing to be there's only a very small handfull of people that could form it up even if the alts were present.


Yeah not a lot of people like to follow anyone other than lili and a few others, and lili has always said she doesnt like taking an hour and a half to form for evils cause of the same reasons kegor has mentioned. as i mentioned id like to see just for the fact that it would change group dynamics some, would give people other options rather than grey elfs for casters.

btw downgrade grey elfs!
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby grundar » Sat Aug 22, 2009 9:25 pm

selshanar wrote:Oh, btw, thanks for calling me a monkey Grundar, I much appreciate it.


i didnt call you a monkey... monkeys understand the split pbase concept, you still dont apparently. but hey, you're welcome.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Sylvos » Sun Aug 23, 2009 4:44 am

I've cast my vote, gave my reasons but in answer to something Valendhal said above, with regards to an evil barbarian vs. an evil troll.

I'm going to use elves as an example as there's a literature based example of the two, evil elf and evil drow.

An evil elf of FR canon was Elaith Craulnober (sp?). He committed evil acts such as theft, murder, and the traditional unlawful type activities from a crime lord. He extorted, he betrayed people, so on and so fort.

Dark elves of FR canon, nobles at the very least, have as an aspect of their culture that the third living male child born to a noble family is named and then has his heart cut out and sacrificed to their goddess.

Cultural evil is deeply ingrained far past what anybody can just choose to act as evil. That's always been a mental justification of the differences that I used. An evil elf really is less evil than an evil drow, in ways that numbers and alignment labels cannot adequately represent.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Valendhal » Mon Aug 24, 2009 12:50 pm

Ok, so I think Sylvos is saying in his example that .. a Grey Elf, since he is born into a peaceful, good-doing society .. would really have to be much more evil to commit acts of theft, murder, etc. than a Drow Elf, who thinks he is doing "right" ie. the norm .. by sacrificing his 3rd born son etc. .. To the Drow, this is the way of life, and may seem "right" to him.

Since there are so many shades, and complexities to how characters interact, I think in some situations, inherantly Evil raced types would cooperate with Good / Neutral raced types .. if there was some type of advantage to doing so.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Valendhal » Mon Aug 24, 2009 12:56 pm

And then, from playerbase standpoint .. throwing all this RP / alignment / D&D speculation in the trash can

Toril Mud gets new players from time to time. Take our normal retention %, and cut that in half .. because many new people choose evil (thats 50/50 right from the start) .. they level up their characters and are ready for the next challenge .. zoning, item acquisition, quests .. and pushing further Tiamat runs.

Well the problem is, they just spent months leveling up .. and now they are unable to get into zone groups based upon a more than often innocent choice up front. Most of these people quit the mud, and the player is lost forever. I can probably think of 15-20 names of people who were frustrated about this and gave up .. within the last year.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Delmair Aamoren » Tue Aug 25, 2009 2:21 pm

My .02 =

As it stands now almost everyone has multiple characters. And by multiple i mean between 5-15 different chars. I'm sure that amongst these players are at least a couple of evilraces per player. Why is it so impossible to get an evilrace group together? Unwillingness to play due to restrictions/dayblind? I don't understand really. The pbase is the same 50-100 people playing 10 different characters. There should be some way amongst all this to make it happen. There is no reason to take down the walls and make all the hometowns tolerant of different races and make grouping restrictions disintegrate. As Adriorn said above, it would be one swift deathblow to the last bit of RP there is left in this MUD. Leave the restrictions except for as described below:

I do agree with the proposed !racial restricts (for grouping) weekends, only because of the "something different" it could add and intrest it may bring to some of the evilraces skills/abilities and what combinations are fun. We have done it for the multiplay rule, so why not racial restrictions?


Del



And as far as the removal of racewars restrictions for RPQ sphere went, i think it was a necessary evil. Ultimately i don't think it was well played by the characters, but the purpose was for an EPIC event that ended in a mutual benefit to the races involved.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Todrael » Tue Aug 25, 2009 3:24 pm

I voted yes, because the last time I played for about 2 years straight, I never once got to zone as Todrael. Even on Evil Tuesdays, they always seemed to need a cleric or enchanter (Belathar and Tanir are neutral humans) more than a second Lich (plenty of liches out there).

I haven't zoned as Todrael since the days when he was guilded in Crimson Coalition, back when I was an evilrace player, not just character. My defection to the goodraces was a difficult moment, but it was required for me to continue playing the game.

Exclusive evilrace is dead. It has been dead for years and years. There's no resurrecting it, unless evil-exclusive zones become far more numerous (and worthwhile). I haven't played in over a year now, and making this change wouldn't bring me back (still waiting on 2.0), so count my opinion as you will. But I think it would improve the mud.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Jerthal » Tue Aug 25, 2009 10:10 pm

I voted yes because I just realized that I still have a Duergar cleric here from 02 Sojourn 3 (can that be right?) and I'm ready to go.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Lorendel Ebonmist » Wed Aug 26, 2009 2:31 am

I voted no.

The FR milieu I have loved for so long, that WAS very closely represented here on the this MUD
cannot weather such a deformation of its nature, without changing the names, people and places to something else other than FR originated lore. The problem with evils not being able to get acceptable groups lies within the people that play the game...not the game.
If you want that to change, then the pbase motivations have to change. The game should not be altered to adapt to you, you have to change to adapt to the environment. Not change the environment to facilitate you. Challenge and overcoming it is the greatest reward. Gather your evil minions and conquer what is. Captain Kirk's approach at beating the Kobiyashi-Maru is still cheating. The game is already something it was never intended. Monty Haul approaches DO exist here, the same approaches that have been documented and tried to save campaigns are failing and will continue to fail,( as documented in countless articles and eureka and explanantion by the RPG developers over the last 30 years). Ever increasingly powerful EQ will not save it. Making it easier will not save it. Making fights easier will not save it, making things harder, ceasement to coddling of the pbase might save it...the real rewards of RPG are defeating HARD challenges, overcoming extreme adversity, accomplishing a task/quest or zone, not defined by how long it takes but the fact that you defeated it at all are the best rewards of RPG, if you do not know how these things feel, its not your fault, but YOU ARE missing out on the highest most satisfying rewards RPG has to offer. As has been said before all of us have evilrace chars, if you cant get people to commit to logging them and trying to do something together (isnt that why evil always loses to begin with?) its ultimately the players fault, not the design mechanisms in the game. Buck up, suck it up...log in your evils, group your evils, laugh in the face of death (even when you cant see it) Quit trying to take the easy road, when you succeed you WILL feel a reward better than any piece of eq can give you.
I promise.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Cordan » Wed Aug 26, 2009 3:06 am

I think Nilan has hit a good point about day blindness, but I'm not sure the effect will be all that negative.

Say you have 30/5 zonable chars online. Lili forms a goodie zone group that's all goodies - no day blindness. Well the 5 evils want to zone. There are 15 eligible zoners, all goodies, that the 5 evils can't recruit from to do a zone and have some fun. Remove the restriction, and now we've got two groups zoning.

The one problem i see is some evils possibly getting mad because the goodies don't drag them along because of dayblind. They'll just have to get over that.


I've also got an observation to share.

Do a "who" sometime and look at the range of levels of players online. I came back after a hiatus and decided to roll up a few new little chars and level them for fun. I've come across 3-4 new players believe it or not. Well, one used to play duris, so he's new to Toril, but not the mud in general. Anyway, every one of them has said the same thing at one point or another.

"Man, there's no one to play with, and solo'ing all the time sucks. Glad you logged on."

And it's funny that as soon as I log on, they shoot me a tell within the first two minutes because they're looking for me... because they know I'll group with them.

I can't play every day just to make sure they have someone to play with. And I don't mean power leveling, because that's not playing with someone. Having a char of a similar level and sharing in the xp'ing and exploring catches more attention than just power leveling someone. It's more fun than just being drug around, especially for a new player.

In the last three weeks, I've seen two of those new people that thought this game was cool leave because they got bored with solo'ing. Another I haven't seen in a week, though I don't have high hopes.

We all need to remember that new players don't know what zoning is, how to do it, the rewards, the fun, the rush, the whatever. All they know is they gotta find some waybread or a pemmican patty, that stray dog has got to pay for whippin their ass at level 2, and that they forgot where their guildhall is again.

Roklam/Kulak/Pelax/Soker
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Kegor » Wed Aug 26, 2009 3:35 pm

Lorendel Ebonmist wrote:I voted no.

The FR milieu I have loved for so long, that WAS very closely represented here on the this MUD
cannot weather such a deformation of its nature, without changing the names, people and places to something else other than FR originated lore. The problem with evils not being able to get acceptable groups lies within the people that play the game...not the game.
If you want that to change, then the pbase motivations have to change. The game should not be altered to adapt to you, you have to change to adapt to the environment. Not change the environment to facilitate you. Challenge and overcoming it is the greatest reward. Gather your evil minions and conquer what is. Captain Kirk's approach at beating the Kobiyashi-Maru is still cheating. The game is already something it was never intended. Monty Haul approaches DO exist here, the same approaches that have been documented and tried to save campaigns are failing and will continue to fail,( as documented in countless articles and eureka and explanantion by the RPG developers over the last 30 years). Ever increasingly powerful EQ will not save it. Making it easier will not save it. Making fights easier will not save it, making things harder, ceasement to coddling of the pbase might save it...the real rewards of RPG are defeating HARD challenges, overcoming extreme adversity, accomplishing a task/quest or zone, not defined by how long it takes but the fact that you defeated it at all are the best rewards of RPG, if you do not know how these things feel, its not your fault, but YOU ARE missing out on the highest most satisfying rewards RPG has to offer. As has been said before all of us have evilrace chars, if you cant get people to commit to logging them and trying to do something together (isnt that why evil always loses to begin with?) its ultimately the players fault, not the design mechanisms in the game. Buck up, suck it up...log in your evils, group your evils, laugh in the face of death (even when you cant see it) Quit trying to take the easy road, when you succeed you WILL feel a reward better than any piece of eq can give you.
I promise.


Not sure that you are seeing the issue correctly. Maybe you should try leveling an evilrace char to 50. Maybe you should level 9 of them, lead a guild (or anything for that matter), try for many years to zone regularly to satisfy the constant loss of your ranks to the goodrace side, before finallly giving up, defeated, only to roll humans from that point on just so you no longer have to deprive yourself of the full game too. Had countless good times and good adventures in small group evil raids back in the day, but if thats all the game becomes and you are missing out on the rest of it, whats the point?

That post slapped me in the face and pissed me off. But it shouldn't have, because a person with only one 50th level goodrace character and no evils has absolutely no idea what this discussion is about, and should have no place giving speeches as shown above.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Kegor » Wed Aug 26, 2009 3:44 pm

Cordan wrote:The one problem i see is some evils possibly getting mad because the goodies don't drag them along because of dayblind. They'll just have to get over that.


Yes this is true. Ultravision races would be of lesser value for a lot of zones. Nobody would get mad about not getting to bring an ultravision race to certain zones, because it beats the hell out of collecting dust in the inn, only getting to zone once every couple months at best.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby ssar » Tue Dec 01, 2009 11:32 pm

I voted yes - only open to the idea in a limited sense.
Mainly cuz with the pbase so low, evilr chars very rarely get to stretch thier muscles with zoneage these days.
Perhaps somewhat regular events (for a week duration at a time) where these restrictions are lifted.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Dalar » Fri Dec 04, 2009 2:03 am

Shevarash, please comment.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby amena wolfsnarl » Fri Dec 04, 2009 3:49 am

i believe he went on record as saying hes not opposed to this but would require some reworking of code or something for grouping.
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Re: Poll - removal Good / Evil group restrictions

Postby Kegor » Mon Dec 07, 2009 2:15 am

1.) Half of the players don't sympathize with this issue.
2.) The damage has already been done (divided the MUD years ago and helped expediate the main playerbase decline along with games like EQ and WoW).
3.) Humans grouping both ways helped a little, but only delayed the inevitable.
4.) Evils do not need to zone regularly, or at all, for the MUD to continue on (this is a proven fact).
5.) This is one of the most dead horses that has ever been beat and not too many people care anymore.
6.) The people that quit over it long ago probably wouldn't come back anyways.

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