Civil Disobedience [Trolling Welcomed]

[Drakill Tannan]

After reading the post above, i have to agree, thigs seem biassed towards team blue only because team red decides so.

But i think it is important to note that a group of low level characters must have really good DM support or have exelent timing to defeat a goup of high level characters. Otherwise mechanics count too much.

Wich means a team that powerquests untill all it's members are level 8 against a group that has dedicated most of it's time to build weapons and plan strategies, the high level team will always have the edge in the fact that they can simply kill the other team to solve the conflict, the other team cannot.

So even if "red team's" RP was better, "Blue team" will win when it comes to the conflict most of the time.

Broken? don't think so. It makes sence the group that has dedicated itself to hoard supplies for war and training their soldiers wins. Regardless, this is a RP server and the focus should be roleplay. I don't like sitting and typing all day, i'd rather go questing, but thouse who plan and roleplay a lot should get i bigger rewards, how much is to DM discrecion.

Would that solve it? I really don't know. I presonally don't like to depend on DMs to solve everything.

[Thomas_Not_very_wise]

Heh.

Let me give my sentiments.

My playing my wild orc crew, we made EFFORTS to be MONSTERS SINCE DAY 1.

Guess what, gank squad came four days later after we mugged some folks. We never even got close to level 4.

What RwG says is true on some things, you ought to power quest to level 6 and then start conflicts, but really, who the fuck thinks that is fun?

IMO, real players push plots from day one and go down fighting like real men.

[Box]

I only bothered to read RwG's post so this might have already been said.


Proactive characters die fast, get ganked by the reactive players.


But at the same time, it is the reactive players who whine and bitch about never having DM loot and never getting DM quests when compared to the proactive players, coining them 'DM Pets' and forcing them to quest their asses off so they can have supplies and XP on par with the DM granted rewards.


It is a slippery slope.

[Caddies]

You can bin all this garbage talk about 'Red vs Blue', it doesn't make any sense. All the PvP on EFU:A is usually the result of complex character interactions. Its the clash of goals and philosophies usually that spawns PvP, rather than some simple minded red vs blue mentality. Its just an inaccurate description.

As for the post/thread, I don't really understand it. It just seems to be alot of players blathering on without any focus or points being made.

Do you die more often if you're proactive than reactive? Yes. But that goes without saying.

There is no problem with questing alot so long as you (ideally) back it all up with pursuing involving goals. Those who quest alot and do nothing besides engage in some boring RP will generally be ignored by DMs.

Ganksquads are a feature, and can't be avoided if you've made a yourself a target. Sadly they usually involve a bunch of reactive characters who don't do much, but thats just how it is.

If you play alot, and take the time to really master the mechanics of NWN and PvP, you can reach a state where you can be proactive and still feel very confident that you can overcome most forces that come at you. The worst thing for me is seeing very proactive players like Scalebane and RwG suffer early deaths because they are mechanically inept. Get to know NWN, or at the least recruit someone who has, and you'll see your chances of pushing your agenda rise dramatically.

[Kiaring]

Personally, I use TheNaga.

[Kiaring]

Let me just go ahead and say this. I used to be a big fan of threads like this whenever I died and felt like I wasn't able to accomplish anything at all. Let me just say that Caddies' advice is extremely sound; to add to that, let me throw in a bit of my own: Be patient. Know what you can accomplish with the power you have at any given time. People will not think you are 'less awesome' if you refuse to PvP the entire server, even if your character is supposed to be the GREAT DREAD EVIL OF THE SAND CAVERNS or whatever. At the same time, no one will respect you, if you stand at the back plinking a crossbow at sand spiders or trogs. Be daring, but don't be stupid. Be ruthless, not impatient. And most of all, just enjoy yourself, it is a motherfucking game ffs.

[Random_White_Guy]

Some very interesting points brought up.

The notion that EFU can be brought down to teams may have been my fault in talking about villains and heroes and law and criminal, but for the most part its non existent. Every faction, every group, and hell even every PC can be seen as a self-involved party. They'll fight, they'll argue, they'll tussle. Having played on the Ixpadian side for most of the quest I can assure you they in fought, as did the stygians and sharboneth fight each other.

This just came up as a reflection of my last PC, which was fairly antagonistic, but probably about 60% of my short time IC was spent running various quests for supplies and other things in hopes of surviving another day. That got me thinking about EFU and all that business, and thus the rant.

To be honest I think Strife's post on the first page summarized pretty accurately.

[Samo]

I know exactly why all of this is as it is. It's because EFU is a brilliant idea built on bad bedrock.

To understand what I'm about to be talking about one really needs to read this: http://www.indie-rpgs.com/_articles/system_does_matter.html

EFU is built on NWN, which in turn is built on the ruleset for DnD 3.5. Most everyone here is probably already aware of this. But what kind of system is DnD or NWN really? Let's start with DnD.

DnD is, and always has been, without question, a GAMIST game. I've been playing since 2nd edition, but I've also gone back and played some first edition, but regardless of which edition you are using the design philosophy has always been the same, that is to say, gamist. The bulk of the rules are about combat resolution. Seriously. If you have access to a rulebook flip through it and count how many pages are devoted to some aspect of combat resolution. Now count how many are devoted to story, role playing a character with depth, social rules mechanics, etc. See what I mean? DnD has NEVER been about telling a good story or accurately simulating situations. If you have been involved in a game which has done either of these, good for you! Your DM was obviously a keeper because he sure as hell didn't succeed at doing so due to any help from the ruleset. DND is not simulationist and it certainly is NOT narrative.

Now let's talk about NWN. NWN is a game which VERY faithfully follows the DND 3.5 ruleset. And that's its problem. As far as video games go, DND (and by extention NWN) isn't even a particularly GOOD system on which to base a gamist game. If you want hardcore questing, group combat, phat loot, and overall interesting and engaging combat dynamics, well, NWN is about the last game I'd ever choose. WoW does a WAY better job of delivering all that. Seriously, even if you don't like WoW in particular you have to admit that at least its design philosophy is on the mark. It's a gamist game, it doesn't really pretend to be otherwise, it's based on tabletop RPGs like DND, but no more so than any other CRPG. Its designers took those few things that were good about such systems, discarded the rest and then built up their own system from there. I can't even compare the experience of playing a warrior on WoW vs. playing one in NWN. For those are aren't familiar with WoW let me break down the differences for you:

WoW - Click on the enemy to begin attacking, since I'm the tank I hit him with Devestate a few times to make sure I've got aggro, hit him with Rend to have some damage over time happening, oh shit it's a spellcaster, hit him with a Shield Bash to interrupt and silence him for a few seconds, got a second enemy coming up from behind use Thunder Clap to get him to aggro me and maintain aggro on the first guy at the same time, now let's drop a Demoralizing Shout to bring down their damage, might as well drop a Battle Shout while I'm at it, oh shit that second guy is going after the mage now, use Taunt to get him attacking me again, alright now let's hit him with Devestate a few times and then Thunder Clap again, just about got him, let's finish him with Revenge and then Shield Slam, ok, he's down, now let's finish that other guy...

NWN - Click on the enemy to begin attacking, sit back and watch as the computer handles the archaic game mechanics of rolling initiative, rolling for attack, rolling for damage if there's a hit and then wait for the next combat round, no seriously, your character just stands there waiting for his next combat round, meanwhile you go get something to drink while the combat plays out entirely in accordance with the luck of the dice throws and your character's combat stats which are almost entirely based on level.

Ok, ok, I know sometimes there's a bit more to it than that... You might have to down a potion or two. So hit F5... wait... wait some more... ok HP are down some hit F5 again, wait... etc.

As far as engaging combat dynamics NWN and pretty much any other game that utilizes the DND ruleset is a massive, steaming pile of fail. If I want to go do group questing and be pretty well assured of having a good time I can hop on WoW and go get involved in a 5 man dungeon. If not WoW then there are plenty of other interesting and engaging gamist RPGs and at least one of them is likely to suit your tastes.

I would never recommend NWN as a good gamist RPG. But how does it do as a platform for something like EFU which is clearly an attempt to create a narrative RP environment? "Fail" would be too kind.

If I were to take apart NWN and examine to code for it I would guess that the overwhelming majority of it would be dedicated to combat resolution. Not surprising considering its origins. There are simply too damn few tools for social interaction. Even WoW has more tools than this crapfest. Your ability to create emote macros or speech macros is severely limited, in part by the character limit for macros in general, you only get 24 action buttons for any macros you do create (and they have to share them will all other actions, sucks if you're a spellcaster). There are damned few animations, voice emotes, appearance options, clothing options, class customization options. And though NWN is highly moddable there are still limits to how far one can go with it, I mean, at the end of the day it's still NWN. This doesn't help EFU anyway because it prides itself and using no hakpaks (great for new player accessibility, bad for game dynamics, vanilla NWN is simply teh suck).

The point I've been driving toward is that EFU is attempting to mix two incompatible type of gaming: Gamist and Narrativist. Many different people have made a lot of commentary on the deficiencies of EFU, but I don't think anyone has ever really nailed the underlying problem 100%. I'm convinced that the problem is this incompatibility of underlying design philosophy. EFU is trying really hard to be a narrativist game, but it's constantly hampered by its platform.

For instance, much debate has taken place on the subject of suitable character death. The ultimate conclusion that always seems to be reached is: "It's just part of EFU, suck it up and deal with it". Why does it come to this conclusion? Because combat and death are about the most interesting things that the underlying game engine allows for, and most people want interesting stuff to be happening, they want drama. While combat and death can be great sources of drama they are not the only sources, nor even the best sources.

Imagine Lord of the Rings EFU style...

There's Frodo and Sam trying to sneak across Mordor wearing orc armor to blend in, they come upon a column of orcs marching to the Black Gate who see them and drag them into the column to join them on their march. They start a mock fight with one another as a ruse to escape in the ensuing chaos, a big fight erupts and they try to slip away but fail their sneak roll, so orc archers shoot them in the back, take the ring to Sauron and the land is covered in darkness for the next thousand years. The End.

Now... who wants to read THAT goddamned book? No one I know. But that's what EFU is, a series of characters playing out a story in which most of said characters are killed off before their story is concluded, sometimes before their story is even really started, and often time due to stupid shit that would never survive the editing process of any decent book/movie/tv show/video game/comic book/etc. And for some regulars here this fact is worn like some sort of twisted badge of honor, for others the number of permadeaths they are involved in is how they "win at EFU".

And the reason for all of this? Because combat and death are about the most interesting things that can happen. This game engine doesn't allow for much more. Yet many of us play for that tiny bit more that CAN be done, for us being part of a long running story rich in non-combat elements IS the interesting part.

Character death is not the worst thing that can happen to a character in a good story.

Some people may not fully get that, so I shall repeat it:

CHARACTER DEATH IS NOT THE WORST THING THAT CAN HAPPEN TO A CHARACTER IN A GOOD STORY!!!!!11eleven

But in a gamist game, it is. For the simple reason that you're now out of the game. And for some people this is enough.

For those who enjoy gamist RPGs I recommend WoW you'll have a lot better time than grinding the scripted quests of EFU. If you really want a harsh penalty for character death (or you're just a masochist) try EVE Online.

For those of us who enjoy Narrativist RPGs I'm sorry to say that we seem to be a minority. I haven't really seen many alternatives to EFU, flawed as it is. Ideally EFU should be transplanted to another game with mechanics more favorable to creating dynamic stories (something without levels, classes, more types of non combat interaction, etc.), but I know of no other game out there that would be suitable. Most RPGs these days tend to be either gamist or single player RPGs which just put you at the center of a big scripted plotline. There's not really much else that has any equivalent to DM tools either.

Sadly, this is what we got to work with. Nothing to be done except make the most of it.

/$0.02

[Kiaring]

EfU is a place where story comes before system. It actually (for me, at least) overcomes the (admittedly terrible) limitations of the engine it is built upon to deliver a superior storytelling experience.


Text is the basis of everything. As for combat being such a huge part of things, welcome to FR, DnD, roleplaying games and games in general.

[Caddies]

NWN isn't as bad as you make it out to be. If it was so simplistic why are most people, after -years- of playing it, still awful at it?

[Joe Desu]

I am still awful at it!
Oh wait that is not what this is about.
 
I enjoy spending time in EFUA as it is more interesting than watching TV, whether I am questing or RPing.  I do not know who the powerquesters are, I do not know who the red team or blue team is.  I just know the characters I meet and immerse myself in the world.  
 
Sometimes I have more fun than others.  I wish I had more time to cause some havoc and make plots come to life, but I don't.  I generally have long living characters because I cannot think of interesting enough plots to get me killed or I am not online when exciting things are afoot.
 
Does all of this bother me, not really.  As long as I find at least a few fun people to hang with and hide from annoying folk than I think all is fair in love and war.

[TheImpossibleDream]

Personally, I use TheNaga.

[Mort]

@RWG: You're probably right. The time that you take the risks and get notice by a DM that has the time to properly reward you... You'll likely be dead by then.

But... I dont know how the state are right now, but back in my days, your nemesis didn't necessairly kill you at the first opportunity he got.

Strong protagonists usually ignored weak antagonists to give them a sporting chance and vice versa. I wouldn't say that the longer you play a character, the more loot you have, the more successful you are... The important part is to have fun and I can get that by:

 - Challenging Quests/Adventurers
 - Mild Roleplay Session about really mundane stuff where you just define your character and make them clash with others. It's really evasion where if you have an ounce of actor's blood in you and some creativity in description, you can really create unique, memorable and interesting characters.
 - Player vs. Player confrontation where you REALLY dont know the outcome and you are really anxious about it. It provides both Eustress if you succeed, bad stress if you dont succeed, but that Eustress is really addictive and its what makes people try and try again despite failing 97% of the time in pvp '_'

But really... if you focus only one of those, you're missing something BiG. I mean, its not every day that I want to login and be anxious whether I'll lose my char or not, those days I focus on mild roleplay, challenge quests and so on... and you mix it.

Roleplay, succeeding at challenges should be their own rewards and you get the occassional praise from others that keep you pumped.

[UnholyWon]

But... I dont know how the state are right now, but back in my days, your nemesis didn't necessairly kill you at the first opportunity he got.

Strong protagonists usually ignored weak antagonists to give them a sporting chance and vice versa. I wouldn't say that the longer you play a character, the more loot you have, the more successful you are..

Those words speak volumes of the history of EFU (I left the 'A" off on purpose) that has made this server "GREAT" that has lead to some amazing moments.

[Egon the Monkey]

Try some condepts that'll lead to non-lethal PVP? My run-ins with the Bog Boys on Merristan were a lot of fun. Him and his dwarf thug Koili just kicked the shit out of and taunted them in mass brawls, arranged via shit-talk in the sending system. I think we could use a few *less* ruthless PCs. Ones who would meet insult with insult or fists, not duels to the death or drive-by Icestorming. PCs who aim for low-grade hooliganism over massive battles, who have a political opponent framed with slander as opposed to assassinated. Maybe even recruit OOC for members of two opposing gangs and run organised subdual fights with clubs and knives.
 
The problem is it requires control on both sides, the ability to not think "any conflict ends in FD". I think that a strong "guard" faction might pay dividends on this if PCs become hesitant about murder due to it being risky. Right now, if you gank somone in a cheap disguise and get clear, you're smelling of roses.
 
If there was a tendency for supervising DMs to introduce "clues" or Npc witnesses that could lead to people being tracked down potentially later, we might see more drawn out tension as opposed to "Well, we'll never know who did it now" or "boom, you're a fugitive".