The NWN1 platform - changing customs and rules

[Nalo Jade]

Lets just get this out of the way then:

NWN 1 Guys:

How do you feel about splitting away from ALFA, and getting your own website and forums. Make up your own rules, and pretty much start a new PW for NWN1 ?

I think it spells the downfall for ALFA as a whole. Splitting our community when it is at the weakest it has been would only make each part weaker still.

[Brokenbone]

For what it's worth Ksiel, DMA Ayergo has organized a discussion (which is ongoing with HDMs) regarding at least part of the stuff above, though other parts I think will probably also need examination.

The old "why won't you join us in NWN2, you must want your own community" tune (the same one that played during Cipher's exit from TAship, and Electryc's departure from ALFA DMing) is not likely to produce positive results when it never has before.

[Ksiel]

Just to reinforce that some of us don't have the rig to run NWN2. I have logged into the server, but I lag so bad even with graphic setting set at the lowest point possible it just wasn't fun. With the addition of twin boys to the family, I won't be able to update my system for quite some time.

Thanks for the heads up on the post BB.

Thanks Ayergo for starting a discussion "behind" the scenes.

I hope this discussion doesn't implode like so many before it.

[zicada]

For what it's worth Ksiel, DMA Ayergo has organized a discussion (which is ongoing with HDMs) regarding at least part of the stuff above, though other parts I think will probably also need examination.

The old "why won't you join us in NWN2, you must want your own community" tune (the same one that played during Cipher's exit from TAship, and Electryc's departure from ALFA DMing) is not likely to produce positive results when it never has before.

Right, sorry. I wasn't around much back then, guess i missed out on that. I don't understand it one bit, so I asked. If It's a dead horse, ignore.

To clearify: the last thing i want is a bunch of great ALFA members leaving in a huff. I want to solve the issue though. And to do that we HAVE to be realistic.

ALFA simply will always continue to go in the direction of NWN2 full steam. That is reality.

An argument I have heard and seen a lot is "why isn't ALFA NWN1 given any attention anymore?! We are the main attraction, we are the big platform" etc. Those statements are simply not true anymore, and completely contradict the arguments this whole thread started with,- namely that NWN1 is now so small that they demand specific rules.

Knowing all this, and knowing an admin body + HDM body vote is required to change the rules, as well as knowing where we currently stand on the subject, the options boil down to SPLIT being the only viable choice to "please everyone" as it were. Since I'm against that, as it would further weaken both camps, I would really consider the best option to be NWN1-people getting into NWN2 head first. It's not as horrible as you may think, and the 'I dont have a good enough rig' argument simply does not justify all this. Anyone who are passionate about this game can get a better videocard. It may take a few months to get the cash for some, but it's been 2 years now...

[Swift]

It's not as horrible as you may think, and the 'I dont have a good enough rig' argument simply does not justify all this. Anyone who are passionate about this game can get a better videocard. It may take a few months to get the cash for some, but it's been 2 years now...

You really do need to start living in reality and not some european fantasy land Zic.

Ill let the people that actually have families to feed tell you why that statement is so ignorant, but suffice to say, not everybody can just drop 200 or even 100 bucks on a video card just to play a new game. For some, it just isn't feasible to direct money to that, especially now.

[Brokenbone]

Fair enough post Zic... nothing confrontational, and of course, no need to be.

For what it is worth, the only reason I'd have to migrate from my current laptop (with non-great integrated video, and non-great everything else), to a laptop I could reasonably use for gaming, would be NWN2. NWN2, whether in ALFA or elsewhere, does not knock my socks off, not so much as to justify a gaming laptop type of budget. I do not intend to get a gaming desktop (cheap as they are), just doesn't fit my current needs... that plus new additions, twins, still not quite home from the hospital yet, equals a vast reprioritization in terms of what gets done with leisure time, or for that matter, disposable income.

[NickD]

A number of people still don't appear to realise that walking with the keyboard causes a fair bit of lag. I still get a little bit of lag with my 2 year old machine, but it's usually bareable as long as I use the mouse to move.

Or has that been fixed now?

[zicada]

It's not as horrible as you may think, and the 'I dont have a good enough rig' argument simply does not justify all this. Anyone who are passionate about this game can get a better videocard. It may take a few months to get the cash for some, but it's been 2 years now...

You really do need to start living in reality and not some european fantasy land Zic.

Ill let the people that actually have families to feed tell you why that statement is so ignorant, but suffice to say, not everybody can just drop 200 or even 100 bucks on a video card just to play a new game. For some, it just isn't feasible to direct money to that, especially now.

A GPU to run NWN2 well costs 50-60 bucks. What's that over 2 years ?

Maybe I'm completely crazy here, but 50-60 bucks for your favorite hobby,- that's not something only rich oil tycoons in Norway can afford.

[zicada]

Fair enough post Zic... nothing confrontational, and of course, no need to be.

For what it is worth, the only reason I'd have to migrate from my current laptop (with non-great integrated video, and non-great everything else), to a laptop I could reasonably use for gaming, would be NWN2. NWN2, whether in ALFA or elsewhere, does not knock my socks off, not so much as to justify a gaming laptop type of budget. I do not intend to get a gaming desktop (cheap as they are), just doesn't fit my current needs... that plus new additions, twins, still not quite home from the hospital yet, equals a vast reprioritization in terms of what gets done with leisure time, or for that matter, disposable income.

Sure. If you're one of them laptop types (I am too really), then we're talking quite a bit of change.

Put another way,- say within a 4-5 month timeframe, would it be feasable to assume that with a bit of diplomacy and education, we could help most with the transition ? By then we would likely have at least 3 live NWN2 servers,- prices on hardware to run NWN2 will have dropped even more (nehalem comes), etc.

I just think it makes sense to try to turn this whole thing around and look at it like that instead.

[FanaticusIncendi]

I've got nwn2 installed on one machine. I don't like it for a plethora of reasons. I decided about a month ago to take on a big build project and in doing so thought to give nwn2 another shot. Figured if I could get addicted to building for it, there might be a chance. Forget it. The toolset is just too damn daunting and I'm not the only one who feels that way. I can put together a nice exterior in 20 minutes with nwn1. I have neither the time nor the desire to learn a whole new system when I am only now feeling proficient with the old, and there's just not enough incentive otherwise to make me want to bother. I'm building my new project with nwn1 tiles, some extremely amazing tiles that just got released and in fact incorporate A ton of nwn2 content and placeables. Look here to see one example of the tiles I speak of. They're damn near as nice as nwn2 and no steep learning curve.

My point is, there's A LOT of life left in nwn1. In part evidenced by the fact that people are still releasing new tilesets for it and happily ganking nwn2 placeables to put in it. I like the nwn1 platform better and I can build quickly with it. Another nwn1 server I play on has 30+ people on it every night. The nwn1 platform isn't dying, just ALFA.

And besides all that, Jayde plays on a laptop that can't run nwn2 and we're broke. I'm not going to start playing nwn2 when he can't.

So far I've seen one nwn2 person saying no way to ideas that most others seem cool with. I don't care if these changes get implemented with nwn2, if they don't want them that's fine, if they need to be global that's fine too. I also only see one admin posting saying that these changes would even need to be global. One admin does not constitute a decision either way. Let's let the admin and HDMs figure this out as a group. That's what we hire them for.

[wvincenti]

I'm not impressed by NWN2 and I'm far more comfortable with NWN1. Even when I finish building a new computer someday in the distant future I probably won't be in a hurry to dive into NWN2.

I'd love to see the new tilesets that are available for NWN1, but sadly the old servers would need to be rebuilt almost from the ground up because of how the NWN1 haks were made. Having poked about on some other servers I'm frankly astonished at the sheer bulk of custom content that is available through the CEP that ALFA doesn't have, but losing out on much of that is one of the prices we've had to pay for the decisions made about our haks in the past. If anyone wants to tackle rebuilds of any of the new servers I say "Amen!" (I had no idea that there were hundreds of spells available. Holy mackeral!)

That all being said I don't think telling folks to upgrade their computers to run NWN2 isn't appropriate at all. Money is tight and it's I don't like how NWN2 runs on my old computer. Heck, I don't even have kids and I have bigger things to worry about than building a new computer. NWN1 however runs great for me. *shrugs* I'll be in NWN1 for a good while to come.

-Bill

[psycho_leo]

Meh. I can run NWN2. I just choose not too. And it's very unlikely this will change anytime soon.

[ayergo]

Because everyone seems to have missed what i said earlier, you can have your cake and eat it too:

That said, the NWN HDMs will ultimately have a big say in this. The admin body may find that some of these issues are important enough to warrant change and rewrite the current system to allow the HDM's to choose for example.

And just to be clear i'm gathering opinions of the HDMs on the HDM forum. If we did do it, it would likely be only on a case-by-case basis.

That being said, i would like to point out something that many have forgotten in days of ALFA yore. Some servers (particularly the much revered TVS) would have the DMs use the player client to better facilitate their DMing. This means they would log in with the player client (and the knowledge of their team) to interact/DM with the other PCs. Many times the PCs were not even aware that this was happening. It became a great way to keep tabs on the server and the players in an un-obtrusive way. These characters would NEVER travel to other servers though and at all times they were in fact a DM and always kept their team in the loop about who was who.

This may be a better solution overall to think on.

[JaydeMoon]

Hey, Zic:

I think NWN2 SUX. So f%&# off

Seriously, I understand that you think it's lovely, and a lot of other people think it's lovely. And they are entitled to their opinion and welcome to play NWN2. That's great.

But coming down and asserting your opinion on others in the form of "Why don't you just buck up and jump on the NWN2 train" is arrogant, presumptive, and discompassionate. Some of us simply don't want to. Whether it's because we don't like the game, because there are realities that a high on life single norwish computer geek guy could never truly understand, because God says NWN2 is the devil, toolsetting there is perceived as too hard, whatever, we aren't going to invest our time in NWN2.

You can yell at folks to jump on the NWN2 bandwagon til you're blue in the face, it's not going to accomplish anything but the previous string of defensive remarks and spark up forum drama. You're like this smiley:

Meanwhile, Nalo says he hears a little ring of people leaving.

HEY! That may happen. I'm thinking of leaving, personally. I have two very tenuous game ties to this community and only one or two personal ties anymore. And the personal ones I can maintain out of game. I'm exploring cutting my game ties and bringing them with me.

I'm not arrogant enough to think that ALFA cares enough about ME to change for MY benefit. I'm not arrogant enough to think that the project will die without me. I mean, I'm pretty f'in arrogant, but not THAT arrogant!

But just in case the community DOES care, and just in case the feeling I have is bigger than just me, I'm here putting in my 2 dinars.

You can bully the community with your ultimatum of 'Change for All, Change for None, or GTFO' or you can see that there is a perfectly reasonable compromise of Change for Some.

[FanaticusIncendi]

ayergo I'm unclear as to how making an NPC/PC as a DM is anything like having a PC.

Or maybe that's not what you're referring to?

Because everyone seems to have missed what i said earlier, you can have your cake and eat it too:

That said, the NWN HDMs will ultimately have a big say in this. The admin body may find that some of these issues are important enough to warrant change and rewrite the current system to allow the HDM's to choose for example.

And just to be clear i'm gathering opinions of the HDMs on the HDM forum. If we did do it, it would likely be only on a case-by-case basis.

That being said, i would like to point out something that many have forgotten in days of ALFA yore. Some servers (particularly the much revered TVS) would have the DMs use the player client to better facilitate their DMing. This means they would log in with the player client (and the knowledge of their team) to interact/DM with the other PCs. Many times the PCs were not even aware that this was happening. It became a great way to keep tabs on the server and the players in an un-obtrusive way. These characters would NEVER travel to other servers though and at all times they were in fact a DM and always kept their team in the loop about who was who.

This may be a better solution overall to think on.