Do you feel your character can make a difference?

[Jai_V]

Y'know, the only part of this that really caught my eye was the "Level 15 should be treated like royalty" approach and everyone neglected to mention that beautiful Sundren "Reputation" system that seems to be severely under-used, sometimes.

I mean, I remember a few times I ended up in events, I'd ask the DM to for-go the normal reward in favor of my character gaining Rep points.

Maybe Maia, and other characters interested in fame/infamy should invest their DM attention on accruing Rep?

[Bishop Cornelius]

I totally concur, Jai V...

But thankfully the DMs/Devs have told us about the Faction System

I am very much looking forward to all the fun things the DMs/Devs have in store for the faction system upcoming ways to gain rep... I've already seen an improvement in rep-gain recently... and I think it will only continue to improve...

Specifically relating to the point in case y'all can't tell already:
I think faction involvement is one of the major ways that my (or your) character can effect things in the world.

[Gurkak]

I voted for option:

1. Yes, I feel my actions can change the world of Sundren.

What form and to what extent that change manifests is up in the air for reasons that are fairly blatant given that Sundren is a PW.



Commenting on GodBeastX's earlier post(26 back from this one), I just wanted to chime in that I've always been a strong supporter of a lower level cap rather than boosting the power of all of the beings in a setting so that characters can get an artificial high from making the double digits on their character sheets; however, that's a discussion for another topic.

[grant]

Yes and No.
Its not logical to assume that the Devs. will trot out and replace the Trading post because I want it burnt down.

I like to think my characters can make a difference... Some of them like to think so.

[Root]

Voted no based on my timezone. Very little in the way of DM events or such appears to happen any earlier than midnight for me.

[JuneyGnomey]

I didn't vote; there was no option for "No. You grossly overestimate my character and what motivates her."

[MadSeer]

I have to vote "no" with my experience up to now.
My first issue is in game. I've seen several events go on up to now, but none were friendly to lower levels. Which meant if you went anywhere near them without being level 20, you died. Low level characters need some attention from the DMs too, even if it's just a mini event thrown to a party adventuring in the Viridale that allows these level 6s to be the "heroes" for a few minutes. It makes a huge difference.

Second, my character has been trying to get his faction's help for the past 2 weeks and a half, but I still have to get any kind of DM input either on the faction forum or in the request forum.

I can't speak for the other character requests as I can't see them, so maybe it's just me, but in my opinion, being more active in the two departments stated above (low level focused events and character requests) would help greatly in giving the players choice, or something.

[Anrilor]

I am going to go with a yes and no on this one. I have seen players change things, the shar's abbodon coming into play and Vraer going "hmm, i want to know more about it" makes my character go "why does the guy trying to bring back Myrkul want with a anti-magic crater." and started looking around and asking those she knew that have been around longer than her what it was all about. Only Problem? I can't figure out how to word a request that basicly goes "I want to try and learn more about this area and see about discerning why Vraer wants to know about this place." when My PC doesn't have the needed skills, or even has a clue to what those skills would be to research more.

the other half is when Saulus through a large bone at Ami and a few others when he had two NPCs talking about how close they are to raising Myrkul. When I went around ICly going "hey! holy crap! vampires are just a thorn in the side compared to this! they are looking for this Item, what do you know about it?" the older PCs went "yeah, we know they have that." and seemed really apathetic to the whole situation, as if OOCly they felt they couldn't do anything to stop the god of death from returning. "oh" they go OOC "its a Saulus event, we tried but he stonewalled us." which to me as a player who recently has come into a bit of power and feels like she can change the world. is a little daunting because in the back of a lot of older player heads they are already defeated.

Now I am going to admit, I used to hold a poor opinion of Saulus because of the few posts i seen him do on the player side that I read were "no you can't have that because I said so!" and the opinions that other players have told to me. However the last event that I had with him completely changed my outlook on him by the simple tell he gave me after my character was dead. which simply stated "you know the full consequences of attacking a vampire stronghold and dying within its grounds right?" to which I replied "yeah, probably a PK right?" and he sent back "we'll see, based on what these characters do next." Turns out... not that bad of a guy, he isn't out to PK every good guy and have the bad guys win all the time, in fact my character was taken prisoner by the vampires, and was released after some deal was made. that's right, the good guys saved the other good guys from prison! in a Saulus event!

all in all though, i think players can change some events, but I think the DMs also have the right to go "I came up with this story that is going to play out over a few RL years, and yes, somethings you wont be able to stop." however, part of it should be a choose your own adventure book, sure some of it might be stonewalled and unchangable, but leave a few parts open so that we can reroute the story to our liking. be it for team good or evil.


and as a final note.... team good get off your ass and do something! rather than waiting for something to happen and try to stop it, actively plan for what is coming ahead while stopping what is happening now. stop being reactionary, and start planning ahead, its the only way to stop team evil!

also side bar, why don't DMs ever mess with team evil?... you know, like take a bunch of NPC adventurers and go mess with their plots a bit :P


Edit: also suggestion for when DMs stop and disapear, have another DM pick up where he left off. because it makes it a bit hard for anyone to do anything when they get half way through and they loose the DM support they needed

[Saulus]

Of course everything in a plot is not changeable, otherwise DMs would have a hard time planning anything interesting, but there will always be parts of the plot people can affect.

No one seems interested in stopping the Myrkulites at all even though I give the opportunity to do something. Eventually I will just assume no one on the good side cares anyway.

I'm very informal with my events but I find people don't try things often enough as if the risk of me denying them is too great to afford the risk. If I say no, its likely a good underlying reason, I just don't always have the patience to justify my reasoning behind every decision.

[Anrilor]

If I say no, its likely a good underlying reason, I just don't always have the patience to justify my reasoning behind every decision.

nor should you, because if you did that, you would have to give out things that would probably be too much info and meta'd. All I'm saying is that it would be nice to have a few more of those chances to turn the plot.

now one thing I have also noticed is that, when vampires feel like attacking, they get little NPC minions to help too, or when defending if a DM is on and requests some support in attacking. now, i was just curious if a good PC that had some rank in a faction, say the legion, asked a DM for a few legionarres to go up and attack some baddies somewhere, would we get it? i think that would help with some plans too.

[BedlamX]

I'm sticking with "no"..but with a slight caveat.

High level toons, it the larger (or just the right one at the time) have a chance to get things done. Change the world? Maybe not. But get something done. If you are a lower level (or one of my wimpy builds :P), realistically, the only way you can get anything accomplished is if a DM decides to champion your cause. No one will listen to you due to your lack of experience. You can't do things on your own without a DM present and actively watching you...then that may or may not help as many times if a DM takes note of a player, bad things happen to them. As Mad said, it seems like a waste of time to post any kind of character request as the staff can only get to so many and, from the list of topics and replies at the bottom of the screen, there are only certain ones that seem to get answered (on the forums, at least...may be getting answered in game).

So it's not like no one cares about events and bad things happening. It's more an OOC reaction to lack of responces and talk in tells about the same that seems to have made many feel it is a lost cause. Without hope, apathy reigns supreme.

Ugh...sorry...this sounds more like a rant than a logically though out post. Hate it when I do that.

[Torgar]

I voted yes, but it's a moderate yes, not a definite one. I've been part of some of the more pertinent events this last year as both Torgar and Tigen, and some of them have been changed greatly because of how either I or another player has reacted, thus taking the event in new ways neither side thought was going to happen. But i've also been part of events where the conclusion is forgone from the very begining so there is no point in trying to respond outside of where the event is going to go.

However, that being said, I still greatly enjoy all the events i'm part of, even if over 50% of them I have never seen an xp, faction, or item reward for it. In the end, that doesn't bother me too much, as long as the events i'm part of that are important make me feel like me being part of it mattered.

I will also add, however, that I often hear more then once in a given play session that when I'm trying to facilitate some kind of change, however minor, that the other players involved usually respond to my efforts with "Dude,there is no point to you trying this, the DM's don't even pay attention to our requests." Now, I know that's not really true, and I know that the staff gets a LOT of requests, many of it for things that will not happen because it's either against policy or just isn't really being asked for correctly. Part of that is perhaps that many players posts simply go unanswered for weeks at a time, so they feel neglected. If these lost souls could get a simple "we have looked at your request and are discussing it, we will get back to you at a later time." they may feel a lot better about themselves and feel differently about GBX's primary question. Thanks for letting me rant like that.

[Machiavelli]

In terms of achieving IC stuff, people just need to be proactive. That said, you might well say "I've tried, but you guys aren't helping!", and this may in fact be true. A lot of it depends on not just how you ask, but what you ask for. By this I don't mean whether you're asking for something big or small... ah, I wrote a post about this ages back, I'm just going to link it. Sorry, too lazy to rewrite something I already made a perfectly good post about!

[Edit] Looking back over my original post, it was mostly intended for requests taken in game, but it applies to character requests as well. If you just say what you want, the chances that you'll get it are basically zero. If you explain your goal and give an intended course of action, your chances of help are greatly improved. If you can't think of a course of action, feel free to ask for advice, but I'd encourage you to use your creativity before doing this if possible (though it isn't always possible for people who aren't too familiar with the server and so forth).

P.S. Feel free to Necro on my old post if you like to make comments that would be off topic in this thread.

[Sir Kharn]

Hmm..i voted yes but it was some time ago. At the time i was thinking that yes it is possible to have an impact on Sundren due to some things i was beginning to get involved with, Kharn had joined the legion and had some awesome encounters with some of the denizens that roam the valley and thru the RP the followed he began to develop in ways that i had not intended. Almost everyone around him has over time had one effect or another over him, helping him/me to make decisions that further effected his development until he is where he is at today. He might not be in the Legion anymore but he still does what he can to protect his friends and Sundren whenever the need arises.
He/I does this because of the impact that those around him have had on him. And i'd like to think that maybe i've had some impact on those around me in the same manner.

I guess my point is this, just because what you do might not get put in stone don't think for a minute that your actions have no impact because i can say personally from my time here that they do.
Just my thoughts tho, feel free to throw any soft kind of vegetable produce at me

[Raistlin Feenix]

I believe I can change the world.