A Land Far Away

Hi.

I am not going to be my usual long-winded self and just cut to the chase. The proposal is really very simple. We temp-retire servers with less activity on them and consolidate resources on servers with more. Players that actually interact should beat having several servers. Is it possible to merge WHL with BG? We look through servers to see if there is any fat to be trimmed and we do away with things that prevents players from actually playing together. And we accept that ALFA has cartoon time so that travelling isn't really that big of an issue.

We're a small community, no need to act bigger than we are. Just remove the excess "fat" for now, and then focus on putting on weight when we're growing at a pace that works.


Anyways. 2cp.

Highly agreed.

This idea's interesting to me as one of the newer players who generally only has time to log in when I see no one (save for the Tuesday sessions) on WHL, yet do see players on other servers, but don't dare to stroll off onto said other server in case I can't make it back in time for WHL sessions (24hrs waiting time). For the builders/DMs of course it might involve a lot of work and hassle; understandably.

No.

Consolidating BG and WHL would mean I would lose DM status, as I have no desire to DM on BG.

Adanu wrote:No.

Consolidating BG and WHL would mean I would lose DM status, as I have no desire to DM on BG.

It wouldn't have to be the "same" server, just sharing living quarters, Adanu.

Also, I'd like to think that DMs are trusted well enough to allow them to be able to play where they DM. I mean, we trust them with just about everything else. We grant them "improved" status, able to vote in some elections that we mere mortals are not allowed to vote in, potentially deciding the direction of the community. But we don't trust them not to cheat? I say that is one archaic rule that needs to go.

Supposed risk of DM abusing power vs allowing further player connectivity. The profit from this looks greater than the loss.

It wouldn't have to be the "same" server, just sharing living quarters, Adanu.

At first I thought I misread the original post or this post in some way. But if the point is that while BG & WHL regions might be merged into one server, the DM administrative side would still be kept separate ("if you're near the Cloakwood, DM X is in charge"), then I still agree with the OP.

BG & WHL should be examples in this though, not what I'm necessarily looking to merge or change.

This idea's interesting to me as one of the newer players who generally only has time to log in when I see no one (save for the Tuesday sessions) on WHL, yet do see players on other servers, but don't dare to stroll off onto said other server in case I can't make it back in time for WHL sessions (24hrs waiting time). For the builders/DMs of course it might involve a lot of work and hassle; understandably.

WHL and BG are already consolidated, effectively; travel between the 2 servers should not be an issue at all due to their close distance geography wise.

If the concern is 'I'm on WHL but I see folks on BG I'd like to RP with' that's not a problem, simply go there just as you would bring your toon from Beregost to BG or vice versa; no need to put both into one mod.

If the concern is 'I'm on WHL but I'd like to zip over to MS or TSM and back within 24 hours' that's another issue altogether, one that consolidating WHL with BG won't help with at all.

I may be supportive of the idea of consolidating BG/WHL if 1. it's even practical/feasible from a NWN2 builder (additional workload and module size limit) perspective and 2. it'll actually mean DM/builder etc presence effectively increases. i.e. instead of 1 active DM on one server and 3 active DMs on the other, you get 4 active DMs on a consolidated BG/WHL server. I'd be more enthused about the idea if instead of 1+3=4 we were looking at something like 3+4=7, but ce la vie. However if this means that Adanu stops DMing then the net gain is zero (actually -1, since one of these guys happens to be Heegz who DMs both servers currently).

As far as DMs playing where they DM... *sigh* the day may come when we're reduced to that, but I for one would like to hold out hope that's not necessary yet. I see this policy as a luxury that I'm very grateful for, for the benefit of both DMs and players (and admin as well who don't have to deal with as much crap), one which we hopefully can afford as long as we have more than one server and a decent pool of folks to RP with. The issue isn't so much about 'zomg we don't trust people to not cheat' as much as it is about not being naive about realities of human nature, as well as fun for the DM himself. Bringing Aglaril to MS for me was something I wasn't as enthused about because having DMed there there are some aspects of the mystery that aren't there for me on that server, and even if I'm not actively out to cheat, I have to make some effort to suppress my knowledge/brain damaged memory banks in order for me to both 1. enjoy the surprises of the server as much as I can and 2. avoid metagaming, even unintentionally/subconsciously. It should be for my own enjoyment that I DON'T WANT TO KNOW SPOILERS as much as possible as well as avoiding potential metagaming issues.

I've always been glad for the fact in ALFA things are set up to avoid such to a greater extent than on a 1 server PW, because I've seen firsthand the funk that happens on some other servers when this comes up. I personally hope the 'can't play where you DM' policy never ever changes here.

I agree totally with Ith on Playing where you DM or DMing where you Play, It is a very rare individual whom can totally ignore what they know. And even more rare to enjoy ignoring what you know when it works against you/your char. Even if someone works hard at it, unconscious metagaming will almost certainly occur. I've seen it on other servers and even had DM's lecturing me on how "C'mon you know I would never do that" having just finished a session in which they did it unintentionally and without realizing it. It does not need to be intentional to happen or need to be ill meant or harmful to be noticed.
I hope we need not combine servers or close any..I also hope we do not allow DM's to play where they DM..I've only ever seen one DM do it well and seen numerous others fail.

No DMing playing on the same server.
It's not even a matter of trust. People treat you differently when you DM, which is fine, but they should be playing with you on the same server as you DM. It's just too problematic even if we were all paladins in RL (which we are most certainly not).

however I could get behind removing all travel limitations.
I once thought that a 24h wait is too short and we should go for a longer wait.
But since then we seem to have lost many active players.

With our dwindling numbers removing said wait on server travel all together isn't a bad idea imm.

Copper wrote:Highly agreed.

This idea's interesting to me as one of the newer players who generally only has time to log in when I see no one (save for the Tuesday sessions) on WHL, yet do see players on other servers, but don't dare to stroll off onto said other server in case I can't make it back in time for WHL sessions (24hrs waiting time). For the builders/DMs of course it might involve a lot of work and hassle; understandably.

No worries on travel to BG, there no wait so you can always get back in time.
There might be some IC issues that you'll have to work out about why you left and came back and so on, and ofc you might die horribly as BG (while being richer in statics and goldz, is also more deadly to the unsuspecting noob)

Proposals forum is for new server proposals

I'd suggest players are free to agree to congregate wherever. If some group, even DMless, wanted to say "let's rock the Moonshaes all October long in Euro evenings" and sort of signal to each other that is where they all agree to make kind of preferred for the month... go nuts. Anyone who finds themselves alone on TSM during a Euro evening, well, if it's not secret that a come-one-come-all thing is going on elsewhere, at least the info is out there for the choice.

And yes sometimes "choice" will be "no I'm going to stay in character at my faction base, temple, dungeon, whatever" or "oh man I DM on the preferred server at that time so I can't play with these people unless as a DM" but again, still a choice.

Turning servers "dark" to say "hah, here are your 3 choices not 4" is a little less about choice, it's more forced congregation. Shut down 3 out of 4 at a time to make EVERYONE be on WHL or MS or whatever... not as good I guess.

As said rare imdividual who can compartmentalize information, I can understand that not everyone is like that, hence me not supporting the idea, even though I myself can.

If you are playing lonely heart on a server an other peeps are elsewhere...

Move, or use that 2nd pc.

Or even better, DM.

There is a lot of opposition to people playing where they DM, for a variety of reasons. I imagine we will have to get very small and desperate before such an option might become popular. I am pretty sure Exodus allowed their DMs to play a PC on their servers, and I don't recall it being a major issue. I wasn't part of their council for very long but I think I would have remembered any major issues there. Incidentally, this is part of the appeal of the other servers for me, as I could continue DMing as well as begin to play a PC again.

this was proposed before and dropped for some of the reasons Ith mentions. It's not worth the labor, you can already click a mouse to move btwn the servers, just like an AT , but with cooler effects.

We could simply remove the 24h wait.
1 server with DM sectors.
I used to think we should have a week wait between servers.
Really don't think it's important anymore compared to having people to play with.