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What should we do IC with Amia EE?
1. Full Copy: leave all areas the same. 16%  16%  [ 16 ]
1. Partial Copy: remove Arelith references. 19%  19%  [ 19 ]
1. Full Wipe: remove all areas and start fresh. 15%  15%  [ 15 ]
2. No IC Change: don't remove Arelith references IC. 8%  8%  [ 8 ]
2. IC Retcon: just change the names without a story so it's easier. 9%  9%  [ 9 ]
2. IC Story: remove the areas via an apocalyptic story arc. 33%  33%  [ 33 ]
Total votes : 100
Dark Immolation
 
PostPosted: Fri, Apr 05 2019, 22:36 PM 

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Mein Führer! I can walk!

So this is what you guys have been up to. I've occasionally popped in every now and again, but this is the first thing where I've really felt moved to say anything, given my absence. I'll keep it short(or as short as *I* possibly can :oops: ) and direct, as anything else I want to say has its place elsewhere.

I'll address my thoughts on the “Apocalyptic” concept, as that has the most votes at the time of this posting.

The Pros:
-Fresh Air
Whether perceived or real, the idea of moving away from stagnancy can inspire both Player and DM to go beyond what they know and are comfortable with. Both parties can be more inspired to move and shape new worlds, as there is less of an attachment to the ideas of what they “should” be.
-Breaking Ground
With new settings comes the ability for PCs to be involved in the foundation of new settlements. To actually grow what was something like Bendir from a small fort to an actual town. Between the Faction Area and PC Housing system, there comes the real possibility having certain areas be completely PC-run from the ground up. And in doing so, these PCs become as important to this new game world as any previous so-called “All-Star” PCs once were.


The Cons:
-Blood from Stones
In most games, I've found this to be true: subtraction seldom attracts. Removing a class, feature, area, item, history, etc, has never attracted anyone to a game, except in cases where such things were actively breaking the game. Removal of server areas has no reason to be any different. In fact, some players are old enough to have lived through the efforts of the Glim-era, where many areas and features were removed in an attempt to consolidate playerbase and stories. It met with poor results.

PCs who hung around areas that were removed didn't move to ones that still existed. They simply left, through what I imagine was the frustration of the player in finding new areas for their PC to fit in. Or the PC being so tied to the location that they scarce made sense anywhere else.

-Sealing the Door
Much in the vein of the previous point, some players will find Amia unable to come back to after an apocalypse(assuming they would, in any case). As unpopular as area and item removals are from the module, they are still magnitudes more manageable than an “apocalypse.” The scant city or meadow or trinket can always be put back into the game(Djedet comes to mind). But what this means is essentially removing half of the “physical” server, and specifically the half that had been before there was even a second half. It can't be understated just how much that will mean to some players and its impact cannot truly be known until it will be too late to do anything about it.


The Cautions (Or, the majority of what I have to say):
-The Server is the Stage, not the Play
The benefits and drawbacks of doing away with what we have have been covered. What is important to keep in mind is that any feelings of stagnancy or inaccessibility can just as easily follow the server to its new home. Sort of like when people move to a new city, thinking it will solve every problem they have; it's just as likely that they'll bring those problems with them. A change of scenery may help, but it is imperative to remember that DM's and Players make a story together, in equal share. Whether that happens in the decade old center of Cordor or in the remains of what's left after all of this, that situation is still at the heart of most of any issues that arise for an NWN server.

-Push and Pull
There are some older players that may find the prospect of more or less erasing the island enticing. Just as well, there are some that would never return after such a thing. Some characters are tied to these locations and the events that happened there. What makes a setting impenetrable to some makes it, well, what-it-is to others. On the other hand, there are players who would never be enticed to come back, no matter the new arc, and others who wouldn't come back, no matter how faithfully the server was transposed in its current and historical form. There are new players that would have interest in an older server with tons of backstory, and just the same, those would not. With the Apocalyptic concept, it must be kept in mind that you will, ultimately, be prioritizing one set over the other. And in the end, it's a gamble, like most things. No one can really know until it is done. It is not a magic bullet, but a choice like any other. Choices, unfailingly, have consequences. Good and bad.

-A Faux Adieu to Lore
Lastly, I would offer caution towards the idea that in erasing the “Arelith” bits, that the server would somehow be stepping further into its own identity. While it's true that a vast majority of players were not even around for the split to remember it, the story that continues from it will always be to some extent present in its characters. Whether or not there is a Cordor, there was a Cordor. And a Bendir Dale, and so on and so forth. Simply because these places shared no longer exist in “physical” form, it has in no real way changed that Amia always was to some extent: a twinned timeline. In one, there is an island in the Trackless Sea, called Arelith, with a place called Cordor, that has a different history that the other island in the Trackless Sea, called Amia, with a place called Cordor. Apocalypse subsiding, the difference ultimately just becomes there's still a timeline where: there's an island called Arelith, with a place called Cordor, and a timeline where there was an island called Amia with a place called Cordor. Those feeling that an apocalypse further gives Amia an identity must realize that an IC change in scenery doesn't necessarily deepen those differences. It will, in some sense, be as is everyone were banished to Server B: a place that is no more or less Arelith for being associated with Amia. And any new player that would log and accuse Amia of “copying” Arelith without doing any research is bound to be an even greater pain when their character logs on and begins talking about things as if they are 4th or 5th edition. Those with little attention span will wash out all the same.

Additionally, I would wonder the point in moving the server “closer to FR” lore, with this action. Forgotten Realms, as a setting, has long ago diverged from what Amia is, though it is indeed based in it. It has progressed beyond what would have been the “Year of Blue Flame,” the Spellplague, all of the many god-deaths and so on. 3rd Edition was long ago done as a setting, and thus you are essentially creating your own lore in order to stay there. There's nothing to stick closer to. There is little lore accuracy to be had, beyond going back into the books, seeing what was, and figuring out how such story lines could have progressed. Which is what has always been done. Any who believe that this move, for all its benefits and drawbacks, will somehow result in a more by-the-book setting must realize that Amia, for what has been a majority of its life now, has been writing its book largely as it goes. Even if every PC were dropped into book-accurate version of 3rd Edition Waterdeep, it will still be one 2-3 years beyond a point the lore ever covered. Thus, everything that is done from now until whenever, is and must necessarily be “homebrew” to some extent. Whether the story takes place on the homebrew island of Amia or the homebrew version of a Sword Coast post-1385 DR is incidental.



In the end, I can only wish everyone luck and say that I am happy to see folks still keeping at it. Much love.

TormakSaber wrote:
Use Tarkuul to spark the apocalypse, it's had the buildup for a RL decade.


Oh, my beloved Tormak. You'll never know how close we came! Alas, Tarkuul will forever be the Chekhov's Gun upon the wall of my heart.

Dunecat wrote:
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We'll always have Belenoth, my friend.

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PrinceofallThayans
 
PostPosted: Fri, Apr 05 2019, 22:48 PM 

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I say that wiping out everything and starting over sounds like a horrible idea. Here is why: If you drop that bombshell onto PCs that are old as dirt, like myself. It will possibly, at least in my case, turn me off. I like knowing what's going on, and the fact that everything will be new, that's scary. If you want to remove the references, and or update the areas via a facelift, that's fine. I don't want to see the hard work that my PC did go to waste. Not to mention the whole 'building' from the ground up' approach is a lot of work. Especially for the DMs. We all have lives so how can the DMs constantly be watching these new settlements get built? Plus that's probably months of resource collection and stuff until you get that built up, you have an empty field. That's not fun to RP in. Not to mention you'll have people get their groups of friends to start their town leaving people who are lone wolves who are left out and such. This is just my two sense.

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Naivatkal
 
PostPosted: Sat, Apr 06 2019, 17:47 PM 

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First impression:

I swear to god if we remove the Shadow Realm and/or Vyper I will riot. I will not ever stop posting about the need to include it.
Seriously though I doubt anyone is thinking about removing it, but I love that Amia still has that tribute around to a player I never ever knew.

Beyond that, though, this is a tough poll to vote in. Honestly, I like all the options because I can see how they are all viable and would work. Right now I am leaning for changing names. After all, we are the offshoot so Arelith gets priority (I know they don't care, just saying) on keeping the names as they are the original server. I see it as the best compromise.

However I'll add this: The idea I like best that came to mind is a new server plot where the Island is 'removed from play' and people have to figure out how to get it back. IN the time before that happens, it's reshaped and changed. It gives the Devs the opportunity to remaking Amia Island and the cities within. But that's also a lot of work (granted it would probably take a year or so to get to that point in the server plot).

I dunno. Honestly I have always felt it weird that we have old Arelith areas with the same names and everything. They should have been changed when Amia was created, but at this point it hardly seems like it matters you know? Bah!

And now, reading responses I think I am more in favor of the Apoc approach. I don't know, it's hard, ahhhh!

edit: I don't say apoc lightly, I'm one of those players than has a lot of characters invested in Amia Island. Temple of Love, Kohlingen, those are my favorite places. But I think the change will be good, for old and new players. In the end, if you want to play on Amia you want to play on Amia. Not because of Amia Island being there, but because of the community, story, and mechanics (mechanics were a big reason I never really wanted to play on Arelith after finding Amia hah).

I went with Partial and IC Story.

second edit: I love everything Tormak and RaveN said. Not Revak, though, he's a smelly boi.

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angst360
 
PostPosted: Sun, Apr 07 2019, 5:53 AM 



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Joined: 10 Jul 2014

Nuke the server vault.

1.) There will never be another, er, planned opportunity to do this. It's the perfect storm.
2.) Tear down the hedgemonies, vanquish the custom scripted, bankrupt the uber-equipped, and death to the nobility... 8)
3.) This would save the staff the headache of trying to "restore" old characters/factions with custom scripting/etc back to their former glory, freeing up time better spent elsewhere in developement and debugging. Other wise, the logjam of requests is going to be insane and cause frustration.
4.) Shouldn't the EE apocolypse be about bold adventures, fresh stories, the thrill of exploration, and change? It probably shouldn't be about the continuation of old stories that bog down the evolution of the server.
5.) A bunch of OP 'toons' running around in uber-gear discovering all the new changes seems kind of lame... and just a bit meta-gamish...
6.) In case you haven't noticed, the end game is NOW! ...not later.


What about your DC's, you ask? You'll earn new ones.
What about all the work people put into their old characters? Yeah, life sucks.. good thing this is only a game.


Or, failing all of that, maybe allow each account 1 or 2 characters that they may export to EE... Whatever works.


 
      
Kiasyd
 
PostPosted: Sun, Apr 07 2019, 19:02 PM 

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Just to re-state this.

Jes wrote:
I'm gonna reiterate this, as it seems to be a popular topic.

At the moment, we are not considering a character wipe. Players will (as of this post) be fully able to access their characters with the items/levels they have worked for. As such, this poll is ONLY regarding areas in the module.


This is not in discussion. Characters are not being wiped, period.

Edit: Just so we all stay on the same page!

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Yimmi
 
PostPosted: Sun, Apr 07 2019, 20:38 PM 

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I did vote but forgot to answer here.
I like the idea of a fresh new start area wise, but mostly because I like the thrill of adventure and getting to know new places.

And the part of RETCON it's just to make it easier for the stuff.
Thats regarding the current topic that is area moving... about characters it's a totally different story!

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Revak
 
PostPosted: Mon, Apr 08 2019, 10:59 AM 

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Naivatkal wrote:
Not Revak, though, he's a smelly boi.


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LibrisMortis_666
 
PostPosted: Mon, Apr 08 2019, 15:41 PM 

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As an inactive player but active forum-reader and no-good-doer, here are my thoughts.

1. Less bias. With the potentially new start I believe we need to push more towards a less bias setting. Argue with me in what way you wish but in my experience those who play primarily Evil characters get the bad end of the stick. Amia for as long as I could remember it has always been a more Good-aligned favor. (Argue if you want!)

2. Work in Tarkuul. I mirror Tormak. Please. If the server is destroyed in some manner let Tarkuul be the responsible party. I feel like there is no better story then to have that lingering City in the outskirts being the ultimate threat even though no one /really/ gave it enough attention because a few rotten eggs said it was "Neutral". Neutral.. Ha.

3. Custom Scripting / e.t.c. Pretty obvious this is what made Amia the unique server that I fell ln love with. I /personally hate/ custom scripting. Weird, I know. I hate anything that gives players a mechanical advantage over another. But it brings so much enjoyment, so much fun to the server when it was at its prime. I've seen a lot of players with custom spells, feats, e.t.c and it's insane. I'm jealous. But it's not my cake for those reasons I mentioned.

4. Also as my main squeeze sorta said. There are some things about Arelith that make it unique. I'm not saying copy it but figure out something super unique (I know its hard) that makes Amia stand out even more.

Arelith has: A unique traveling messenger system, language (Which is the best I've ever seen), tons of custom scripting.

I think you should focus more on the unique side and less on the appearance side. Yes... Making a evil temple look super evil is cool. But I think going super simple with the design at first and nailing the unique scripting is important. Appearance is cool. Function is cooler.

I've got a huge list of ideas but these to me seem the most important. I'm fine with any Amia. With or without Tarkuul, Kohlingen, Cordor, Uhm, Wharftown, e.t.c. I have my memories with every island at some point. Let's make more.

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Cracked Red Eye Orb
 
PostPosted: Tue, Apr 09 2019, 4:41 AM 



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I hope DreamCoins will be done away with.


 
      
OpenTheRift
 
PostPosted: Tue, Apr 09 2019, 7:33 AM 

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There is a nasty bias against evil on Amia that hasnt been resolved in over a decade. I find this odd as evil is more likely to kickstart rp than good chars for a wider range of cars by challenging the way things are violently and visibly.

you need a dm for team evil or DMS should be confident in their disconnection to aid the "opposition"
I have heard a few tales of PCs getting sidelined because DMS call a conflict of interest when evil PCs ask for over sight and aid.

Other than that bias and response times I can not think of any reasonable complaints. Game on an good luck

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Pony
 
PostPosted: Wed, Apr 10 2019, 11:42 AM 



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Joined: 07 May 2005

I am not voting either, as I am no longer an active player. A lot of what I would say, was already said by Tormak and Yossarin. So I'll just tack on the following to their take on it.

A fresh start is very attractive. Especially if things feel like they have ended up being stuck in a rut for a few years and you do not know how to get it out of it. I imagine it would attract a lot of attention of past players to check it out. Which is a fantastic opportunity to bring back activity. In addition of making the server more accessible again, by being able to easily solve the challenge of story continuity and respecting the established history of years of storytelling.

I do think a big part of it is the lacking player numbers. I do not think the current community would care much about the perception of living in the shadow of Arelith, if that were not the case. So in my opinion, the whole removal of Arelith content would be more of an additional bonus to a big, sweeping revision. On paper, this fresh start also looks a lot easier than working with a complicated jumble, in order to figure out how to make the current server setup work again. So I understand the interest. However, in my opinion, it is not really easier than finding a solution to how you can make the Amia island work for the community again.

That is, if you want Amia to remain Amia, and not just create a new server. I feel like it is something you do need to be very conscious of, is what made the server what it was. Without a good grasp on that, if the community from 10 years ago, from 5 years ago and from now had done this, it would likely create new experiences that would feel very different. Which begs the question, how much will the revised server feel like Amia? How much would it feel like a new server created by a few folks who were part of Amia back in the day?

So I do think that if you folks want to work on a new experience, a lot of careful consideration needs to be put into what made Amia what it was. What made it feel like Amia for different players in the past and present, and how much you can boil it all down to the common denominator. How you can capture the Zeitgeist of yore in the new content.

If you lose that "je ne sais quoi", that indefinable quality that made Amia distinctive or attractive, you might fracture what is left of the community. It could come across as a new server folks can no longer relate their past experience to. It is important to regognize the risk of it being a new server that feels like it is trying too hard to recapture the glory days of Amia, while never managing to.

Which I suspect will be the case to a degree regardless, because a lot of that magic that was Amia for people was the experience they had with players who are no longer around. So even if the new content is done in a great way that feels a lot like old Amia, it might not hit the mark regardless. Which makes it even more important to get everything else right.

The risk of it all is being stuck chasing something incredibly hard to capture, instead of going all in with a new server or finding a solution to making the tired, stuck-in-post-Reyes-epilogue-Amia island work again. Being a spiritual successor that does not live up to old Amia is not that appealing. Being stuck in the shadow of old Amia, instead of Arelith's would not be a good trade.

--

I do want to make clear I think it could be a worthwhile opportunity to pursue. I just want to add a bit of caution, because if the delievery flops, you will have ripped out years of storytelling and content creation folks have poured their hearts into for a decade. It likely will be a lot harder to return from that. It is a extreme direction to go, as it will narrow down your options for the future.


 
      
Budly
 
PostPosted: Wed, Apr 10 2019, 13:05 PM 

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You do bring forward an interesting question Pony. How much Amia is left if we remove these areas? And then, how much Amia is left if we remove the characters? Im not running into the wipe the server on chars now, but if the server do not have the Amia feel withotu the current roster of characters! Then thats a capital change to the server. I remember last time I jumped in in like 2011 or something. It felt so alien to me back then, I did not recognize the Amia I knew, it was the same but it looked different and the people where new. So I never sticked.

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freaxxshow1338
 
PostPosted: Wed, Apr 10 2019, 13:50 PM 

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No offense, but people who haven't played over a year should really stay out of the discussion.

It's simply not your business anymore, and your input is based on experience long outdated.

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Budly
 
PostPosted: Wed, Apr 10 2019, 14:12 PM 

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freaxxshow1338 wrote:
No offense, but people who haven't played over a year should really stay out of the discussion.

It's simply not your business anymore, and your input is based on experience long outdated.


This is not helping, it sure won't make old player feel welcomed. So lets not spit on old veterans and experienced players. They just like all of us others, share their opinions.

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Sylveera : Sun Elven fury packed in an Arcane Archer, not a Drow, promise.
Tetrik : Greed incarnate in a Duergar.
Budly : Has gone to a better place.
Barrililath : Shadowy Drow, probably less Drow than Sylv ever be.


 
      
Jes
 
PostPosted: Wed, Apr 10 2019, 14:28 PM 

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Hokay!

Well, looking at everything in this topic and in the poll's 100 votes, I think it's safe to close this now. This has been an excellent, productive discussion and we thank you all for your responses! It was good that we could have this talk as a community.

We've taken everyone's thoughts and ideas into consideration and once we get closer to EE release we'll all see how it goes and do our best!

Thanks again!

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