Player shortage

[Swift]

Then there's my personal soapbox issue, the inability to trust our DMs to play on the same server they DM on.

Regardless of the reasons, this is likely the main sticking point that is preventing many people putting their hand up.

The current policy of not playing where you DM was implemented when we had half a dozen servers, where being locked out of 1 did not really have much effect, because you could likely find a group on another server. It was implemented without the thought that, at some point, we might only have 1 server.

This restriction needs to be repelled if we are to have any hope of better DM coverage on our NWN2 server. You cannot possibly tell me that we are utterly incapable of punishing those that take advantage of the trust given to them.

No DM App for DM's, and create a pool of qualified DM's. Once you have a pool, then work on mentoring.

Do you really want to hand the keys to, say, me, someone who does not know the wealth standards, does not know how to price items, barely knows the DM client and knows nothing about the server?

No. Opening the floodgates to DMs without any sort of education about how the DM side of things work in ALFA just for the sake of getting DMs will be just as harmful as how things are now.

[FanaticusIncendi]

The current policy of not playing where you DM was implemented when we had half a dozen servers, where being locked out of 1 did not really have much effect, because you could likely find a group on another server. It was implemented without the thought that, at some point, we might only have 1 server..

It was also implemented without the thought that one day our NWN1 servers would essentially be campaign servers, with a handful (I think we're at around 30) of players left campaigning over three or four servers. Times have changed. Without adaptation survival becomes real tough.

Good lord does this mean Swift and I agree on something? *gasp*

[Swift]

Good lord does this mean Swift and I agree on something? *gasp*

Im beginning to lose count how often i see people post this, but don't worry, the others havn't dropped dead yet

[Veilan]

You cannot possibly tell me that we are utterly incapable of punishing those that take advantage of the trust given to them.

We are almost utterly incapable of punishing those that take advantage of the trust given to them. Policing after the fact, done by people, does very, very seldom work in this community, hence the attempts of so much "front-loaded" policing.

Im beginning to lose count how often i see people post this, but don't worry, the others havn't dropped dead yet

Emphasis added .

[Rick7475]

If I could play on TSM and DM, I would DM. I understand what NickD is saying though and I am not sure of DM's playing on the same server is going to work. I would like to play, though, and beta just doesn't cut it. Maybe a solution might be DM'ing only a certain faction or region? ie a DM player play in SM but DM in Rivermoot? Or perhaps DM the dwarf faction in Felbar when you play as a human in Rivermoot? I could still see potential hate related conflicts, such as DM'ing the Bane faction and playing a Helm paladin Maybe this would need to be tightly controlled.

I think the best solution, however, is to get another NWN2 server live ASAP, which I understand Ayergo is trying to do.

[zicada]

Yup, we ARE getting another nwn2 server up ASAP.

Once we switch to the new website, we should hopefully also get quite a boost of people ending up on our page, through clever indexing with the searchengines. Drupal is excellent for this sort of thing.

Furthermore, we are doing PR things like nwcon, and working on a much better design approach to the webpage, aswell as the human-computer interfacing aspect,- which is actually pretty important.

Finally, we are going to bury things like Charter, Rules, Lawyering and other semicrazy game-b content away from prospective new players a bit. Because things like that, frankly, scare the shit out of people

Finally, we are playing around with the idea of maybe contacting similar nwn2 projects to look into the possibility of joining forces. This is obviously just an idea at this point, and the number of PWs that would be applicable is very small (hi Exodus )

[White Warlock]

You cannot possibly tell me that we are utterly incapable of punishing those that take advantage of the trust given to them.

We are almost utterly incapable of punishing those that take advantage of the trust given to them. Policing after the fact, done by people, does very, very seldom work in this community, hence the attempts of so much "front-loaded" policing.

Front loading to counter exploitation is a waste of time, it really is. At present, the nwn2 choices ingame are to farm or not farm, to hunt down spawns for xp, or to sit in a tavern and soak up auto-rpxp. Without dms ingame, and without dms providing sufficient rewards, the motivation is to wait until a server reset, empty out all the caves, and log off.

So... all this worry about DMs with PCs exploiting the server is a joke, when the game's lack of DM coverage merely opens up the game for far more exploitation.

[ayergo]

Just a note on number of DMs:

I've seen a lot of DM apps recently, and they've all been approved. You should be seeing more and more coverage. : )

[White Warlock]

Just a note on number of DMs:

I've seen a lot of DM apps recently, and they've all been approved. You should be seeing more and more coverage. : )

hi ayergo... do you know if their plans are to DM, build, or script? And, are they going to dm on nwn2 or nwn1?

[Ksiel]

I have recently been accepted to DM, granted it is on a NWN1 server. The DM application process was simple and quick. I got a response within 24 hours. Props to Ayergo and Vald.

I do not agree that I should be able to play a pc on the server that I DM on. If this is the case, why should a DM not create one of his old PC's and play them as a NPC? (which I disagree with also) It is just a slippery slope that I think would be best not tested. However, with NWN1 we have multiple servers, so this is not near the issue that it seems for NWN2. For NWN2, I wouldn't care if we allowed a temporary suspension of this rule until another NWN2 server went live. Then the PC/DM would have to decide on which to play and which to DM.

I agree that we should allow new players in on a sponsor system. Anything that will increase the player base is a good idea at this point.

[ayergo]

hi ayergo... do you know if their plans are to DM, build, or script?

DM

And, are they going to dm on nwn2 or nwn1?

Yes. ; )

[Zelknolf]

Just a note on number of DMs:

I've seen a lot of DM apps recently, and they've all been approved. You should be seeing more and more coverage. : )

Yeah, but c'mon, what's the actual retention rate on DMs? Most DM for a little bit, sure, but only a few really stick with it, despite remaining listed on teams for huge lengths after they become inactive; look at the 015 DM team, for example: when was the last time anyone saw Aitana, Adalia, Alynnrobinso, Brokenbone, or Ewayneself DM, or saw Chamu run anything on SD? -- they've got good reasons, I know, and I'd totally be asking them what they were doing if they did DM, but that's literally half of the team, and (at least I think) a fine illustration of numbers of DMs not amounting to DM coverage.

Not gonna complain that our only incentive to DM is that it should be fun or anything, but I think we're a bit of a small community to really have as many barriers as we do, and despite Veilan's (ironically predictable) pessimism, I'd tend to think we have a fine system that could control misuse of DM power: HDMs have the power to kick anyone off of their team and ban anyone from their servers.

[Mayhem]

Yes, some quit because some sort of strange OCD causes them to read every part of the forum, even the bits that offend them. Weird.

[AcadiusLost]

when was the last time anyone saw Aitana, Adalia, Alynnrobinso, Brokenbone, or Ewayneself DM, or saw Chamu run anything on SD?

For what it's worth, ewayneself has transitioned to DMing NWN2-ALFA (IIRC his laptop didn't have space for both NWN1 and NWN2 installs with all the haks/PWCs/etc. He's been pretty much the most consistent and active Live DM we've got for NWN2-ALFA since then, second only perhaps to Wynna.

Neither here nor there in terms of the player shortage, but in the interest of due recognition, I certainly wouldn't classify him as inactive or shirking DM duties. It would certainly be accurate to say that the DM listings for some of the servers should be revised to consider recent activity levels, though. In the past we've tended to leave people listed on teams in order to facilitate their return to "active duty" if things clear up, which isn't the best policy for players trying to get an idea of how many active DMs a server has.

[White Warlock]

Yes, some quit because some sort of strange OCD causes them to read every part of the forum, even the bits that offend them. Weird.

Maybe you should step up as DM and see the crap you get before you make such comments.

DMs have to access the forums to keep up with what's going on, and chat to make themselves available or players, and thus end up occasionally being subjected to 'crap' they would rather not have read. Lancaster_X's spamming of the TSM forums is a prime example of this, as are some of the rather discourteous PMs. Ingame whining and backhanded comments don't help either.