In the Wake of Fallout

[The Almight Red]

I had considered writing nothing in regards to what happened on the Monday, the 2nd of November. I had weighed what could be accomplished on my saying anything in regards to it, and if it would have any beneficial impact in the end. After considering it for a bit, I have come to the conclusion that I believe there could be some benefit of such.

Namely, players having a voice to their frustration over such, and perhaps reform. Perhaps even an apology for how it was handled. I want this topic to result in a few things. First, people to voice their opinion of what actually happened, so the staff does recognize it.

Second, for people to recognize what did happen.

And lastly, I hope it's a reminder to the community what the purpose of RPing is. Not what it could be. Not what it is. But what it should be. That being, what is fun for the community, while remaining balanced for the community.

In the wake of what happened yesterday, I was accused of many things. I won't mention which DM did what. But I will say what was done.

I was accused of doing things IC that I did not (such as, I was accused of Baragorn following Balthasar to perform the ritual [as most know, he did no such thing]).

I was accused of sabotaging the event, because of Baragorn's decisions. I honestly found that accusation reprehensible and just downright unethical.

I was even accused of lying. I was literally told, "you're full of shit" about something that blatently happened. I won't go into the details, because then it's pointing fingers at particular staff members. But if anyone wants to know, I believe in the free flow of knowledge, and even honesty, so I will answer inquiries through PM systems.

And I was continually told things like, "You knew you were doing a futile thing." Which, I did not. There is a particular post in the Character Request forums where I had decided to have Baragorn 'attempt' something, to destroy the Anti-Phylactery. I was even replied to, in that very topic, that I was welcome to let Baragorn try it. And that his success/failure would not be predetermined. Any DM can go look at that forum post, for it still exists.

But when it came time for the event, and we got to the 'end boss,' I received a /tell from a DM that rather insinuated otherwise from what I was told in that forum post. The /tell was, "You destroyed the one chance of making 'Agamanon/or whatever' vulnerable, and now you're reaping the consequences." I was, quite literally, never even allowed to try what Baragorn was going to try. I was not allowed.

On top of this, there was a player that was even told that we were going to fail if we didn't do the ritual, period. It was futile to try another way. This is clearly in opposition to the very thing that was said to me on the forums. They are blatently contradictory. There was one way, and it was predetermined, and on top of it all: I was not even allowed to try what I was said I could try.

The icing on the cake is then I was told by a staff member, "you knew you were going to fail." And that's why I deserved everything my character had in consequence of his actions, apparently. The fact is, I did not know I was going to fail. I had no omniscience to know that I wasn't going to be allowed to try, when I was previously told I could.

At one point, I was even told I could have just sat out of the event if my character didn't agree with the evil plans. So, is that how this works, now? We stage this whole event from the Triumvirate, but I should have my character non-chalantly kick his feet up on the desk, pull out a cigar, and wave his hand dismissively. "Yeah, go ahead. Go work with evil. I'll just sit back and let you guys do something vile and heinous. No worries."

Another thing continually grilled into several of us (not just me, but other players) was that we should have known what would happen, because a NPC told us. Which is ironic, because I've been told, in the past by DMs (even some of the same DMs) that the words of a NPC aren't canon. They aren't law. Just like in real life, they can be wrong, and they can even fail themselves.

Lastly, I was accused of peer pressure. Literally. I was accused of trying to force other players to follow my character in this. I actually didn't even directly ask many players. Furthermore, I didn't ask one player OOC. It was all IC. If any player feels I forced them into this, whether by rank (yes, I was accused of pulling rank, even, by Staff), influence, or 'peer pressure,' please speak up. Because I apologize then. But I can't recall that even being remotely the case.

Now, I want to point out the implications made by this whole fiasco. Because there are a lot of them.

First, you must take a NPC's word as law. If a NPC says they're going to do something, and it's the only way to do something, you better believe it. There are no other options. None.

Second, don't seek answers outside the main events. Ever. Don't bother, because all the time you spent will prove literally pointless. Even if a DM tells you it's not predetermined and you can try, it's not the case. It won't be the case.

Third, if you do something unexpected in a DM event, due to your own character's ethos, you can be accused of sabotaging the event. So, instead, you should force your character to follow along with the event (even in contradiction to the character's ethos) or just sit out the event altogether, even if it doesn't make sense.

Lastly, DMs act with impugnity at this point. Not only this, they can swear at you, be rude to you, call you names, make wild accusations, and then in the end: even go so far as be vindictive in their events and IC RP. And in the end, the player can be the one that's accused of wrong doing. Sabotage, lying, etc.

I've done DMing, and I understand that 'united front' aspect of the Staff Team. But I also know, back when I DMed on PotM, DMs are not infallible. And if we always look at them like they are, then there's zero accountability.

I don't expect any DM to come out and publically say, "Yeah, this was wrong. It probably should have been done differently. We need to say change." I want to see that. I hope we see it. But I don't expect it.

What I do expect is that the Staff doesn't delete or lock this thread, because it just further proves my point, to an even more depressing degree.

And what I expect, most of all, is players speak up on this. Because this sort of stuff is only allowed to continue when the community is mum on it.

Thanks for everything, Sundren. To many, many players, and the DMs, the Admin, and the Devs. I have lots of great memories from here, and I believe I got to be a part of a lot of unfolding stories. It was exciting. It was thrilling.

[Cornuto]

Hey TAR, I was waiting for the calm before the storm to break. From your post it seems like you've decided your time on the server is over, if thats the case I'd say goodbye, good luck and that you'll be missed. I've had good interactions with you and enjoyed your role play. Where ever you go from here I wish you nothing but the best. Personally, I hope that you don't walk away from the server over this.

Looking at the conclusion to this event, the fallout, and hard feelings, I think no-one is going to disagree that things could have gone better. Theres a lot of room for us to do better on the next event, and theres going to be a ton of examination and discussion from this on the staff forums. You're of course right that the staff isn't infallible, we're human, working for free, and doing our best.

That being said the opening post seems like an amalgam of an invitation for constructive criticism of the event, a Jerry McGuire goodbye speech, and a discussion of a personal conflict with one or two members of the staff. While you say that locking or deleting the thread will only strengthen your arguments, the public forums are not going to be the place to discuss personal conflicts between players or staff. If that happens the thread will be locked, moved, or deleted. If you've got a greivance with something a staff member did, please take it to the help forum.

[Vala Rift]

I can't give my opinion on the exact details, because I didn't attend the event.
However, from what I have gathered OOC, you may have been putting a lot of pressure on the DMs with your actions.

When there is a large event, they are tasked with setting things up accordingly - chess, if you will. When they are not informed of what a player intends to do ahead of time, then all their preparations tend to go to waste and, I imagine, it can get really frustrating.

Now, if my understanding is correct and you chose to act on your own volition (even within the realm of RP) without informing a DM ahead of time, I can only suggest you read this post: Good DM Event Etiquette

I can't say I wouldn't have done the same thing under that kind of pressure. People have limits, and DMs are no exception.

If however, you did immediately inform a DM of your intentions within an adequate amount of time and were not given the option - I could reason a bit more in favor of you.

From my, relatively outside, perspective.. Both sides are at fault for various reasons and it shouldn't be a reason for you to quit. We should all learn from this and allow it to become an experience that makes Sundren an even better place to RP. We've taken two steps forward, and now we have our one step back.. So lets get on with the next two steps again.

[Phantom Lamb]

The DM team made a promise at the last community meeting that it wouldn't contribute to public back-and-forths and aire dirty laundry. It isn't fair to the 95% of the community that just don't want to hear drama.

That being said, I hope those that read this consider that what's being writen is only one side of the story.

I will leave this thread open so long as it stays constructive. Folks, feel free to post, but not to argue. We're interested in hearing feedback about things and are open to suggestions for improvement. But please refrain from play-by-play details. If this turns into a chat logging, TLDR post, it loses value.

TAR--making demands about "what you expect" for this thread will lead it to being locked, should they continue. Please be respectful.

[prismaticcrow]

As one of the one's who was there, I feel the need to speak up on this. In essence. I believe Red is in the right here, for the most part.

The bottom line was, if we didn't go along with event as was predetermined, we were doomed. We were given no options or alternatives.

I am a PnP DM, and have been for over ten years now. This story arc had some great potential but it also possessed something that many great stories that are created by DM's tend to get. It was a railroad. For those unfamiliar with this term, it means, essentially, that the story was on a track, and there was no way to deviate from it. It means that the DM consciously or unconsciously closes every avenue and every door of possibility until only one remains for the players to walk through.

As a DM, one's responsibility is not to the story. It is to the players. The whole point of being a DM is to facilitate roleplay and entertainment among your player group. If that means they one-shot the big bad villian by accident, so be it. It happens. You move on and start other stories. The problem here, in this event, is that the story took precedence over the players. DM characters were made more important than player characters.

Another thing that was bandied about was accusations of peer pressure and sabotage, which are completely and utterly false. At no point was I coerced into doing what we did. None of us were. Do you realize that every single PC who went in to fight Averganon was there because they were following Baragorn, and not Balthasar? Whats so wonderful about that, is that we were all there because we believed in what we were doing! Not once did Baragorn demand that we see things his way. Not once did he ask us to help him! He never attempted to sabotage anything! We all were completely and totally in character and were totally into the event, up until the point where we realized we were doomed in that last fight.

I don't think those running the event realized how genuine and excellent most of that event was for us. When we stood against Balthasar and the others in the name of what was good and right? Oh man. That was so heavy and excellent. I honestly thought that was how things had been planned! To see one Paladin face of against his fallen breathren? Good lord that was excellent stuff. Now it seems that they very event was actually a triggering point for DM disapproval! We apparently had ruined the planned arc for the paladin to work with evil and now we were going to suffer for it in a futile battle.

Let me ask you two questions. These questions should make you consider whether or not this was a railroad:

1) Was there any way for one of the players to convince Balthasar not to fall? Would you have allowed a PC to talk to him, and stop him from falling?

2) Was there any way for the PC's to convince Balthasar not to go through with it, later, when he was there with the other evil people? Would you have allowed any PC to talk him down from his action?

Were I DM, let me tell you how I would have considered things:

Ok, so the players have totally blindsided me and killed Balthasar. Obviously, I was not expecting this. My first thought should not be, okay, now I will punish them for ruining everything. My first thought should be "Can they still beat this thing?" If so, how? Red posted his idea about how he would permanently kill his character to see this deed done. That, in my opinion, would have been an excellent way to facilitate the destruction of the anti-phylactery. Let me remind you that there was, indeed, advanced warning about player intentions. I knew what Red was planning the whole time. I knew that Red's intention was to sacrifice Baragorn. He did, indeed, make a post about it to the DM's in advance.

I would have had the players walk in there, fight the lich, and perhaps they defeat him. But wait! He's a lich! Not just any lich too, a special one! Why could he not have been killable, only he would regenerate in a few minutes? That would have given us players enough time to attempt to come up with an alternative solution, or, if the DM feels there can be no solution now, then it would have at least allowed us to flee, knowing full well we had failed.

All of these options should have been available to us, because, as a DM, it is one's responsibility to provide alternatives when the players throw you a curveball, not punish them for not going along with your idea. It would be the equivilant of dropping a Ancient Red Dragon on a low-level party, and expecting them to fight it, not allowing for any other solution, such as parlay or stealth, or anything else the players might come up with.

Another thing to consider is the community implications. Do you realize that I have heard of three other players that might leave the server over this? Do you realize the implications of permanently killing a dozen long-term player characters? No one should have that kind of authority. Following such logic, a DM could run a small event where Bandits ambush a lone PC and murder him for his stuff, then dispose of the body. "Oh well, your permanently dead now. Too bad. Make something else."

It boils down to responsibility. As a DM, one is responsible for ensuring his players are a part of the story, and not just watching it unfold before them. As a DM, one is responsible for ensuring players are given choices, and that they make their own decisions and suffer them if need be. But such is not the case here. We were given no other option, but to suffer for not going along.

I truly am sorry if I come off badly as I type all this down, but I feel it is something that must be said. People are leaving because of this event, and that should alert to you that something is terribly wrong.

[Phantom Lamb]

Let me make sure we're on the same page folks.

We're not going to discuss right or wrong. We're discussing feedback about how we can improve DM events for the future. That's it. I see a level of drama in the above posts that need to be toned down for any constructive feedback to be gleaned. If it starts sounding like a lecture again, it will be locked.

Thank you for understanding.

[Saulus]

You guys will get over it. It's only a video game character.

[Intrepid42]

In reply to Phantom Lamb, I think the main issue is one of narrative.

Most "heroic fantasy" stories involve "Heroes overcome the odds and defeat the Evil". There are also "Team up with the Lesser Evil to defeat the Greater Evil" narratives.

However, speaking as a casual player without much knowledge of the back-story, it seemed the narrative you were trying to play out was "Team up with the Greater Evil (two evil gods) against the Lesser Evil (one evil lich)". This looked like a rather different sort of event, and player resistance should have been expected.

Sure, it was clear the lich was particularly powerful and probably the more imminent threat. However, in standard Forgotten Realms Bane and Myrkul are/were two divine incarnations of evil. I mean, those guys are/were just plain Nasty.

I suggest that for these sort of events you provide back-story in the post announcing the event. Either that, or keep the PC's well away from your protagonist. Putting Tormites and Banites in the same room is just asking for trouble...

[Redjack]

As a member of team evil I was happy to be available for players to kill.
As my usual play style I was multitasking between family and Sundren and was a bit confused to the change in story line when I discovered that half the party had changed to hostile. Not a problem as I am flexible and can go with the flow of events. Disappointed? Only in that I was unable to take more of you with me to the FOEN. I can understand the emotion of losing a battle but not getting too worked up over it. I am looking forward to whatever the DMs and developers have planned for Sundren in the upcoming days. Now if we can all get back to the serious business to killing each other.

[TheBrogueadier]

Well, firstly I’ll stick my hand up and say “I wasn’t there!”, but I’ll happily throw my oar in regardless.

Firstly I need to express some confusion as to the “Killing of a dozen long-term player characters” as I understood it from the RP post on the subject the only truly dead character is Baragorn (who was going to sacrifice himself anyway) – It seems the rest were picked up by a Scholli and returned to the Triumvirate.

Now, it seems to me that we have some fantastic stuff to be going on with:

The Triumvirate –
Balthasar was a loved man, but represented the old guard, his principles had grayed and tarnished with the long years of his service. He was, rightly or wrongly, willing to work with an ever present threat to crush an immediate threat.

Baragorn, a relative newcomer; full of fire and fueled by a passionate devotion to the church. Never willing to compromise his faith he led what the bards would call a heroic charge against a god-like foe.

But now both are lost, the twisting of Balthasar’s soul as he fell so severe he’s become an undead servant of a heinous lich. Will this old/new contrast bring on a split in the Triumvirate?

Baneites –
The Lich was no friend of theirs, and no doubt the idea of working with the Triumvirate wasn’t a fun prospect for them. They’ve suffered a blow from having a paladin getting all heroic on their clergy, they’ve had a lot of setbacks recently – How’re they going to recover? How’re they going to put the fear back into the land?

Lich –
People mistook him for a small moon, but thankfully some of the good guys had a managed to smuggle out a small golem containing plans on the liches magic – These had revealed one weakness in his powerbase, all it would take was two magic balls to his exhaust port and he’d be doomed, but with enough firepower to destroy planets it would be a tough battle and small fighters would have little impact in a frontal assault.

Unfortunately only morally bankrupt people launch an assault on someones exhaust port, a full frontal assault was launched and repelled, thankfully during the assault enough damage was done to incapacitate the deathstar and contain it for now. But now it’s got Balthys soul.


Generally –
The Triumvirate and it’s allies are hurting, they’ve lost two good men and have split public support, but they have shown the Baneites that they are a force to be rekoned with – unflinching in their ideals.
But they’re still hurting, the lich is still out there and to make it worse it’s using their former leader as a puppet.

What is the Legion going to do? The Veritas could capitalize on the situation by making a huge fuss that the Legion barely got involved, the only survivor seems to be a Legion Scholli – Was it his cowardice that cost the fight?

The Corsairs have been making huge headway in recruiting, now their Captain is wounded and part of a defeated party – What impact will this have on the Sestra Militia.

What’ll the Thayans do? How can the Cartel turn this into a profit making situation? Can Exigo push up weapon and armour sales on the back of the threat of this Lich?



Yes, on this occasion the good-guys didn’t win, and yes, it looks like they’ve lost a head piece (although charmingly they still have the head). BUT, that opens up a massive amount of potential RP goodness for everyone.


Rather than getting bogged down in the details and whyfors of what happened – When it’s crunch time and there’s text flying everywhere I suspect it’s easy for sharp words to slip out of stressed keyboards – and let’s take this as an opportunity to really get some story based goodness on.

It’s a personal opinion, but being able to win everything simply because winning is what gives you a warm glow is a bit dull – Loosing is always an option, and on this case despite a valiant charge the good guys lost, so did the bad guys..

In fact seeing as the baneite/evil team were killed by team good, so they lost, and team good / Triumvirate were killed by the god-lich, so they lost... As far as I can see the only winner here is everyone; everyone that has the decency to see an ongoing story for what it is – Something to be going on with.

[Intrepid42]

On reading the above posts and my post again, I may not have expressed my point properly.

Where I say the most common heroic fantasy narrative is "Heroes overcome the odds and defeat the Evil", substitute "Good attempts to overcome seemingly impossible odds".

It was clear from the beginning that things were going to get messy, and I went in completely uncertain of the outcome both OOC and IC, though my PC was prepared to go down fighting. My PC was not present at the final battle upstairs, but would have gladly joined them in defeat were he present.

The point I tried to make was that it seemed to me that staff were surprised so many players tried to choose a "Dumb but honorable" option for their PC's, rather than the "Smart but morally dubious" option laid out. In retrospect this should not have been a surprise: "Evil will triumph because Good is stupid" and "Why must those wretched do-gooders always get in the way!" are cliches for a reason...

In reply to the above posters, I happen to agree with you. The forces of Light have been dealt a heavy blow, as have the would-be allies. The lich yet endures, and the story continues. It's cool.

[Urithrand]

Right... got it... in future, when I plan events which must be solved by good and evil working together, allow the good guys to do whatever the hell they want, then spoonfeed them their happy ending afterwards. How could I have been so stupid.

[prismaticcrow]

I'm going to respond to the previous post in private since I do not wish to appear like an antagonist.

I will only say, that we, as team good, did not expect to win. The real issue here isn't about us expecting to win all the time. I guarentee you, that none who were there is mad that they failed. Failure can lead to greater roleplay.

I will only say, the real issue here, is how players were treated.

[TheBlankStare]

The big thing that seems to have really ticked off The Almight Red though is the way he was treated during and after the event. That kind of thing really needs to be addressed but by the staff, not the community at large. Witch hunts are only fun when there's a real witch involved. Let the staff sort that stuff out. It's icky to deal with anyway. Besides, they've got access to the logs.

Now, how could the series of events leading up to the finale and the finale itself been better and how can the staff improve? Here is my attempt.

prismaticcrow has a lot of it right in his first post in this thread. The focus of the event seemed to be on Balthasar more than on the players. NPCs should be facilitators and antagonists. They shouldn't be the stars of the show. It's fine for them nudge players in one direction or another but they shouldn't take the place of the players at all.

I think that in the future events that take into account multiple solutions to a single problem would be better. If a situation came up where Team Evil was forced to show Team Good all of their cards in order to accomplish something this same type of thing would have likely happened. Good and evil don't get along for very long without lots of strife. It's one of the reasons it's been such a good story element for as long as anyone can remember and it's one of the reasons that every version of the DMG has advised against having good and evil characters in the same party.

I think the big deal with what happened recently though was that Team Good was given exactly one option to rid the world of a dangerous force and that option was to, quite literally, sell their souls down the river. (Poor Balthasar.) That was the only option presented. I remember learning about this and thinking, "In all of Sundren, Toril and the Planes, there isn't one other individual or group that could fix the darn thing? It has to be done by these super evil people?!"

It all boils down to one of the DM axioms that I've followed for a really long time in my PnP game and one that's been proven to work by countless DMs over the years. "Find a way to say yes if at all possible." It seems like there were a lot of "absolutely nots" through this whole plot line when maybe a couple of "Hmm, what ifs" would have made things run, develop and finish much more smoothly. If events are planned where good and evil must work together I'm afraid you're going to be doomed to have history repeat itself.

This is one of those situations where involving even more players would have likely been better than forcing the PCs down a single path. Getting a couple of PC crafters involved in remaking the sword could have alleviated a lot of the tension in the air (and have provided some very interesting RP). I can imagine a couple of dwarven smiths spending hours reworking the sword over a forge. I can see a bunch of priests with the Craft Arms and Armor feat standing in a circle around the thing and imbuing it with the powers of goodness and light. You could even set Spellcraft, Concentration or even Knowledge (Religion) checks with high DCs that make the whole thing dangerous to attempt. One failure by the circle of priests and the sword could have created a deadly backlash.

While all of this "repair work" was going on the Ultimate Bad Guy (UBG) could have easily learned of it and started working with Team Evil to get back/destroy the sword. This would have done a couple of interesting things. A) Instead of Team Evil having to assist those goodie-two-shoes defeat the UBG they could have been given the task of intercepting Team Good and been highly rewarded for it if they succeeded. B) Team Good could have actually been . . . well . . . good instead of morally questionable in the whole affair.

[Urithrand]

On "Railroading". Sometimes in life, there are problems which only have 3 options. Do something you don't like to solve the issue, ignore the issue entirely, or try something different to solve the issue despite knowing that it won't work in the long run.

For example: Your marriage is completely broken down. There is no hope of retrieval, you've both cheated on each other and betrayed each others' trust, but you're staying together for the sake of some misplaced notion that things might eventually sort themselves out. The options here are simple: Stay together and ignore the problem. Try more and more insane things to rebuild the failed marriage which will ultimately fail. And finally, you can get divorced. The first is undoubtedly the easiest. The second is what most people would try, but fail and end up just as miserable in the first place. The third option is the elephant in the room - the thing that no-one wants to do, but the only thing that will ultimately and finally solve the problem.

In this situation, there's no mystical or fabulous fourth choice which will override all the other choices and save the day. There is no DM to say "Wow, they're trying really hard, let's just give them this one."

Sometimes there just isn't a fourth option. DMs indulged every effort to find one, we've all run events for people searching for one, we've had a lot of fun doing it, and we've had the players fail for that very reason. There just wasn't a fourth option. Period. And I absolutely will not apologise for designing an event this way because it's just the way it is, sometimes you gotta do or die.

People calling this railroading have clearly never been in a failed marriage. Not to mention it's quite irritating.

On player abuse. The issues here are not up for public debate. Many times in the past we've had an issue similar to this, and I'm going to get something very clear.

The staff do not discuss player indiscretions on the public forums. Nor should we. It's a certain level of maturity and proffessionalism that enables us to keep these things private and discussed through the correct avenues behind the scenes.

Unfortunately, players with a bee in their bonnet do not have the same qualms about making their problem extremely public. Posts in the forums can do a bit of damage, but tells amongst friends, ooc in game and private messages are much more personal, perfect avenues to garner misplaced trust, and thus give the antagonist a great deal more credibility.

I'm sure you can see where I'm going with this. We as the staff have no defense against these claims, because we're tied by morality and duty not to respond, and expose the reasons why this player has been the receiving end of the proverbial boot once or twice. I will point no fingers, and name no names, but I will not allow people to point the finger of shame at the staff when they have absolutely no clue what's been going on behind the scenes, except what they have heard from the alleged "victim".

On Permadeath. This server uses permadeath. And this is something which players will always assume is some form of punishment or personal affront against them. This is simply not the truth. Permadeath is used in situations where the character dies and there is no logical or excusable reason why they can and should be ressurrected.

The players who assaulted Averganon are a prime example of this. They destroyed their single chance at success. Had they then walked away, the entire event could have been remodelled and reworked through another series of events. But they didn't. They walked into a room where they found a completely invulnerable lich, and they fought him. When the doors were opened, they could have still run away, but they didn't. They all died.

Then a building collapsed on top of them.

Then the pocket plane where those crushed bodies were situated imploded in on itself.

I'm sure you can see where I'm going with this so suffice to say that permadeath in this situation was not discussed as a punishment, it was just a ridiculous unavoidable truth.

Luckily, there was enough sympathy amongst the DM staff and divided decisions that could not reach a majority vote, so we allowed the players another chance, and gave them their life back, with the exception of the instigator himself.

And that's pretty much all I have to say on the matter.