Shadowgate

Kossuth · Joined: 18 Nov 2013 Posts: 136

So I am creating this thread as an open forum for people to ask questions pertaining to the mud and its lore as well as plots and characters. My work schedule has finally even out so I am back to doing what I love which happens to be helping to build a fantasy world with the rest of you. Please feel free to ask me anything or make suggestions about things you would like to see more of, less of or anything in between.

I am currently working on a plot involving the Feywild(SG version not FR) and having a lot of fun. When it concludes I intend to do some more smaller scale character development plots which will mostly target hm characters who are committed and looking to help build more realm history and have themselves be a part of it. If you are interested in being a part of this please mail me with your ideas just try to keep it smaller scale and more personal. I am not looking to take on a massive war or city breaking plot atm but rather trying to encourage some more character commitment and spread the attention around as best I can.

Everyone can be important to the mud however I will warn you that if I see someone I am taking this time with alting you will be dropped and any further requests will be at the very bottom of my list. When we imms do a plot for you and you drop characters to play something else immediately after it is a waste of our time. We often have follow up ideas in the works to further build on your story and thus the muds story. The easiest way to keep the history alive is to have players who have experienced it still around.

Those players who make the effort to promote rp with others and work hard to build their own history will be rewarded for their efforts. I will do everything in my power to make sure of it.

Hope to hear from you all soon!

Verbannon · Joined: 30 Sep 2013 Posts: 398

Okay I give up. Whats the april fools prank with this?
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Verbannon · Joined: 30 Sep 2013 Posts: 398

I think perhaps the 'two till post' rule should be used in the emote figts. You don't post agai until two other people have postd to help keep it from running away from people. Also people who are on the phone or something should be encounraged to inform others and as a rule they should be waited on.
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PM me in the forum here when you want me on to RP or dungeon dive. The forum will automatically notify me by e-mail. Then my e-mail will send me a text message. Then I will get on likely within minutes.

Verbannon · Joined: 30 Sep 2013 Posts: 398

I'll have to admit that is the most epic final battle we ever had. But it would have been completely impossible without two clerics constantly undoing all the damage.
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PM me in the forum here when you want me on to RP or dungeon dive. The forum will automatically notify me by e-mail. Then my e-mail will send me a text message. Then I will get on likely within minutes.

Trillet · Joined: 27 Oct 2013 Posts: 8 Location: i have a cat

Just in case anyone's wondering, this current topic is about a style of emote-based combat Kossuth's run twice so far, over the plot. The final battle of this plot (I'm assuming this is going to be common IG knowledge rather soon, so I'm going to use it for context) involved a showdown between three high-level adventurers and a giant fey golem thing. At night. Atop a crumbling lighthouse. Presumably "A Night on Bald Mountain" was playing. Epic stuff, basically.

Pretty much what Verbannon said - if there had been two thieves present instead of clerics, they probably wouldn't have pulled through without a whole lot of luck, or having been allowed more time in advance to prepare for the fight. I'm sure the fight was tailored to our party, but I can see a danger of "tier-locking" fights like this, with only certain classes capable of overcoming certain threat levels.

On the whole, though, I really like this format of RPing combat - it's a lot truer to the feel of actual D&D. I get the feeling that it might be tempting to impose a rule or two on players (like "no preparing spells", or "cabbages are not acceptable melee weapons"), either to make the scenes more "realistic" or easy to handle, but I'd advise caution before implementing anything like that, since too strong a focus on mechanical rules would kind of destroy its appeal. I can maybe see a rule involving the speed of player emotes, but even that seems like it could be prone to gaming if it were too explicitly defined.

As for the the fight itself, it was definitely one of the cooler things I've done on this game. However, I did start to notice a pattern emerge as the fight wore on. Going back to what I said about class tiers in this format, as a melee character my input/output basically boiled down to: "You do something to slightly inconvenience your foe....and then something BAD happens!" Twisted Evil

I don't actually mind it myself (honestly, arcane casters should get a chance to show off more often), but it's something to keep in mind. I think one good way to offset the potential monotony for melee characters might be to use the format's flexibility to change up the battle's dynamic. For example, what -actually- happened during the fight was that my characters arrows were suddenly no longer effective, because the golem we were fighting seemed to discover the joys of blocking, with appendages other than its face. Many coded mobs could stand to learn from this thing. With this format, however, you could've just as easily had the golem strike at the lighthouse, sending it slowly tipping over, leaving my PC without proper footing to shoot and improvising as he attempts to fight on an increasingly steep incline. In most cases, you can probably leave the casters to peruse their spell lists in fights like these, but melee characters will probably need a bit more tactile, environmental information to work off of.

That said, I had a lot of fun. Looking forward to seeing more like this in the future.

Kossuth · Joined: 18 Nov 2013 Posts: 136

Thanks for the feedback guys. I did notice that Trillet and I actually was about to start adapting some more ways for your melee specifically to be more tactically advantageous as the casters opened up some more weaknesses however you left the fight about that time :p That being said I'll work on keeping that in mind for earlier on. Thank you guys for helping with the experiment. I was very satisfied with how it went and I intend to do more like it in the future!

Verbannon · Joined: 30 Sep 2013 Posts: 398

Well the edition of D&D I play is big on fights similar to this and suggestions on how melee characters can assist more in them. Of course the most common way is in defense of the casters. But against something this big, thats not really probable.
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PM me in the forum here when you want me on to RP or dungeon dive. The forum will automatically notify me by e-mail. Then my e-mail will send me a text message. Then I will get on likely within minutes.

Raveena · Joined: 04 Oct 2013 Posts: 7 Location: green

After taking more days than I expected to think about this, this still isn't going to be a novel. Short and sweet cause that's all I know how to do. First off, I really did enjoy how it was done with emotes rather than just I hit enemy, enemy blocks then hits me, and that back and forth forever. Not saying I mind it, it was just a pleasant change. My only issue with it at first was with the first battle, I'd not really considered how to go about doing things that way. Anyone that's had to RP with me for longer than five minutes knows, I don't handle change too well without being informed somehow ahead of time and I panic. Granted, I got my shit together somewhat by the second fight. Over all, I really enjoyed it, though, and I'd not mind seeing more of it.

Kossuth · Joined: 18 Nov 2013 Posts: 136

Thanks for the further feedback. I'm taking it all into consideration and I am working on a guidelines post for my more cinematic storytelling I intend to use going forward. Don't worry it won't be bogged down with a lot of complex mechanics because I did enjoy the more free form play and the rewards for outside the box thinking. I just want more players to have an idea of what they can do with the system so they don't end up a Raveena in headlights Wink

Please feel free to make any further suggestions, criticisms, or just thoughts in general here.

kellan · Joined: 27 Oct 2013 Posts: 39

The limited experience I had with emoting combat was positive, Except for being on an iPad.I think this could be very helpful for players, because it allows us to step outside of normal game mechanics,while not exceeding our characters normal abilities without avatar approval. This could be extremely beneficial for players with positions of power such as high priests, generals and political officers. We can use this as a way for high scale wars sometime out in the future along with many other role-play situations, which currently weren't available, until Kossuth implemented this.

Going forward I'd like to see a return to player positions of power and political espionage,which could help the mud with its Player base and diversity.