| Subject: The State of Faalor Address (long, and not for the weak-stomached) |
Author:
Lee
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Date Posted: 18:13:04 08/15/02 Thu
The state of Faalor with a few long and rambling preparatory words, by Lee B. (not to be confused with the Faalorian NPC would runs around behind adventuring parties pretending to be invisible).
When I first began to seriously consider putting a NWN campaign together last year, I came to the table with a set of assumptions and expectations and hopes and dreams. Hopefully, I can enumerate them here and give you a sense of where I think and hope “Faalor” will be heading.
I was sick of UO and no longer could count it as an environment even marginally conducive to role-playing. Without a doubt, we gave it a shot, trudging headstrong against the doods, PK’s, semi-rp’ers (like Phantom Menace, the Byzantines, Ghaelon’s goons among others), and whiny children who COULD RP but insisted on crossing the line (the classic “Why doesn’t Vlondril like me?!?!” and “I’m bored, entertain me, but I refuse to contribute to anything to the guild, group or community”). UO had no realistic structure to it in terms of natural laws—especially when Trammel opened up. The most annoying thing, aside from how terribly impossible it was for someone to die, was how often important PC’s would “sleep” for months on end, leaving important plots and events dangling.
NWN was the answer to these and many other problems because we could choose who we played with. We didn’t have to share our worlds with annoying people who wouldn’t or couldn’t buy into what we were trying to do. (Speaking primarily about creating a consistent world or guild—“Can I be a good Priestess of Llolth drow bard who frolics in the woods with the Glamervelt and talks smack to the face of the Ilharess?” . . . don’t laugh, it happened a lot.) In NWN, a DM can control exactly what kind of PC gets to join his/her game. What a breath of fresh air that would be, I thought.
NWN is one awesome game what I’ve been able to dig into it. Scripting, while not a breeze by any stretch of the imagination, is quite easy, especially for a code-thief like myself. I think the classes/feats/skills are pretty balanced, though, of course, there’s room for abuse, but what can you do. The opportunity for quality RP’ing is exceptional, IF Bioware can fix a few things (that’s the subject of yet another magna opus).
With the experience, I had with folks in UO, I decided to choose a small minority of good role-players from the endless sea of doods and . . . well, morons.(1) All in all, I’m pleased with my choices. Only had a few misunderstandings, and, well, like I said from the beginning, my style of DM’ing/gaming will not be compatible with everyone else’s even folks I really enjoy, respect and care about.
Unfortunately, I was having a bit of communication problem with many (perhaps most of you). It’s almost a generational or cultural thing, I suppose. There’s no moral judgment implied here; I just grew up playing RP game BEFORE the computer was a household appliance, when we had to role dice or move cardboard chits around a two-dimensional map. We would sit together, around a table and see each others’ faces; with UO, we were able to separate ourselves from each other, hidden behind our characters’ names, and roast each other on the forums like first grade bullies. With table-top, we all came together at one time to play, being late was a major transgression, both disruptive and discourteous; with UO, you can show up, when and where you wanted—the world would always be there regardless of whether anyone else’s characters were “awake”. And, with the variety of Doom and Diablo games—games that were often marketed as “role-playing” games—out there, it was easy enough for folks to get confused about what RP’ing was and carry that over to the UO experience. I’m not saying that you guys can’t tell the difference between RP and non-RP, nothing quite that fundamental. I’m just saying, that I made some assumptions, that may not be correct. I take full responsibility for not being able to communicate my wishes and vision for Faalor properly (so, I’ll begin to do that here and now).
Now that I’ve offending you, youngin’s . . . let me get back to Faalor.
Faalor was conceived two decades ago. This incarnation was to be very different, I wanted other people to contribute to it’s creation. Unfortunately, I was hit and miss about what that meant. What I had hoped was that folks would, in the time BEFORE NWN came out would write up backgrounds, history, NPCs, and help add them to the “world”. With that said, I didn’t want to put any pressure on anyone to help and I definitely didn’t want to have to create some detailed list of specific NPCs or areas/towns/places that folks had to work on (if I had been that specific, I would just do it myself). I was happy with the work folks put into it—Eve for helping to shape the religious/worldview to start with, Mike for submitting NPCs, Justin for his story, among others. But, to be perfectly honest, the work the DM’s have been doing has been spotty at best; we either really need to get together on things or let me just do it (more on that below). I certainly don’t blame anyone for this. We all have real lives and sometimes that just gets in the way of play time. We all have very different styles of work. And we all have different strengths. I am prepared to work with everyones’ strengths and attempt to avoid their weaknesses.
What the DM’s are up to: Eve is doing some major planning as we speak. She will have the honors of putting on one of the two first major plots. What little I’ve seen of it, it sounds like it will be very good. Rob is learning scripting and working on the evil party prelude and Shaun will primarily be our possess-the-NPC man, though he has also the beginnings of an excellent story-hook worked out. I’ve got the unenviable job of keeping the ball in play. I’ve got the second major plot arch sketched out but not fleshed out; I’ve been waiting to get through some mini-campaigns to tell just what is possible in NWN before I dive into that.
Mini-campaigns: I understand, Eve’s campaign didn’t get off the ground due to time constraints, and I’m not sure if she plans on picking it up again. I’d really like to see someone else create and host some games, either one shot deals, mini-campaigns or full-fledged campaigns of their own. That’s just not for selfish reasons; I know I can’t entertain everyone and I know my style may not be the best for everyone. There’s also the issue of timing as well (another issue to be address below) as some folks will definitely be able to make it to games I wouldn’t.
So far, my little campaign has been a blast with the exception of some glaring and embarrassing technical glitches in the DM client. I mean, come on, the damn monsters were ATTACKING ME! Now, that’s a switch! And that Undead Thing nearly killed ME! Geeze. (“I’m tired of this campaign, let’s go PK the DM and loot his azz!”) I’m learning quite a bit from your feedback.
Now, for the potential campaign-breaking issue: game session time. Faalor cannot be a persistent world. I don’t want a persistent world and I don’t think NWN can handle a persistent world-state without a lot of work—more work than I would ever think about putting into a game. Besides, we don’t have enough folks to make it work anyway. For most realistic campaigns, everyone would have to be on at the same time. I don’t want plots to “break” because such and such can’t make it. There just has to be a consistent player-base for this to work. That doesn’t mean folks have to be to every single game, but 90% , they do. This has always weighed heavily on the back on my mind.
I kinda put myself in a bit of bind on this, and I’m feeling mildly guilty about it. Last year, or was that two years ago, when I quit UO for the “first” time, I decided to get more involved in real life. I volunteered for some church activities and actually liked seeing real people (not that you guys aren’t real . . . unless you’re all part of the computer-collective impersonating real human beings . . .) face to face. I still have those obligations I need to meet for my own sanity. So that means a rotating schedule at church on the weekends and on some Wednesday nights. I also decided to get off my lazy ass and get a job, which will take up two weekday nights (Tuesday and Thursday). On top of that, I’ve invited two or three Europeans and me and a couple other players are West Coast (North America), which separates us by, what, 8 or 9 hours. The responses I’ve gotten back to my ICQ about times have been well, like this:
“Any day but Monday”
“I’m available on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday nights”
“I can only play ‘til 7 Eastern.”
“I can only after 8 Eastern.”
There’s not even a single time convenient time when all the DMs can show up together really either. As you can imagine, it’s rather disheartening. I fear that, in the end, I will have to pick a time that works for me and say come if you can. That will undoubtedly force some of you out of the campaign as it were. This saddens me to no end frankly. We’ll make a decision on game times the first part of September.
At any rate, I hope we’ll be doing some more mini-campaign things ‘til school gets well underway (I start the last week of September). I’m really enjoying them. AND SOMEONE ELSE HAS TO MAKE A MODULE SO I CAN BE PLAYER IN A MULTI-PLAYER GAME!!!!
Notes (you bloody well better have notes with an essay THIS long)
(1) Not that I have anything against doods or morons, it’s just that doods who can’t tell the difference between RP and RL and morons who THINK they can RP but wouldn’t know RP’ing if it bit them in ass, just aren’t folks I want to play with. I enjoy playing with true PK’s and true doods, who realize that it’s just a game and are playing it the way they want to CONSISTENTLY
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