Timeline

[[DM] Grinning Death]

So, I have a question for you guys. The server has been in existence now for about five years (not counting before PW's were a possibility with NWN2). Not many people have been here that long, especially not me, but let me say this: A lot of stuff has happened in that time period. Like, a lot.

I was curious as to your opinions on how time has progressed since then. It's only been five years, but gametime goes far faster than RL. If you've had a PC for six months, he/she has probably become a relatively seasoned adventurer.

So what I want to know is this: How would you guys feel about the clock moving forward on the timeline? Having your characters age depending on how long they've been around (i.e. your 1 year RL PC gaining 3 years onto their age)?

For some races like dwarves and elves, this won't matter a whole lot. But for humans, we'll be talking seasoning of your PC's.

And yes, I do realize there are certain issues (My PC Bob has been in existence for three years, but I never played him and he's still level 10 even though he's been a Legionnaire. Why hasn't he leveled/ ranked up?), but I'm just trying to get a feel for what you think.

Thank you!

[Snowmane]

I would be ok with it, but there are a lot of questions that would need to be answered before it moved ahead.

How would aging affect older characters? Stat losses? Chance for death? 5 years RL time would be 15 years game time and those who have older characters may be in real danger of death from old age.

The biggest problem I see however is that Forgotten Realms itself has changed a lot in the years subsequent to Sundrens "current year" 1372. The biggest change being when WotC revamped Faerun with the SpellPlague in order to usher in 4th edition, and that happened in the year 1385! A quick browsing of the forgotten realms wiki also shows that there were a lot of changes on the world stage between 1372-1385 which could be problematic to intergrate with sundren lore.

So either we would need to very clearly announce that this is a divergent timeline from PnP or somehow restrict the timeline to pre-1385 so as to reduce confusion for new players joining the server.

[[DM] Grinning Death]

This is purely conjecture, but seeing as we've already stepped from the original timeline (Kelemvor dying, Myrkul, etc.) I wouldn't see it as a huge leap if we ignored the Spellplague stuff. And the example was just that, it's simply an inquiry on my part.

[Seheren]

To do so, I think it would take a lot of thought into what lore is used and what isn't. That said, if that is taken into consideration, its the beauty of a fantasy realm. You make it just the way you want it. Diverging from post 1372 lore to fit what has happened on this server makes complete sense.

[Tamha]

I was going to make a post about this, as a matter of fact. At the very least, I would like it if instead of people treating the world as if it's been in the year 1372 for the past 5 years, that it's now actually 1377. I know that the in-game clock resets every time the server does, which is why it's always the month of Kythorn, but as players we should at least be able to recognize the passing of real time, at a minimum.

I also agree that we are already, clearly, on a divergent timeline, so having that posted somewhere makes sense whether we add additional "seasoning" or not.

If we do add extra time passing in Sundren and work out all the details of such, I would make one suggestion: instead of having it apply retroactively to the last five years, just start it applying when the details are finalized and it can officially go into effect. As a player that took a year off, I know that personally I've been playing my characters as if they have been gone for just one year. I also know that there are others that have been treating the time in game as the same as real time since we haven't had a system in place for it before. To have to go back and say, for example, "whoops, I was gone for 3 years, not just one" would be more confusing I think than just shifting to treat the time as moving faster only after the change is implemented.

[pidcocjn]

I would be all for this, if the length of days IG were greatly increased (and resting was modified to reflect this increase in time per day).

I just don't like the idea of going to bed, waking up, going to work for 9 hours (Probably 18-19 hours elapsed), and knowing that my character has suddenly missed out on 7 days in her life (or however long days are now).

[Saulus]

^ Time will never be adjusted on Sundren for a multitude of reasons. One of the bigger ones is our vampire system would be crippled if for an entire day of realtime it was DAY out.

Time has been always handled in a relative fashion because of the fact that it's a game and certain liberties have to be taken into consideration.

[pidcocjn]

^ Time will never be adjusted on Sundren for a multitude of reasons. One of the bigger ones is our vampire system would be crippled if for an entire day of realtime it was DAY out.

Time has been always handled in a relative fashion because of the fact that it's a game and certain liberties have to be taken into consideration.

I understand this, and that point is taken. But I didn't mean to imply game time would need to be converted to real time. More say, 1 full game day takes 4-6 real hours and the gap in resting could be expanded to fit this.

While increasing the duration it takes for time to lapse in Sundren would be detrimental to the vampire system in some ways, it would also add to the RP aspect of them. No longer would a vampire have to go inside every 30 real minutes because the sun is coming out. Instead, they'd have an hour, maybe two.

Of course, that's just one issue brought up. I haven't a clue of the others, and I'm not even entirely sure what the day cycle is set to . It seems that about 1 real hour is equivalent to 24 game hours.

[Saulus]

It's 5 minutes (real time) per game hour and a lot of logic has been designed around that. Essentially for us to change it would involve a lot of tweaking after to fix all the problems that would arise.

We didn't haphazardly come up with this value for ingame time either.

[Doubtful]

No longer would a vampire have to go inside every 30 real minutes because the sun is coming out. Instead, they'd have an hour, maybe two.

The opposite would also be true, meaning that vampires would need to remain in safe areas for an hour, maybe two. For players with limited time to play this could effectivly put them out of play for entire sessions.

[Handsomeman]

The way i view the timeline in sundren is, it is on a constant standstill but characters are oblivious to it. Days, week, months can pass but the year will remain the same. As far as aging for characters is concerned, i have always treated it as a player preferance. For example, my paladin and a warrior has been traveling together for sometime during their youth. The warrior stops playing for a rl year and then comes back rping as an old wrinkled woman, while i was still rping as a young handsome paladin. I just dismissed it by saying something like, wow you sure dont age well.

[[DM] Grinning Death]

Yeah, the day system isn't going anywhere. I speaking in broader terms, with large events that happen such as the Lizard War, Genum's Cube, etc, which would be the basis of applying it retroactively.

There wouldn't be any benefits, or disadvantages to aging. And honestly? Most PC's haven't been around the entire five years. Most of the current population has been around for two years, tops. Which (if we were going by my previous example) would translate to around 6 years of experience for players.

And a lot of PC's aren't all that old. From what I've seen, most are in their early to mid twenties, so I doubt anyone would be dying from old age.

[roguethree]

The opposite would also be true, meaning that vampires would need to remain in safe areas for an hour, maybe two. For players with limited time to play this could effectivly put them out of play for entire sessions.

What vampires? *he brushes his hands together, wiping off ash and dust* Haven't seen any in a while.

[pidcocjn]

The opposite would also be true, meaning that vampires would need to remain in safe areas for an hour, maybe two. For players with limited time to play this could effectivly put them out of play for entire sessions.

Which is what I was considering with the first part of my statement.

Anyhow, if my math is correct, if characters were to age at the same pace at which the game-time now progresses it would equate to each character aging nearly twelve years per real year.

That just doesn't sit well with me.

There wouldn't be any benefits, or disadvantages to aging.

EDIT: That changes my feelings, then.

[roguethree]

Yeah, no one's suggesting that. GD is proposing three years of age for every real-life year the character has existed. E.g., Dain turns two years old in February, so Dain would age 6 years.