Getting the servers busy again

[Cynon]

To be honest, NWN1 has this feeling of the curtains closing.

It's not one of those games that's got a massive billion people community anymore.

BUT!

I see a new era for NWN1

The game is still a platform for playing Forgotten realms D&D on and for the moment it's far superior to what NWN2 can offer in that all the cracks and flaws are smoothed out and people are familiar with it.

If you look at gamespy nowadays there is thousands of completely empty servers.

For most of the day, all the ALFA ones are some of those empty servers. ALFA went down with the rest. It's just a select club now of those that still have left over mid-higher level PC's from the good old days, occasioanlly loging on one evening and having a bit of an RP and a chat and maybe getting the run around from a DM if one of them can be bothered to log on with the client instead of as a PC.

There are a few player worlds still rammed full of players though.

ALFA's vision of building all Faerun is obviously a little out the window for NWN1 as we used to be almost there and now half the servers are retired and closed down.

What are these select few Player worlds full of Players doing different that ALFA and all the rest arn't.

They are catering for what has become 'The NWN1' player. SOme servers are just level up and fight arena's of course and some are WoW style, wild loot and fast xp team CvC and monster bashing battle grounds. They provide fun their own way.

There are a couple though that are good old D&D RP servers like ALFA used to be.

The difference. They are full of content and have plenty for players to do. If a DM is present, GREAT! but if not they are brimming with statics and high content areas. full of various shops, crafting rescources and facilities. Wild areas and dungeons to delve.

In providing for a players attention span and giving people who just rolled up a level 1 PC, (in the latter days of NWN1), something to do, they have kept themselves busy and interesting. They have made themselves the place for remaining NWN1 players and DM's to gather.

Why not go out on a limb ALFA.

Why not take perhaps one of your servers and just try out putting more group statics and content in. Put in some quests and areas that contain danger and monsters and treasure to snatch in reward for the risk of exploration and adventure. It might even be like playing D&D.

[JaydeMoon]

Why not go out on a limb?

Cause.

We don't wanna!

[Cynon]

You don't want to go out on a limb, out of your comfort zone, but all i see on the forums is moans about how to solve this issue and that issue and it all comes down in the end to the fact that ALFA is about catering for huge admin roles and not the IG player/DM environment.

Of course it is more comfortable and safe for Admin people if there are no players to deal with and no DM's stressing about how to keep their plot working without screwing anyones PC up etc.

ALFA is nice and comfy and save and quiet and STERILE right now and if that is the way you want it then by all means, well done.

I just really don't understand why anyone would want it like this?

[Rick7475]

Hmmm, do you know how long it takes to put in a static and fully test it? I would say 1 - 2 hours for a simple fed ex static, and 4 - 5 for a more complex static. And that is not including maintaining them when there are script changes or documenting them properly so that the next builder doesn't break it.

The servers with the most statics in NWN1 went down a while ago. Even with the statics, they still went down.

The good news is that the NWN2 servers should have plenty of statics. But for the NWN1 server, we are short of scripting resources as it is for NWN2.

I did a survey of some NWN1 servers with the most populations. Do you realize that a lot of these servers with 20+ players involve players in the level 25+ range? Like Everquest1 verses Everquest2, the EQ1 servers were full of 55+ level players who did not want to start all over.

[AcadiusLost]

I will say, for what it's worth, that Legionnaire and the Shadowdale crew have altered, improved, and added a number of statics lately. I added some to NC before I finished there as well, though mine were pretty simple ones (and I can concur with Rick on that time estimate as a conservative one for quest coding). Now, I played a high-WIS PC lawful PC who didn't do much risky exploring- but I can say from the glimpses I did get, that 015 has a lot of content one can find with or without a DM, if they're in an exploring mood. Much of it might be irrevocably deadly in one way or another, but I suppose if you're looking for an interesting ride, possibly ending in a memorable death, you could probably find it there.

[Rotku]

Well, I have been accepted to DM once again, so just watch the masses of players flock back

[FanaticusIncendi]

To be honest, NWN1 has this feeling of the curtains closing.

...
For most of the day, all the ALFA ones are some of those empty servers. ALFA went down with the rest. It's just a select club now of those that still have left over mid-higher level PC's from the good old days, occasioanlly loging on one evening and having a bit of an RP and a chat and maybe getting the run around from a DM if one of them can be bothered to log on with the client instead of as a PC.

Well Cynon, to be honest, that's one perspective. It all depends on what kind of game you like to play. I run regular sessions and am still constantly building both new content for my player group and new content for my server. I'm having a great time DMing and I think my players are having a great time being DM'd and having their personal stories fleshed out in ways that were less likely when we had more populace around.

If what you are looking for is to be able to log on any time of the day or night when the fancy strikes you and find bunches of people to RP with and DMs randomly popping in unannounced to run one-offs and such, then yeah now is probably not your time.

But if you're looking to hook up with a scheduled campaign and find a DM who has the time and interest to really work with your character and you're not afraid of being a little proactive, then I say now is a perfect opportunity. Hell, I just retired my mid level PC and rolled up a new one and am having a great time.

Most of the people i've been hearing complain about the lack of life on the servers (not referring to you in particular- i've been hearing and observing this from others) are people who can't seem to be bothered to stretch a little and maybe contact a DM to coordinate times, either that or they're people who aren't happy unless there is stuff going on that fits perfectly to their whims of when they feel like playing. That's just not the reality right now.

The onus is on you the players to find us as DMs, not the other way around. We're busy DMing and building and making stuff happen, it's on you to get busy finding the right group and playing.

If you want game, then match your PC and schedule to a DM. Be proactive. Contact the DMs where you want to play and inquire what they're running and when.

The game is still a platform for playing Forgotten realms D&D on and for the moment it's far superior to what NWN2 can offer in that all the cracks and flaws are smoothed out and people are familiar with it.

On that I totally agree. I am committed to continue on with nwn1 for as long as I have players. I don't phear nwn2 but there are a myriad of reasons why i'm not pleased with it and I prefer nwn1. Not the least of which is many people I like playing with don't have the ability to upgrade their machines. In time i'm sure it will all shift, but I have a feeling that's going to be quite a while.

[Cynon]

Some encouraging answers folks.

Pause for thought.

[psycho_leo]

I miss being able to play any day I wanted. Back when I joined I could log on at any given night and find players and/or DMs and that was great. Now we don't have that many players, server or DMs. I can't play every night and mostly do so on scheduled times. But I get an incredible amount of personal attention. The kind of attention that's pretty hard for a DM to give a player when they have a dozen others to take care of by themselves.

So to be honest, as much as I miss servers full every night, if I had to choose between what I had then and what I have now, I'd pick the now in a heart beat.

[Lazlo]

...So to be honest, as much as I miss servers full every night, if I had to choose between what I had then and what I have now, I'd pick the now in a heart beat.

Definitely, the then not now. I don't mean to discount all the great RP and DMing that I'm sure exists during this transitional phase, but vintage ALFA1 was a new experience day after day.
The server(s) will be packed when ALFA2 goes live!

[Rick7475]

The server(s) will be packed when ALFA2 goes live!

Just remember, though with all those players tromping through the woods, when you see a big pile of corpses .... RUN!

[Rusty]

There is no policy issue that prevents any builder team from adding static content to their NWN1 server, and - as noted above - several DM teams have recently been engaged in upgrading and expanding the content that they have available. The reason why more content has not been added is, generally, that developing it takes up an awful lot of time - time that many DMs prefer to spend actively DMing in-game. The best way to get new, interesting, content added to ALFA's servers is to volunteer to join a DM team with that purpose in mind.

[Zelknolf]

The best way to get new, interesting, content added to ALFA's servers is to volunteer to join a DM team with that purpose in mind.

If I may say so, the best way to get almost anything done for ALFA is to offer to do the legwork. Most people sound as though they're bogged down with whatever their current project is and tend to have a couple queued up.

[Cynon]

I've tried scripting, I'm crap at it I can build a basic area, put some objects in etc, when it comes to anything like NPC's and dialogue and area transitions I just can't seem to make head nor tail of how things are done.

I've got to be honest, I'm a player, I'm possibly a little bit of DM if needs be but Building just ain't my skill.

I love designing armours and weapons though.

Anyhow that's all a little off topic.

[Zelknolf]

Everyone's crap at scripting at first; almost everyone is crap at building at first. Start small, make a "Hello World" script to make sure that you can make something compile and fire in the game engine, then try a simple static. (there's a wealth of walkthroughs on nwvault.ign.com and on Bioware's NWN forums)

Same thing can be said for building. You've got the simple interior down (and we do have people saying "Simple interiors would save our lives!" amongst the NWN2 teams). Getting better would be just expanding from there. In NWN1, the exterior area isn't much different from the interior area, except that servers on seamless area transitions would be pretty much handled for you, provided the area got tagged properly and you worked from a copy of a template exterior in the basemod.

In NWN2, exteriors are trickier; I seem to recall a thread about pitfalls for the new builder of NWN2 exteriors in the past, and I know there's a whole mess of infomation in its own forum, too.

And re: "Anyhow that's all a little off topic." -- that's very much on topic. You say "I have stuff that I'd like to see happen!" The question of how capable/willing you are to actually do it is incredibly relevant.