Unpopular Opinion

[The Aya]

Where is EfU going?

Another one of those threads concerned about the fate of EfU. Where are / are we even going? Just a thread that is intended to be a place where people could be brutally honest about their thoughts and feelings and what EfU's priorities should be recalibrated to.


Now, I'm not sure about you, but what makes me think favorably on EfU are those plots that you can really sink your teeth into and get hooked on and you feel like you have a stake in the game, for your faction, for your allies, against your enemies, some goal, whatever. That's what makes this Neverwinter Nights server have actual meaning for me and is why I choose to spend my free time to continue playing on it.


so what are the problems?

My thoughts are that, during roughly the past year (12 months) or so, we had about 3-4 months of total DMing activity and plots that actually mattered in terms of having an end result and shaping or changing the server in some way. To me, that's not really acceptable.

-Howland is a great man for everything that he's done for the server and continues to do through maintaining it, though it seems that his priorities are not in developing EFU story or plot-wise nor has there been much indication that he will return to lead the charge. In fact, when he has returned to eager players and DMs, in my eyes he's left a lot of what could be great and interesting server-changing plots open-ended and unfinished with almost no results, which has been a big letdown to myself personally.

I think one of the biggest issues that EFU faces is the narcissistic tendencies that the EFU DM social club tends to exhibit. The ugly side of things. Some of these include:

-Contributing to DM burnout of other DMs via: plotblocking / personal vendettas / random drama / whatever
-maintaining the old guard phenomenon when it comes to appointing new DMs, voting on applications / SoIs while simultaneously not appearing to hold any priorities in contributing to the growth and development of the server.
-Some other toxic DM trait or environment that has led to the disappearance of new or great DMs who suddenly started playing other games (or servers), some of whom I've had personal conversations with and have attested to these kinds of behaviors.


Wrapping up soon:

EFU is an alright pasttime when there's not much going on (at times great, when you need those plot breaks). There's fun scripted quests to do, there's conflict and PvP, there's the smallish (and growing smaller!) memey player community, and there's still the small personal player-made plots you can involve yourself in or create that can be fun and interesting (but meaningless in the big picture or direction of the server, more often than not), but it's fantastic when it's living and breathing. To me, no other game compares and is why I and many others have stuck around.

A lot of this post has been aimed at the DMs, but it's not done in the spirit of hate or toxicity or to damage the server but hopefully the opposite. DMing isn't easy, can be a lot of work, and take a lot of creativity when it doesn't always seem there is much return on investment.

There are people who spend a lot of time on the server who really improve the place by bringing what life to it there is and who should be appreciated. The real message is against the unfairness in how a small group of people who spend a lot of time not playing or adding much to the game still try to maintain a powerful say or vote in our community, especially when it comes to passionate players wanting to improve server life in meaningful ways and create that dynamic atmosphere that had me hooked in earlier versions.

Server still has the potential to be fantastic, despite the thought behind those who may have given up on adding to the life of the server. If this thread gets deleted or locked, hope DM team at least takes it back for internal discussion and rehabilitation.

TL;DR
EFU isn't perfect, but the ones who care about it and actually put the time into the server don't have much control generic complaint

[Certified Retrievals]

Respectfully, I think it unlikely that your intentions will be heard here. Mostly, I think that's because your message is an unc;ear mess of diverging priorities.

Who is your actual audience, here? If it's the DMs, is this the best place for it? You denigrate the mysterious old guard, refer to DM cliques, and rely upon the opinions of the people who are upset -- it SEEMS -- without taking in the viewpoint of those they have a problem with.

No, of course EFU isn't perfect, and I'll admit that I am not privy to the sort of sordid back-channel griping that usually motivates sentiments like these. Maybe I'm just the fool believing the emperor is wearing clothes.

Certainly, I think this is a worthwhile discussion to have. But what you've presented here is a place to air grievances in a form where they cannot be rationally addressed. I would urge  you to take the time to talk to the "other side" of the anecdotal struggles you refer to.

Because as long as we're making claims about what goes on in private between the DMs, it's my understanding that many server secrets remain concealed even from the majority of DMs -- which, I feel -- history has proven to be a good policy. I could be wrong about whether that's even the truth, though. Don't take my word for it.
I don't know who you are, because I don't care to go digging to find out, but I am admittedly curious about whether I would take you more seriously if you weren't under a pseudonym. (FWIW I'm Kotenku in case anybody wasn't aware of that yet. Just lazy, not hypocritical.)

Anyway, thanks for caring about the server enough to complain, your feelings are valid even if your arguments aren't generally accepted.

[zDark Shadowz]

How to make a post without adding fuel to the fire...
[Glances at flame signature] Make sure the fire is a healing one.

-----

Its good to find a place to outlet your opinions. The DM Q&A thread is good for querying the direction of the server and other enigmatic things.

I always thought of EFU as a platform for players to tell their own story. Which is probably why I'm still not fitting in as well as I would like. I'm a bit unimaginative, or I'm imaginative but not in the right ways.

-----

..and I'll end my general discussion there.

[Knight Of Pentacles]

I don't think this opinion is very unpopular at all.  I feel like there's a lot that goes on behind the scenes that most players aren't privy to.  I think it's a little odd that as soon as many new dms are made they simply disappear into obscurity.  I don't think burnout from the often times unappreciative playerbase can explain it all away.

[Howlando]

I've taken long stretches of breaks before, but I always come crawling back. I'm sure I will be back soon and honestly we have exciting things planned. SC is right, EFU is going to the moon; and for sure EFU is not going to just dwindle away to nothing. If players feel like now is not a super dynamic time; I completely respect that; if players feel like EFU is very flawed, I totally agree - the important thing about the project, as I see it, is that it's always there - that there is a slowly evolving story-line, and that members of the community can drop in and out over the course of years and marvel at how things change & also remain the same. There have been many posts like this in the past. If you feel like taking a break, do so - but check in every once in a while, because when things start to move, they will move fast.

The sense that there is some kind of toxic DM culture or secret conspiracy of Old Guard DMs is not something that I think is accurate. I think in general we try to support each other; but it is true that occasionally we have our little nerdy-disagreements. But I don't know, I honestly don't think it's so bad. Regardless, if anyone wants to discuss it with me I'm always happy to do so. I am definitely always ready to try to soothe angst.

[Random_White_Guy]

The challenge I give to the anonymous snipers and the backchannel whiners and the apocalyptic make-me-a-DM-PMers is to contribute more to EFU rather than expect to receive more from it.

I fully support this kind of challenge and would certainly welcome more PC efforts, but I think this is one of the areas that is making EFU feel stagnant or disconnected.

I think one of the biggest problems facing EFU is the incentive to create PC factions and plots has shifted. In the current apocalyptic, goofy monstrous, end of the world setting of EFU:R it just feels like it's more rewarding, involving, and overall acceptable to just not push agendas.

There's always been degrees of mysanthropic style adventurous PCs out for the occasional "dm event everyone welcome", or the classic "here's my level 9 PC to obliterate this boxing tournament for glory and trophy" But I just feel of late when looking at the playerbase and talking with other players that it just isn't effective or desirable for PC factions to exist. And that's one of the driving forces during times of "Stagnation" or DM down time. PCs stepping in to take over the roles. [INDENT]- PC churches are few and far between
- Even the faux "Noble" houses have bottomed out
- Racial factions exist to a degree but on the whole not with the public presence they used to.
- Merchant guilds/factions vs occasional solo merchant
- Necromantic cabals vs fringe one or two unaffiliated weirdos
- Nature's fall to the abyss[/INDENT]
Frankly I feel like associations are to blame to a degree since people use them for nested factions but overall I think it gets very dilluted because that stops things like in-fighting in favor of red v blue v green. We don't have the playerbase sadly to have a civil war between the criminal elements of the ooze vs the drow vs the primordials. We tried a few months back, it got reduced to a trio of PCs fighting each other while the rest of the ooze faction PCs shrieked "GET ALONG WE HAVE BIGGER FOES OUT THERE STOP DISRUPTING THE OOZE BUSINESS", etc.

Red is red, blue is blue, green is green and attempts to disrupt or challenge that is quite literally crushed IC or OOC by PC thrown angst or otherwise actions. So it all just becomes three humongous blobs.

I'm not saying every PC has to go out and start swinging hammer to take over the world but a mixture of get along to go along and putting in some effort by the playerbase (And DMs throwing some bones with shouts, clerical miracles, wizardy trinkets to throw around, a PC merchant visited by a "Mysterious trader" NPC giving them unique supplies to throw around, etc) would go a long way.
[indent]- Show up to the weirdo's sermon about why his GOBLET OF WATER is the new ultimate power, if only to debate with him
- Show up to the Merchant's stall, not to buy anything but just to browse and listen to his soft pitch
- Go to the politician's speech (Less sendings, more speeches and debates please councilors)
- Go seek out to fight the Necromancer and don't shriek about how you will "GET YOUR BOYS FOR REVENGE" or "JUST KILL ME NOW STOP MONOLOGUING"
- Go wander the wilds and meet the druidfolk or piss them off
- Throw fruit at the halflings for being thieves or argue with the humans for being short sighted morons and weirdos.[/indent]

It's the little immersive efforts that lead to more than just "The square is dead, let's log wait for the numbers to go up"

It makes the world feel more alive.

[Paha]

While I will sound like a broken record, to me it's as follows and mostly has been always.

1. DM's don't have hostility towards each other or any interest to block each other. What passion comes from disagreeing with others, is never hate or anger, not that I've seen - or what I atleast feel. It's easy to read wrong into communication that mostly happens through means of text. But we disagree, as has been said above. Most of the time we agree and are more excited and throw out ideas for anyone that is running some plots or other activities. If anyone thinks that what was claimed in original post is the case and DM team is full of toxic air and dislike for each, I can only assume it's related to some experience that probably should be talked about and figure why they feel like it is, or you are making rather wild guesses into something that you really shouldn't try to. Honestly, people put way too big of a pedestal under a DM team and everything around them in nwn RP communities. Most of the time if you ask, you get a simple answer. I mean sometimes if majority of team feels certain direction is for the future interest better, than we speak of it and try to say it. Someone may get hurt by it, but we are adults by now. We have grown up people, younger and older. We got doctors, engineers, people with phd's and master's degrees. We got a lot of big heads but also a lot of really logical and experienced people that by now know not to take things personally. So I don't know why there is a suggestion that DM team is full of toxic. We got ego and we clash, but there is also a team that has grown since childhood and sometimes people grow apart. Nothing wrong with that. If that is the toxic part, then I must define idea of toxic differently. Because I consider constructive and normal disagreeing to be part of life, nothing to be shunned, hated or to be ran from.

2. DM's burn out for simply doing something many hours a day, pushing their minds to the edge in juggling many things at once and rarely being able to quite achieve what they set out to - and it's not always a bad thing in general, but at the same time for a person it is. When your set goal is never achieved and you are under constant pressure, it builds up. I am sure everyone gets tired here and there. For one - EFU is old. It's systems and infrastructure was build over a decade. It's not easy to get into if you have very little technical experience, experience in nwn building and coding ( as simple as it may be, it's still it's own and we have our structure, plus nwn has a lot of curious glitches that you got to know in order to understand how for example code reacts), so it's that much more frustrating for new people or even those that have been here for couple years already. What can I say. I for example have been wanting to come back for over a year, yet my own life situation kept changing and I was unable to finish my own work projects in time, and then got given opportunity for more that I couldn't pass on, and I am writing a large study on my free time. So there just has not been time for efu because I know I can't stay away from it when I get started, and I cannot afford it. It requires too much time investment for me to feel satisfied, and I don't like the feeling of leaving things unfinished, which happened in past. This happens to be the case for many. You simply cannot do things as a DM in an hour. It's never enough. Not for toolset, not for ingame interactions, and if you have it here and there, you don't want to feel like you left long, very epic and nice plot unfinished because you don't know if you can devote that time every week, or every month. And it takes it's toll. When folks have time, they return, even after years. Against what you may feel, most DM's are quite damn considerate of future planning as well, and they do not want to leave other DM's to deal with plots or things they may not be up to date with. Sometimes it happens and it makes things hard for other DM's and the original DM feels really bad for it, and nobody wants that.

3. New DM's are always an issue. It will never be easier. That is the truth. Fact is there is a lot of precious things tied to efu. Who wouldn't want to protect such things. As old as it may be by now, we have had attacks on the server and issues against grievous people. Why wouldn't a person be protective against such potential? We have ever changing community. We have ever changing usernames and it's not always easy to keep up with people. Getting to know someone and their personality is not so easy through text. It may seem like it's simple deal to choose people for DM'ing, but if you want to make that claim, I truly think that while your intentions may be good, you don't know what you are asking. We don't want to remove fun and good players. Some have become DM and then returned to playing as it allowed them more time to be involved in efu with less stress and less required long term commitment. And at least I can recognise the pressure it puts on any new person. I also personally have fear for people I am not very familiar with, and it's surely also because I've had to be away for a long time. All I can do is express my opinion, but I allow more active folks to have better say in it and at last hand Howlando - though he often refuses to overrule anyone lightly, since he isn't a cruel dictator but a rather benevolent one. I really don't think there is a way to simply explain it no matter what kind wall of text one would write to try. It's a sore subject for players, it's a sore subject for us, not because we don't want activity, but because it involves giving access to people, it involves putting them on a fire that can be very stressful and it can in turn lead to losing folks we don't want to lose. I well and truly think it simply is not something you can understand, had you not experienced it yourself and see what goes into all of it. It is not same as DM'ing for any other server. To begin with, there are but few servers that have ever existed with the amount of custom systems we have.

All things considered, we have had talks over long time, and we have plans to make things better in some ways. It simply takes time. As stupid as it is, I once again say: Efu is not a company. We have to get paid to pay the rent, mortgage, food and all sort of expenses. So we got to work. Atleast for me work takes around 12 hours from the time I wake up and get back home and am set up to do any free activities. Doesn't leave a lot of time for me to do many things. Younger folks still have to graduate. Everyone has responsibilities they cannot escape from. We got the time we have to give to it, and it is tied to a lot of wants and plans that often grow out of proportion even with DM's, and causes our own downfall sometimes. I know I have a lot of stuff I'd like to improve, stuff I've promised to do but just haven't as I cannot slip away from projects that are tied to my life and future. But heck, if I somehow won a lottery and was self-sustained, I'd happily work on efu stuff 8 hours a day and get shit rolling again, and after each bigger project is done, take a break and play among you folks as well, and all that.

[Howlando]

I feel compelled to offer a few more points.

1. Even if I think some of what you're saying is off base, I do appreciate the post in general. I think it's good for us to be reminded sometimes when the peasants are getting restless.

2. "in my eyes he's left a lot of what could be great and interesting server-changing plots open-ended and unfinished with almost no results, which has been a big letdown to myself personally."....


I am curious what you mean by this. I assume you are referring to the animation of Etorix. That was intended to be the CULMINATION of a plot, it's been something I've been slowly pushing for (literal) years and I'm glad I had a chance to make it happen in a satisfactory manner. And to be honest, despite a lot of delays, I'm fairly pleased with the whole process went - I ran a lot of classic DND style quests that I really think players enjoyed, the narrative was cool, the final event seemed well received, etc. As I explained at the time, he was not supposed to be the figure of some new faction. That would diminish it. Of course Etorix Reborn will have an additional role to play in the story at some point, but I am just not willing to devote myself to EFU all the time. We have short lives and although I like EFU a lot I also believe in the importance of doing a lot of other things with my life also.

3. But really, I will come back in the not too distant future and sincerely there are exciting days ahead for EFU. That I am certain of.