My feelings on this game are very mixed, I had a huge amount of great experiences / memories, but I have a few issues with the structure of Ralinwood's game style at the moment.
Pros:
The amount of props you guys use is just great, it really helps with immersion and it is a strong plus for sure.
Catapult battle was really immersive, I really got into that battle (a little boggy) and it was because the choice of area was great, and the npcs were a pain in the ass in the right way ( Thank you for a great memory Erik)
Honestly the rest of the night was just perfect, I would never in my life have expected to have befriended the person I did, or have him attacked by the kobold that he was attacked by. After all that getting Jon the darkweaver and bog orcs visiting was just pure gravy.
Friday night then was perfect.
Saturday:
The day itself ran pretty smoothly, things had a steady pace in the early afternoon and I got some personal plot that honestly was a dream come true.
I could go on for hours about how happy I was with snowflake, but I'll just make it obvious throughout the year.
Saturday afternoon was alright, but it's when I started to feel a sort of communal burn out. Despite Friday having run to very late levels (easily 4-5 am), we all still woke up around 9 am, and it was obvious people were all burning out pretty quickly.
The Orc charge was definitely an intense and enjoyable experience and I even enjoyed the build up to it (with the war room)
Finally, NPCing on Saturday night was pretty fun, and I was really happy with the Mud Golem I got to play, thank you guys for giving me that role, it was a troll's dream come true. <3 Camp Mutiny
Cons
I felt Saturday suffered severely after ~6-7 pm, in the sense that we were already slowing down from then. There were no more large attack groups and the one that was planned was unfortunately scrapped. In the future this could probably have been avoided by paying close attention to npc shifting distribution for certain mods.
More importantly though, the cancellation of that mod didn't lead to the generation of a new similarly interesting mod, instead nothing dramatic was done. (A few mods were run in its place, but not anything sufficiently elaborate when compared to the original plan) I found that decision to be pretty poor in terms of entertainment value, especially considering my next point.
The final mod on Sunday felt like a poor choice both thematically and mechanically. Murkers aren't very interesting, and we culled them literally a year ago. I didn't feel that more Murkers were necessary, and I'm sure we could have done something else instead (Maybe go find a psionics casting orc that was controlling other orcs). Mechanically, our original design was pretty poor, but we were upstatted appropriately pretty quickly, indicating a competence on whoever was doing so, just a lack of knowledge going in, which isn't that big of a deal.
There was also a very bizarre instance with an NPC in the first night, who was just completely out of it in terms of what was appropriate RP wise and what the hell was happening IG. I don't understand how this person was able to get through NPC camp without making it abundantly clear that they had no idea what their (trivial) role was, but this isn't really a con of the game and more an attempt on my part to ask you guys to find who did this and sacrifice them to a necromancer or something ( I trust you guys ).
So all in all I had one of the best set of larp experiences in the first half of the game, and one of the most disappointing ones immediately afterwards (Not the worst mind you).
All in all I think that the plot team right now has amazing potential, and is already in a good place, but I believe it needs to work on getting to know itself and to have a better grasp of who is handling what. As time passes the team will gain familiarity within itself which will hopefully lead to more integrated plot. You guys have a lot of talent that really comes through in a lot of places, and I'm not worried about the future of Ralinwood at all.
With that said, I definitely am happy I came to game, and I'll be telling stories from now until the next Ralinwood game for sure. You guys have come an extremely far way from your first event last year this month, and I am happy that my favourite character is in your guild, I'm looking forward to seeing how this season pans out.
Praise Cassan
Pros:
The amount of props you guys use is just great, it really helps with immersion and it is a strong plus for sure.
Catapult battle was really immersive, I really got into that battle (a little boggy) and it was because the choice of area was great, and the npcs were a pain in the ass in the right way ( Thank you for a great memory Erik)
Honestly the rest of the night was just perfect, I would never in my life have expected to have befriended the person I did, or have him attacked by the kobold that he was attacked by. After all that getting Jon the darkweaver and bog orcs visiting was just pure gravy.
Friday night then was perfect.
Saturday:
The day itself ran pretty smoothly, things had a steady pace in the early afternoon and I got some personal plot that honestly was a dream come true.
I could go on for hours about how happy I was with snowflake, but I'll just make it obvious throughout the year.
Saturday afternoon was alright, but it's when I started to feel a sort of communal burn out. Despite Friday having run to very late levels (easily 4-5 am), we all still woke up around 9 am, and it was obvious people were all burning out pretty quickly.
The Orc charge was definitely an intense and enjoyable experience and I even enjoyed the build up to it (with the war room)
Finally, NPCing on Saturday night was pretty fun, and I was really happy with the Mud Golem I got to play, thank you guys for giving me that role, it was a troll's dream come true. <3 Camp Mutiny
Cons
I felt Saturday suffered severely after ~6-7 pm, in the sense that we were already slowing down from then. There were no more large attack groups and the one that was planned was unfortunately scrapped. In the future this could probably have been avoided by paying close attention to npc shifting distribution for certain mods.
More importantly though, the cancellation of that mod didn't lead to the generation of a new similarly interesting mod, instead nothing dramatic was done. (A few mods were run in its place, but not anything sufficiently elaborate when compared to the original plan) I found that decision to be pretty poor in terms of entertainment value, especially considering my next point.
The final mod on Sunday felt like a poor choice both thematically and mechanically. Murkers aren't very interesting, and we culled them literally a year ago. I didn't feel that more Murkers were necessary, and I'm sure we could have done something else instead (Maybe go find a psionics casting orc that was controlling other orcs). Mechanically, our original design was pretty poor, but we were upstatted appropriately pretty quickly, indicating a competence on whoever was doing so, just a lack of knowledge going in, which isn't that big of a deal.
There was also a very bizarre instance with an NPC in the first night, who was just completely out of it in terms of what was appropriate RP wise and what the hell was happening IG. I don't understand how this person was able to get through NPC camp without making it abundantly clear that they had no idea what their (trivial) role was, but this isn't really a con of the game and more an attempt on my part to ask you guys to find who did this and sacrifice them to a necromancer or something ( I trust you guys ).
So all in all I had one of the best set of larp experiences in the first half of the game, and one of the most disappointing ones immediately afterwards (Not the worst mind you).
All in all I think that the plot team right now has amazing potential, and is already in a good place, but I believe it needs to work on getting to know itself and to have a better grasp of who is handling what. As time passes the team will gain familiarity within itself which will hopefully lead to more integrated plot. You guys have a lot of talent that really comes through in a lot of places, and I'm not worried about the future of Ralinwood at all.
With that said, I definitely am happy I came to game, and I'll be telling stories from now until the next Ralinwood game for sure. You guys have come an extremely far way from your first event last year this month, and I am happy that my favourite character is in your guild, I'm looking forward to seeing how this season pans out.
Praise Cassan
"An Orc wearing chain with short hair, carries a spear, slower.
OOG: Elias Tragas
2014 Rulebook Editor,
New Player Liaison
Email: Etragas@hotmail.com
OOG: Elias Tragas
2014 Rulebook Editor,
New Player Liaison
Email: Etragas@hotmail.com