One Week Anniversary: How's it going so far?

[lovethesuit]

It's been one week since we hit Zero, and the big announcement about EfU:A. There has been controversy, bugs, glitches, lag deaths. There have also been mysteries both short and long term, exceptional character concepts, exhilarating quests, diverse social dynamics, teams beyond the Good and Evil, and overall a strong feeling that survival itself is our most imposing foe.

I spent about 1 1/2 hours hiding the basement of a building at 4hp, because Nightrisers had chased me and a buddy in. When the sun came up and they still hadn't left, he ran to get help. It ended with a fierce battle with two somewhat minor monsters, who nonetheless left three of us at less than 5hp and with no healing to speak of. Dude.

Personally, I feel like I'm in the earliest days of EfU, from what I've been told about those times by those who were there. When I see an item with one shot of light healing, I'm ecstatic because it could be the difference between life and death.

In this week, what awesome moments have you experienced, and where do you think it's headed?

[OMGbearisdriving]

On my first day with an actual character, within 3 hours I got invovled in a serious plot to form a government, ended up being at the sight of one faction massacring another and escaping after pwncritting one in the face, and drinkin an invis as i got subdued (and later escaping) and coming tantalizingly close to being in a brawl for all with said faction and a rather large pitchfork mob.

all in day 1. at level 3.

other than that it is an awful lot like the beginning of efu. i barely have any money, any healing, and am hoping to make it to lvl 4 so i can enchant my own weapon briefly. im happy as a clam

[SkillFocuspwn]

Although I'm a week late, just exploring Ymph is absolutely incredible! The island is massive, with so much to kill you.

[Garem]

It's amazing. The only problem with EfU:A is that I'm playing too damned much. On a related note, taking a day or two off so I don't sell my soul away. So yes, it's that good.

[Sternhund]

It's going pretty awesome, and I have hardly touched EFUA at all! I'm glad you guys are enjoying it, but as well as the good, what's the bad? (Beside bug fixes and other toolset errors, which will be hashed out shortly.) I know we had some negative criticism when EfU first ended. How are we feeling about it now?

[lovethesuit]

I always seem to log in just as night time is starting, or in the middle of it. It's bad luck really, but does it annoy me that I haven't explored the island as much as I'd like to yet.

Also, more than a few times when getting groups together for quests, there's too many people, even with a character limit of 8. So inevitably somebody makes a different selection, cuts the group down to 8 excluding the original quest organizer, and goes off to pwn a quest. Which is fine for me 'cause I still go along, but it sucks when there's 10 people on top of the ziggurat and 8 people can go on the newb quests.

Finally, there's nothing going on with the Underdark anymore. It bums me out significantly. If that weren't the exact opposite direction that my character was aiming, I'd do something about it.

[illuminaughty]

Playing too much. Make less fun plz.

[IxTheSpeedy]

I think most people are rocking out quite well.  My only problem as of now when compared to EFU is that since I can't play for more than a couple of hours a few times a week, I can't seem to get involved with much as apposed to EFU where I could when just playing that much.  I think it's because all the organizations haven't been built yet.  They need effort to build and people are busy doing so.  That's it.  I can't really complain about it though.  I mean how cool is it that the playerbase basically gets to participate largely in creating all the factions?

[Letsplayforfun]

It's really neat.

I was looking forward to getting a feel of the atmosphere of the module. I was a bit frustrated because i logged mostly at nightime, and that cut exploration short.

But as soon as day rose... wow!

As for the main course, even if i'm not much of a builder or a human relations' guy, it's really cool to see people starting a settlement from scratch. Makes people feel really involved, and lvl is not an issue imbalancing factions.

Great work, and still going!

[Garem]

"It's going pretty awesome, and I have hardly touched EFUA at all!" -Sternhund

Coincidence?

[Jayde Moon]

It's good.  I really like the concept and I'm having a good time with my new PC.  I've done 3 quests, but I've been RPing a bit.

Harder to get a hold on anything, we did the Nightriser Quest last night and really felt like we were in a tense, tactical situation (despite a couple WTFs, like a tough baddy running right through our entire 7 or 8 party to whack at our lowest HP member)

[dragonfire9000]

Oh wow, reactions to the new server... wondrous!

The Good: I love the survivalist feel, especially when you're either doing a quest with two or three people and have to really think, or when you're doing a really big hard quest with more people and have to be mindful of tactics. Also, the thought that I could just post something on the forums, posterlike, saying that I want to start the standing military or the next War Wizards or something like that... frankly, it's amazing! I mean, I could start a bloody noble house if I wanted to, claim a castle, and have a DM faction two years later! Actually, let's keep it Player Faction. ;) Wouldn't want you all-powerful types messing it up!

The Bad: Simply because EfU:A is amazing and everyone wants to get in on the ground floor, there is a lot of overcrowding. I don't even log on at the real high-traffic times, and there is a great deal of lag. Also there are some minor balance issues and bugfixes that need to happen, but that will come with time.

The Ugly: Your MOM!

[petey512]

I think it's great! A few quests popping up in the actual underdark would be nice, but that's about all there is that strikes me as wrong!

I havn't felt the survivalist thing yet, but I think that's because Iv'e been getting really really lucky drops in loot.

[djspectre]

Got a chance to meet the Elders of the only "neutral" halfling tribe on the islands that we've encountered. Found out some IC bits of our history here through DM interaction. And in a single day, had no less than 3 different DM's lead us on quests while we were exploring around in a single session of game plays!

Where do I think it's going? Well I honestly find myself less 'worried' ICly because it looks like we are all okay. The underdark provided the 'fish-out-of-water' experience for all of us. All the characters would run from beasts of the underdark. here, its the surface, there is no universal fear like that.

I'll see how it goes, been okay so far, but not spectacular like I felt the previous version of the module was.

[Lorloth]

There are things I truly love and there are things that are driving me to distraction.

The things I love I think are things that will grow with time.  The things I hate are things I hope will fade, but things I think it important to note.

-----------------------------------------------------

PROS:

* Exploring the wilds of the server.  This is a very well built module.  People obviously spent a lot of time on it and it shows.  There's a good bit of lore that seems to be burried around out there as well.  I'm eager to see it.

* The player-driven plot, such that it is so far.  It's been an interesting thing to take part in.  Anarchy, in all of its utter misery and confusion, has produced some interesting RP so far.  It comes in fits and starts, though.  After the heavily DM-driven plotline to close EfU, there's also some refreshing freedom to it.  That wears in time, though (as I'll cover below).

* The occassional DM spice. Rare, but it happens.  I also appreciate that the staff is busily debugging a lot of stuff right now and it's draining on time and resources.  Especially after the 'all hands on deck' period for the wrap-up of EfU, this has got to be testing the adrenaline reserves of your staff.  The fact that we see DM's on right now responding to all of the hickups you get with a new product after how much energy has already been poured into this is frankly impressive.

-----------------------------------------------------

CONS:

* It's starting to feel a bit like why I quit WoW and that's not why I came to EfU.  That sounds harsh and it is.  But I quit WoW the first time when I realized I had played the same dungeons over and over and over to the point where they were no longer interesting and in pursuit of a goal that seemed to remain perpetually out of reach.

Given the current state of EfU:A, most of us seem to log in... run Trogs, run Ghouls, run goblins, run nightrisers, and maybe we get through all of those before a reset.  One way or the other, on average once per two days, you are going to die to something completely random, cheesy, and outside of your control.  This will set you back a couple levels and you will start back at the same spot on the next reset.

Rinse. Repeat.

Same quests.  Same sequence.  Every reset.  Over and over.

I think this cycle has only been encouraged by two factors:

1. The pervasive feeling that without higher levels and more gear, each "side" of the various IC conflicts will be unable to face each other.  Rather than engaging in these conflicts directly, each party now seems engaged in a rinse repeat powerquesting arms race.

2. The lack of DM-driven plots.  I'm amazed that DM staff has had the energy to run such a blockbuster series of plots to wrap up EfU and yet still have the energy to launch a new server with all of its exacting demands on debugging, quest balancing, and endless complaints and requests from players without all of you becoming certifiable.  It's impressive - really.  I also know our feedback after the end-of-EfU plot was that it seemed very railroaded (and it was).  All of those are caveats to this point.

One of the results, however, is an empty space in which player-run activity is either doing well (there are cases of this) or is naturally petering out in favor of the questgrind.

The reason that's important is that you can find the sort of RP people do on quests or in predictable drama conflicts on almost any server - and most of them are vastly less frustrating to level on.  For a time, the sheer beauty and work that has gone into building EfU:A will engross you and distract you from this, but after doing the same quest over and over in a futile attempt to progress to other content, it becomes less of a dazzlingly hypnotic distraction and more of a chore.

EfU's niche is in building narratives that are compelling and vibrant.  It achieves this by making the risks and opportunities in those conflicts -real- (unlike most servers) and by providing a setting rich with compelling conflicts and stories from which those narratives are drawn.

Whether or not the party can beat the bosses of each dungeon consistently for several resets so you can gain that elusive next level without randomly or cheesily dying somewhere to something beyond your control is not a compelling conflict and does not build a compelling narrative.

Where the conflicts we've been building are really sort of dull right now, whether because they're "on hold" for the questgrinding arms race or simply formulaic and predictable to start with, there'a vacuum for something to come along and generate some real conflict.