08-20-2017, 11:13 PM
Pros:
Morningeist, distinct pro I: The first thing I saw when I opened my tent was Capri bleeding out on the other side of the town square field, and Morty walking into the woods. Not only was that a good one, but I'm also a big fan of very dangerous things taking place at odd hours - not just very early or late, but generally at times which aren't typical of the meta. A lot of players have trouble with metagaming, and it becomes the norm that things don't happen too early, or too late, that there will be a big mod between each mealtime and one after dark. This generally means that a lot of the on-your-toes horror elements fade away.
Morningeist, distinct pro II: Morty's behaviour was good. There were a few really good things that felt really fitting of the nature of a bloodthirsty demon prince. As a non-elf, I wasn't safe - if you weren't an elf and were clearly trying to hide or escape while there were bigger targets nearby, you'd be ignored. If you were in the way of elves, if you were acting like you were safe because you weren't an elf, or if you were just around and the only thing nearby, you were a target.
Thresholds: It's really good to see far more monsters that lack thresholds. Even if you're dangerously outmatched, the difference between doing *essentially* nothing and *actually* nothing is HUGE. It goes from a sense of disappointment and futility to one of danger and risk, which is nice - while it makes perfect sense for monsters with non-normal thresholds to be on smaller mods from a mechanical standpoint (and for them to exist outright, it makes tons of sense), when they're major dangers in whole-town mods, it just makes it so that those mods are stand-back-and-watch-the-big-kids-play sorts of things.
Assassins: It's just generally really nice when the night feels hostile. Sneaky, lonesome NPCs trying to gank you in the night is kinda played-out, but it's played-out for a very good reason: it works.
Tiny Tower Mod: Cool mechanics. It's really interesting when the "tests" that a supernatural place of magical import are... actual tests. Testing packet aim, testing cooperation, and putting the volunteers through unusual and uniquely challenging circumstances (something something feet planted, something something switch places) makes a lot of sense for testing mages.
Neutral:
Plot: As was said above, the plot seems to have been largely self-contained during this event. That being said, there was a certain Mr. Geist around, so it would likely have been difficult to threat together plot during those interruptions. Plus, it makes a lot of sense re: lore for there to have been little development elsewhere - everything that was a threat during previous events' plot was just as vulnerable to Geisty McGeist as we were.
Disparate curiosities: It's always interesting, during low-stress parts of events, to have small groups of NPCs generating flavour. However, I won't list that as a pro or con, since I think pros and cons should be things that were unusual about games that worked, or didn't. The ebb and flow of danger makes it such that it's good to have more interesting, sparse, and less dangerous things when the action is gone, just to keep things dynamic. This is a good thing that should keep happening as normal.
Cons:
Managing the whole town, and NPC numbers: This one is three different things that remain intertwined. Full-town-mods are problematic, and logistically difficult at the best of times, but are also entirely essential to making sure that there's, y'know, a plot. They're also almost always the highlight of a game.
MTWTANPCN - Die Hard: Full-town-mods seem to follow a distinct pattern: The strongest players in town steamroll the NPCs, who pop further and further into mod sites. The weaker players stay at the back, since it's certain death or watching from a distance. The mid-level players make tiny dents, fall back, get patched up by mid-level support-role characters, and chip again. This is a problem. No matter the event, every full-town mod follows the same structure, and as a result, plot-proper seems to be restricted to higher-level players, and the lower-level players who can't survive (or the newer players who haven't saved the frags and CP for five levels of looting) rarely get any items, RM, or other curios. This, however, is a problem endemic to the nature of, well, having the full town go out on mods.
MTWTANPCN - And Then There Were None: The final full-town-ish mod, with the ritual and things crawling out of the woods, was highly engaging since we were being flanked. As such, we were spread more thin, and in small groups, lower-level characters have a chance to shine even among the stronger ones. The big problem with this is that it requires a mountain of NPCs, and very specific geographical features. Having more NPCs requires, just... so much infrastructure. Each handful of NPCs means another shaper is needed, each handful of shapers means more dans and ivannas, and we only have one of each. As things get spread thinner and thinner, NPC camp devolves into greater and greater stress and panic. Our shapers, owners, and seasons don't deserve that for all they do for us. That would be the easiest option, but it's the one with the strongest backlash.
MTWTANPCN - Divide and Conquer: Perhaps the solution to all of this is to just meta things and physically split the playerbase. Characters of similar levels in groups works really well because their abilities mesh. Low-level characters can be easily healed by low-level healers, high-level characters need the threats and dangers that would simply steamroll lower-level characters for the game to be validating. Splitting based on level could be quite effective. Alternately, as was seen in the final major mod of the last day, splitting people into small groups works really well even if there's a large level disparity. Moreover, this requires fewer NPCs - a smaller number of NPCs can be far more easily managed by shapers, such that even 3-4 NPCs and one shaper can be a challenge to a group of 8-12 players, if well-coordinated. The downside with this is that it promotes segregation of players into cliques - groups with good cohesion tend to stay together and form their own groups, alliances, and in-game friendships; this applies to grouping by level or by number.
In summary: things are good, there are problems endemic to the medium/locale/meta that can't really be solved super easily. it's honestly just great to run outside with cool people and do some stuff you wouldn't be able to without this wonderful organization.
Morningeist, distinct pro I: The first thing I saw when I opened my tent was Capri bleeding out on the other side of the town square field, and Morty walking into the woods. Not only was that a good one, but I'm also a big fan of very dangerous things taking place at odd hours - not just very early or late, but generally at times which aren't typical of the meta. A lot of players have trouble with metagaming, and it becomes the norm that things don't happen too early, or too late, that there will be a big mod between each mealtime and one after dark. This generally means that a lot of the on-your-toes horror elements fade away.
Morningeist, distinct pro II: Morty's behaviour was good. There were a few really good things that felt really fitting of the nature of a bloodthirsty demon prince. As a non-elf, I wasn't safe - if you weren't an elf and were clearly trying to hide or escape while there were bigger targets nearby, you'd be ignored. If you were in the way of elves, if you were acting like you were safe because you weren't an elf, or if you were just around and the only thing nearby, you were a target.
Thresholds: It's really good to see far more monsters that lack thresholds. Even if you're dangerously outmatched, the difference between doing *essentially* nothing and *actually* nothing is HUGE. It goes from a sense of disappointment and futility to one of danger and risk, which is nice - while it makes perfect sense for monsters with non-normal thresholds to be on smaller mods from a mechanical standpoint (and for them to exist outright, it makes tons of sense), when they're major dangers in whole-town mods, it just makes it so that those mods are stand-back-and-watch-the-big-kids-play sorts of things.
Assassins: It's just generally really nice when the night feels hostile. Sneaky, lonesome NPCs trying to gank you in the night is kinda played-out, but it's played-out for a very good reason: it works.
Tiny Tower Mod: Cool mechanics. It's really interesting when the "tests" that a supernatural place of magical import are... actual tests. Testing packet aim, testing cooperation, and putting the volunteers through unusual and uniquely challenging circumstances (something something feet planted, something something switch places) makes a lot of sense for testing mages.
Neutral:
Plot: As was said above, the plot seems to have been largely self-contained during this event. That being said, there was a certain Mr. Geist around, so it would likely have been difficult to threat together plot during those interruptions. Plus, it makes a lot of sense re: lore for there to have been little development elsewhere - everything that was a threat during previous events' plot was just as vulnerable to Geisty McGeist as we were.
Disparate curiosities: It's always interesting, during low-stress parts of events, to have small groups of NPCs generating flavour. However, I won't list that as a pro or con, since I think pros and cons should be things that were unusual about games that worked, or didn't. The ebb and flow of danger makes it such that it's good to have more interesting, sparse, and less dangerous things when the action is gone, just to keep things dynamic. This is a good thing that should keep happening as normal.
Cons:
Managing the whole town, and NPC numbers: This one is three different things that remain intertwined. Full-town-mods are problematic, and logistically difficult at the best of times, but are also entirely essential to making sure that there's, y'know, a plot. They're also almost always the highlight of a game.
MTWTANPCN - Die Hard: Full-town-mods seem to follow a distinct pattern: The strongest players in town steamroll the NPCs, who pop further and further into mod sites. The weaker players stay at the back, since it's certain death or watching from a distance. The mid-level players make tiny dents, fall back, get patched up by mid-level support-role characters, and chip again. This is a problem. No matter the event, every full-town mod follows the same structure, and as a result, plot-proper seems to be restricted to higher-level players, and the lower-level players who can't survive (or the newer players who haven't saved the frags and CP for five levels of looting) rarely get any items, RM, or other curios. This, however, is a problem endemic to the nature of, well, having the full town go out on mods.
MTWTANPCN - And Then There Were None: The final full-town-ish mod, with the ritual and things crawling out of the woods, was highly engaging since we were being flanked. As such, we were spread more thin, and in small groups, lower-level characters have a chance to shine even among the stronger ones. The big problem with this is that it requires a mountain of NPCs, and very specific geographical features. Having more NPCs requires, just... so much infrastructure. Each handful of NPCs means another shaper is needed, each handful of shapers means more dans and ivannas, and we only have one of each. As things get spread thinner and thinner, NPC camp devolves into greater and greater stress and panic. Our shapers, owners, and seasons don't deserve that for all they do for us. That would be the easiest option, but it's the one with the strongest backlash.
MTWTANPCN - Divide and Conquer: Perhaps the solution to all of this is to just meta things and physically split the playerbase. Characters of similar levels in groups works really well because their abilities mesh. Low-level characters can be easily healed by low-level healers, high-level characters need the threats and dangers that would simply steamroll lower-level characters for the game to be validating. Splitting based on level could be quite effective. Alternately, as was seen in the final major mod of the last day, splitting people into small groups works really well even if there's a large level disparity. Moreover, this requires fewer NPCs - a smaller number of NPCs can be far more easily managed by shapers, such that even 3-4 NPCs and one shaper can be a challenge to a group of 8-12 players, if well-coordinated. The downside with this is that it promotes segregation of players into cliques - groups with good cohesion tend to stay together and form their own groups, alliances, and in-game friendships; this applies to grouping by level or by number.
In summary: things are good, there are problems endemic to the medium/locale/meta that can't really be solved super easily. it's honestly just great to run outside with cool people and do some stuff you wouldn't be able to without this wonderful organization.
OOG: Will Hyland.
IG: Alfric Smith, musician, physician, barber, mortician. Listen for the sound of flirting and the smell of liquor.
IG: Alfric Smith, musician, physician, barber, mortician. Listen for the sound of flirting and the smell of liquor.