I love the idea of starting in the Archipelago as a shipwreck victim, and it occurred to me that making a "scripted quest" out of such a beginning would be possible, at least from what I have seen of the quests on EFU:A and the recent improvements in the server's AI.
The basic notion here is that players who have a group concept arriving by ship could take a quest starting from the welcome area, a random situation could be determined much like the voyage system, and from there a scripted quest that begins on ship and involves likely a storm, the Mist, or pirate attack ensues. Players receive experience and equipment equivalent to the typical "lowbie circuit" and after swashbuckling their way through numerous areas ship-board, interior, and underwater, reach the quest ending and stumble sputtering up onto the beach where the current shipwreck spawn option would otherwise deposit them.
I understand the current delivery chain is in place to familiarize new players with the setting, and provide a quick route to establishing our new characters as members of the Colony for those of us who are already familiar with the basic setting information. What this prelude might allow for is characters to skip the chain of deliveries that basically lead up to, "Hey, you ought to go register as a citizen." in favor of arriving, having somebody just tell them they might want to register, and then getting into the mix with the established characters after a bit of excitement to kick off the concept.
Edit: Forgot to mention it should probably be permanent death. It seems unlikely that you're going to end up in the mortuary after getting eaten by a shark out at sea.
Awesome.
Quote from: Random_White_Guy;122474Awesome.
I love this idea.
As long as it's not optional, sure. But I think the encounters should be fairly easy, or there should be an option to skip them altogether.
Neat. "Just another QA", but great for introducing groups.