Charter Revisions

[zicada]

3 day test run will not be useful. It is such a small window that any data collected would be skewed. You need a 1-3 month test run.

You're right. Problem is, a lot of people probably won't be happy with a bunch of noobs running around for that long. Some sort of compromise on the timeframe is warranted though. How about a week at first. If nobody shows up, will they show up over 2 weeks, or 4 ? And if they do, is it even worth it if populatiry is that low ?

[dirsa]

whole discussion is based on two premises that
a. there's a ton of jackaases out there who are just waiting to get into alfa and wreak havoc
b. there's a lot of good folks out there who who will also be joining in droves...

i would guess both are incorrect. jackasses have long left nwn2, and there's no crowd beating on alfas password locked door as evident by numbers of applications. removing passwords will simply let the curious, but not motivated enough to join some community before seeing the game, to peek in and see what the whole fuss is about. if we present it as some sort of gift - we're the jackasses... and they will leave...

of course i could be wrong and a. or b. could be true. we will never know until we try. to work on some contingencies, setups, etc. for this without knowing which is the case is silly. open it, if a. lock it, if b. rejoice, if c. business will go on as usual, we just may end up with couple extra players and no password...

[thinkpig]

Glad he did too, as must you be glad for his initiative since you seem to be enjoying his server quite a bit now. Thanks Ayergo

You are totally forgetting the fact that for the better part of ALFAs NWN2 live time, BG was a total basket case that was, at best, an unfinished mess that was not even close to Live standard. Its taken alot of work by recent HDMs to get it out of "Live beta".

BG should never have gone live when it did.

I played on that 'unfinished mess' for over a year, and enjoyed the hell out of it, sure it took me like a whole year to get to level 5 because there wasn't tons of static content to milk, but it never stopped us from having fun, there was always great RP. I had more fun in BRM's DM games on the 'unfinished' BG than I have ever had in any other ALFA game, enjoyed the tense interactions with good and neutral characters in Sword's Edge, got my lights punched out by johnmecha's Laque after calling Ksiel's priest of Lathander Blaise 'prissy-pants', got my first tour of the server from dirsa's Wulf Larson, boxed with Ragnus outside the black dragon gate, knocked out a priest of tempus sparring by the shrine in the docks, and oh, don't get me started about that spectacular bath house! It is a lot better now, but even before Duncan rebuilt the actual city that server was the bomb due to great RPers of all stripes hanging out and RPing more vigorously, perhaps due in part to the 'unfinishedness' of the server. The bulk of my experience playing in ALFA happened there! <3<3<3baldur's gate

[Blindhamsterman]

A week then, but it still stands, lets do it, trial for a week or so with no passwords, then get me the logs for whichever server you do it on (I only have access to Baldur's Gates) and I'll do some data analysis on it.

[CloudDancing]

A week then, but it still stands, lets do it, trial for a week or so with no passwords, then get me the logs for whichever server you do it on (I only have access to Baldur's Gates) and I'll do some data analysis on it.

I'd say a week trial and if nothing happens terrible, leave it open for a month. If nothing happens terrible, two months..and so forth.

[fluffmonster]

sorry...you do not have the support of 2/3 of the people who care to vote and therefore fail.

[Aitana]

A week then, but it still stands, lets do it, trial for a week or so with no passwords, then get me the logs for whichever server you do it on (I only have access to Baldur's Gates) and I'll do some data analysis on it.

I'd say a week trial and if nothing happens terrible, leave it open for a month. If nothing happens terrible, two months..and so forth.

I am all for doing this one week every month. The players that think we are a good fit for them and we think are a good fit for our community, should apply. We use to do this exact thing with the OAS and it worked out great. Someone would vouch for them, the applicant would just write that they were on the OAS and so and so vouch for them. Done they are in. So after the week whoever wishes to stay would apply.

Now, I say a week every month for a few reasons. First, a week is enough time to see our world and hopefully get in on at least one DM event. Secondly, a week is short enough that a serious noob can't do too much damage. (On a side note I, like Rotku, use you DM on the OAS, I know of two exact cvc events, one was an accident and easily fixed. The other was actually ic and turned out that both players were invited to join because it was done so well.) Third, a week a month is a good thing to do we can announce it on our front page and it is something that is different. Others aren't really doing it and it can get us some buzz.

I would just like to say that I am not for taking our passwords off as a permanent thing. I believe it will honestly hurt the type of community we are. Unless it is done on another server than one of our live servers. I understand that we would like to bring new members in. I am all for that, I mean come on guys I work on the team. I am not for changing what makes us, us. If people aren't willing to write up an application, which come on really it takes like 10-20 mins top, then I don't think those are the type of people we want in alfa.

Changes are good, but too many changes at once is not. Pulling the foundation from under us is not wise.

[Blindhamsterman]

very well thought out suggestion Aitana, it strikes a good balance between the two groups (those opposed to removing passwords and those for it). It is also a good enough time frame to actually get some reasonable data out of.

It could be combined with Sands suggestion of opening just a section of each server, or alternately we could just open up all the servers in that time period (I don't expect it'd cause any additional issues doing that, and it would avoid the need for any additional work).

Then Veilan can get me data and I can drill it down to let folk know if it's successful or not (even though I stepped down from his team).

[Basilica]

3 day test run will not be useful. It is such a small window that any data collected would be skewed. You need a 1-3 month test run.

You're right. Problem is, a lot of people probably won't be happy with a bunch of noobs running around for that long. Some sort of compromise on the timeframe is warranted though. How about a week at first. If nobody shows up, will they show up over 2 weeks, or 4 ? And if they do, is it even worth it if populatiry is that low ?

I don't think we'll get a lot of traction in the end by only opening our servers up for a short amount of time. Think about this from an incoming player's standpoint -- it's not so fun if you can only play your character at seemingly arbitrary times, and at other times the server is passworded.

Beyond that, to add to what Zicada/Ksiel said here, my strong suspicion is that if we open the servers up without a password for three days or even a week, we're likely to not snag any new players. I don't think that removing the password is a bad idea, but I think we're kidding ourselves if we think that we're really going to be "overrun by the barbarians" right away after removing the password.

[dirsa]

I think we're kidding ourselves if we think that we're really going to be "overrun by the barbarians" right away after removing the password.

bingo!

average nwn2 player these days has found himself a home... i've not seen sales stats, but i would bet the house on the fact that they are nil. there are no new players joining, and all existing ones have a place to play. removing password will attract the folk who while may be interested, are not nearly enough motivated to fill out some application stuff for a list of three sparsely populated servers... and there may be quite some gems out there, i just doubt there will be droves... also there might be some bad apples, but, there are ways to deal with that.

on a more morbid note - there is a way to attract new population. it's looking for quality rp worlds that are closing down for one reason or another... that's how i made it to alfa. nwn1 haze shut down, and there was a lot of people looking for a new home... there were reps from three other worlds recruiting at the time. alfa, known lands and dragon..something.. can't remember. just mentioning it as probably the most effective recruitment strategy...

[zicada]

I think we're kidding ourselves if we think that we're really going to be "overrun by the barbarians" right away after removing the password.

bingo!

average nwn2 player these days has found himself a home... i've not seen sales stats, but i would bet the house on the fact that they are nil. there are no new players joining, and all existing ones have a place to play. removing password will attract the folk who while may be interested, are not nearly enough motivated to fill out some application stuff for a list of three sparsely populated servers... and there may be quite some gems out there, i just doubt there will be droves... also there might be some bad apples, but, there are ways to deal with that.

on a more morbid note - there is a way to attract new population. it's looking for quality rp worlds that are closing down for one reason or another... that's how i made it to alfa. nwn1 haze shut down, and there was a lot of people looking for a new home... there were reps from three other worlds recruiting at the time. alfa, known lands and dragon..something.. can't remember. just mentioning it as probably the most effective recruitment strategy...

i say leys put you on looking-for-dying-pws-and-recruiting duty

all opposed ?

Enjoy

In the mean time, can we get some input from the admin body ?

[Ksiel]

Maybe a compromise between the few ideas that are out there. Something like below:

1 - Take 1 server and remove password. (TSM would be my vote, since it is beautiful, big, and few to no bugs.)

2 - Place a level 3 cap that must have DM approval to go higher. This is in place to simply keep non-AFLA members from going higher until they become a full member. All ALFA members get approved no questions asked.

3 - Leave the other server password protected. Do this for multiple reasons. a) It adds a bit of mystique. If you are playing on TSM seeing this beautiful server, what else is out there? What do those other servers look like? b) It will allow full members who don't want to play on an "open" server a place to go that is protected.

4 - If this is approved, set a firm date that a decision will be made to either leave it the way it is, or return back to password protected. (IMHO you leave it this way until Jan 1, 2012. Begin discussion Dec 1st on what to do. By then you will have all the data you need to make an informed decision.)

This will give a mix between the two and has a small amount of tech work to implement, which would be placing the level 3 cap.

Feel free to flame away.

[dirsa]

Feel free to flame away.

i concur

[Rotku]

In the mean time, can we get some input from the admin body ?

Doubt it - not while the election is on. Welcome to ALFA.

[Veilan]

Actually, it's been brought up on the public admin boards, and we've been chattering about it. As stated in the other thread, there's mostly a favourable opinion for a trial, with some minor reservations here or there, but nothing that can't be managed. But yes, elections in the air always slow things down, understandably so I guess.