[Barnet]

I've been pretty outspoken on my large dislike for Tactical given my own past experiences, though even if I find it to be my most pressing issue on my enjoyability of the game it's really hard to say anything on it until the general public gets their hands on it. I will put my point of view in a world that it does not exist.

Role hooks getting stronger and stronger are likely a response to the growing of 'base power' of PCs. Truthfully, I think this is fine to a point. Signatures have long deviated from their original purpose and this is good to me--to an extent. A character having one signature I think should be a given, and why? For the mere fact it is cool and helps make a character stand out, compared to 'hey they use these 3 trees!' and they have some sort of unique ability that they like to RP with it. I had a really fun time with Holy Fire (granted that is a mythic) and rping it out, it really made my character feel more unique to me and hopefully others! Yet, that opportunity doesn't really apply to new character's without having to go through the application system. I think the application system was.. fine, but not enough. Other avenues to that same goal should have been available, and should be. Not everyone likes to share their story in an OOC manner and get 'rewarded.' I do, but that is not everyone. Lots of people have vocalized their dislike for it. The RPL 230 system of getting signatures is a good start, though another method (raids were an idea) should be implemented. After the first signature it does feel like it should be wagered on balance/ yes, the dreaded word, 'world presence' (narrative impact, really), which does need human input to review. But to get the Cool Thing to help define your character, it should not be actual suffering.

Now, I have only really seen two rolehooks in my time of playing Eternia (a year) go anywhere--being Mementos and Aetius. The rest have sputtered out within a few weeks to a month, likely due to the majority of them being alts even with what is given to them. As someone told me and I now realize, a sense of progression really does help people stay with a character. It definitely does that for me; I can only play fresh characters and not rolehooks, lest my interest dies. This includes spawn a soldiers and whole faction spawns. Even with the promise of signatures outside of the app system, I still have seen them fall.

Truthfully? What should likely be focused on is the fresh character experience and their sense of progression. A new crafting system to aid with that in a better sense would help, a lot. Uniques are in a weird spot given I am fine with them existing to help out people who struggle with verb, but not mandatory to compete with others. If you have a good enough build and verb skill, you can gun with a person who has a unique and is not that great, but it comes to be a real issue when a very skilled player gets a ton of stats and is more or less untouchable. So, perhaps in the future (it cannot be fixed in this current state of Eternia, I fear) the idea of these 'statsticks' should mostly be removed unless we fall down the rabbit hole again, or be really stringent on locking them to characters.. but that will have cracks in it, I just know. But--even then, uniques are a form of progression for some people to enjoy.. but probably best to be taken out of the picture.

That was a ramble. Regardless, I enjoy the game and just play it to RP and whatever happens, happens. Developing a more healthy mindset to engage with it has helped me a ton; so hopefully this is not taken as being gloomy.. there is a ton I like! I can only be optimistic for the future and hope the feedback given is listened to.

[Kartoffelstampfer]

Alright, let me come in with the unpopular opinions and for once I'm not gonna nag about certain settlements or otherwise.

My larger part of the issues I have right now with the gamestate is that everything just seems to get more expensive for no reasons, adding an mmorpg grind of collecting 20 boar asses for no reason at all.

Charkram suddenly costing 25 mythril for no reason, Witch-sabbaths being made unreasonably hard to pull off all of a sudden for a group because of the abduction mechanics and costs, sorcerers being basicly fucked in terms of trying to gain essence unless they happen to get a ressouce node, and the costs for golems (an actual personal issue with myself) just to name a few things.

We play escapism with the game. Why do we have to jump through 20 hoops just to do a few of the more basic abilities going that we would have access to? It's getting to a point where costs are becoming unreasonably huge for no reason whatsoever.

On the new player experience, we also have tooltips that at best are old and at worst lie in what they do. It took me 20 years for example before someone told me that reform (a bone spell) cleanses status effects, which is said nowhere at all. The bone spurs that bone aura is suppoed to drop is also still not added/bugged and thus I believe that someone needs to actively go over them and actually adjust them to what spells actually do right now.

Dens themselves and getting end-game ores. They work, kinda, but they are one of the more annoying aspects of the game themselves to the point I believe that an alternative needs to be done (maybe for your suggested plot claiming in the future?) and adding goldsinks to settlements. I am currently actively getting the Commerce settlement experience and honestly, I like it because of how it is actually just abilities that use pooled together money. I wholehartedly believe that maybe switching a few things in the abilities around to create money-sinks for every settlement would work as a better inflation break than dens.

Just my 2 cents on the matter, but a trend that I've seen to some degrees. Might mean nothing, might mean there is a bad direction being taken right now.

[lostrozen]

A lot of words here; a lot of musings about Eternia and why I enjoy it and why I think others do, too.


I don't often interact with the "Game State" discussions as I find this is the quickest way to despair about the game and lose enjoyment, as well as the quickest way for good writers to become at odds with one another as we argue about our idiosyncrasies that define what exactly gets us going about Eternia the most. This game is very small, let's not forget that, and if we were here for its incredible mechanics, we'd probably not be a community of 200-400 people. This is a world that we get to enjoy, with a certain set of rules that help us collaborate and navigate as we all go at it and create narratives. So many of them! There's a lot of characters and, I think no matter who and what character it is, everyone who is here to play the game adds something to it.

I have had a lot of frustrations pile up and, recently, I guess it's all coming up to surface as I find myself often unsatisfied in the discussions that I partake in with my friends who also play this game. Venting can be healthy, but it doesn't really help us reach the conclusion of how to get over whatever it is that has dissatisfied us. So maybe people will resonate with the opinions I share here, maybe not. But either way, I hope that they give someone to think on. At the end of the day, that's what I am here playing this game for - because I think that people's stories give me something to think about, and I enjoy seeing people's creativity in roleplay.

I don't like destruction. I think that every destruction war left me feeling sad. Yes, even the fel crusades left me feeling a bit empty, at times. The lifecycle of a settlement can be so very small, and at the end of the day, they'll be very easily forgotten. And in that aftermath, I am often left to wonder: how can we perceive them as cities full of people, with an economy and a government, if they just get toppled over like nothing? Obviously, a lot of these settlement destructions have been about cults and demon armies and other, ultimately, short-lived ways of living. But these demons and witches did, after all, cause a furor and leave their mark on the land, destroying a lot of cities. How many characters right now will be able to tell you about the Aegis Empire from... not even a full century ago, I think, in the way we would talk about... I don't know, the Ottoman Empire in real life?

History makes a made up world feel alive. When I look around in the present time, I... don't really recognize most of these settlements. Obviously, the settlement system exists exactly to provide people opportunities to breathe something new into the world and start a narrative of their own, but I think with that freedom comes a great sacrifice. Ironically enough, Dandeli's argument is one I agree with very sincerely. I remember the last wipe of E3, with Achyon and Osrona set at odds, with the former being a remaining force of the empire that toppled a kingdom of flawed crusaders with a cool history founded in origin myth. E3 was my first experience with Eternia, and frankly, as banal as the pieces may have seemed, it really charmed me and the fact that all these settlements(with Moxtli and Fireblooded added in addition, driving further how divided the land was after the devastating conquest and plague).

I think that Extinction had a good spirit, and there was an incredible amount of build-up to it. I was involved in it from start to end. I did not always enjoy every part of it and I had disagreements that I tried to make known at the time, but at the end of the day, it happened as it did. How many characters today will look back at that and praise the heroes that saved Meranthe from the conquest, or think about the histories of the settlements that were destroyed back then? It was really strange, from my perspective, to have this really big event occur that was meant to let a new era begin in Meranthe, only for us to go right back to a shitton of settlements all over the map with no history behind them.

I am not saying that the people in this settlements are bad for partaking in this creative freedom, for the record. And, really, even amongst Aetius' players, most are people who I know I have immensely enjoyed writing with in the past. But the thing is that it really makes me scratch my head when you do a whole Extinction event that was meant to destroy settlements, only for us to go right back to square one with one of the settlements being the game owner's creation that goes on to destroy what was left unfinished.

I don't think that Chance is malicious for doing this, nor do I want to get bogged down in discussions about builds, balance, uniques, sigs. But I just think that, at some point, the story of Meranthe should have peaked. I think that wipes are okay, and the mindset of "never wipe" is unhealthy for the generational game that is Eternia. Yes, powercreep starts occuring as we go further and further in time and old uniques/mats pile up and we get big pow sticks... that's progression, and the wipe is a very healthy way of putting a cap to that rather than "equalizing the fields" with empowered spawns(despite this, I'd like to note anyone who complains about Make-A-Soldiers hasn't seen every single one AFK. None of syne's nor camellia's make-a-soldier threads have had a long-lasting character remain. More unique "rolehooks", I can not say much on, as I have never been a part of one, although I tried to create one for other people - it fell through, too).

I think that tactical will be incredibly good for the game. Maybe some people will quit, and I totally get them: I really love the adrenaline from the current combat system even if sometimes I get so nervous it's kinda scary. However, at the end of the day, I am not here for the combat, and I hope that the new system(i haven't been part of the testing) will evolve into something that will be much more conductive to collaborative storytelling.

I am not a total fan of what is happening in the game rn, but I don't think that any player is anathema. I just know that what I deeply enjoy in this game is the way history comes alive through the generational aspect, and that it can be really sad when you get seen as an "old mage clutching for power for decades" when you just know that if you retire and leave the reins of the settlement's narrative in the hands of another, they won't stay around for it and keep it alive. The gamepop is just so spread across the many settlements and more recently wandering groups of people, that a lot of stories get forgotten. At times, the game feels like a furnace more than it is a means for collaborative storytelling, with how fast something can end and go through 3 more cycles of being forgotten about until it's gone entirely before someone tries to revive it and they have to PRAY they have a group of people who are just as interested to go through the grueling process of building from zero.

My DM's are open, too! And I like talking about this game. I don't spend as much time on it as I did the last year or two, but I still vividly play because I care a lot about the stories that I have been a part of or witnessed. It really warmed my heart when something from previous iterations came back(like mimloopen's Elaide stuff, for example, or the whole wave of Azraelism and the Grey Church coming back).

[Milly]

I'm only going to really respond (for right now...?) to Anon's post concerning the raid match ups for the leaders.

It was, sadly, a balance issue. Let me open this with saying: FDG I love you. However, if Bansai Talalt had fought either Cardan or Kyran, they would have steamrolled her 100%. Her fighting Silus was *way* more fair. As for the mercenaries, I think the issue was more so a LACK of strong opponents for Kyran & Cardan, while also going in with the idea of, "okay, these guys NEED a match up, but also so does Bansai".

Just wanted to pull back the curtain a bit on that. I hope it makes sense!!

[catttdusss]

I'm only going to really respond (for right now...?) to Anon's post concerning the raid match ups for the leaders.

It was, sadly, a balance issue. Let me open this with saying: FDG I love you. However, if Bansai Talalt had fought either Cardan or Kyran, they would have steamrolled her 100%. Her fighting Silus was *way* more fair. As for the mercenaries, I think the issue was more so a LACK of strong opponents for Kyran & Cardan, while also going in with the idea of, "okay, these guys NEED a match up, but also so does Bansai".

Just wanted to pull back the curtain a bit on that. I hope it makes sense!!

nah no cap she woulda got turned into chopped cheese good response

[awwlie]

the time I've played this game, I've had a lot of fun, though. Witchcraft being worse Sorcery has made it be a bit awful of a experience in the long run. I love covens and roleplay, but, it is very hard to play a witch in this current environment. It is an chore, you may lose your character to a single bad roll, or have to rely on a coven that has an alchemist, which isn't so easy given peoples repulsion away from witchcraft, so far as I have experienced it.

Its a singular cap roll and you are dead, most of the time.

alas, for 'matchups', they've always been, a mix match. Sometimes they are balanced, sometimes.. it is a dumpster fire, by policy of trying to 'play' fair.

"Game State" doesn't feel bad, it is certain actors that make it feel bad, when all conflict needs to be resolved immidetly, none tries to find new reasons to continue it: or if they have found them, it most of the time seems that half the population wishes that the conflict would end in a day, going in looc screaming how the opposing side are grimers, how their efforts are for nil.

over all it feels like certain people, need to wake up: If a faction that causes conflict, gets told on a constant loop, that they aren't worthwhile, how their efforts are for nil. Why would anyone else try again? The game will grow very stale if it is just a high school SoL-anime

[Milly]

is this what the world is frightened of...?




(this is a joke, please)

[radio]

I will say one thing about all of this because people are afraid of the boogeyman and move on.

There were eight 'chance-spawns' for sorcerers. As it started a few near instantly faded away and others remained. Months later, it was only myself, Nymeris and Cardan.

Now, it is only myself and Cardan. Anyone else in Aetius is just a normal spawn or a spawn-a-soldier with nothing else going for them. As far as what Cardan and I have, there is nothing secret outside of what you see. We have weapons and signatures that were gained in time and accomplishing things.

That said, the weapon I have is worse than every other weapon I've fought in a raid other than the most recent. Every single weapon I have gained through taking others and holding them during their capture is stronger than my own. This is to say that there are crazy things out there at every angle and we are far from unbeatable. I myself have nearly lost three of my recent raid fights, within a spell or two.

This is all to say that there is no hidden secret that is out there, what you see is what you get.

[DirectorBright]

And in the case of the specialized spawn ins, they themselves a response to the obtuse powercliffing of older factions and or PCs that could otherwise NOT be toppled without months to years of developments in a game where time means everything.

So, Chance made a decision!

He equalized the playing field, as much as you'd like to deny or reject this possibility. 

Aetius isn't some faction with ubers ready to gun down any who oppose them; they're all individually beatable, but because they've actually bested the enemies set out before them it's a problem now?

... Where Goldlight did the same thing for ages?

Make it make sense, friends !

Okay. I'll try to make it make sense from having observed the other side of it. Here's what the sentiment was from within a lot of Goldlight- and not just them, but peripheral players as well.

It took a long time for the PCs in Goldlight to get to the stage at which they could do those things vs a spawn in that was apparently just a response to it, which many saw as disrespectful to the PCs in question since they actually had to go do a bunch of stuff to get that strong in the first place and effectively just had someone materialized to dog on them.

It took months to years of development for what was toppled to get where it was, and that was effectively just nullified immediately without any of the same investment. Or at least, not what was perceived to be the case.

You want the source of the salt, and why people are upset, that is their perception. That in a game where 'time means everything,' one side had to go through the time and effort to grow, and one did not. That is probably the biggest centerpoint of resentment that I have observed surrounding the faction, a sense of unfairness that such a person who 'could not be toppled without months of development' had to themselves take months of development to reach such a state, while their opponent did not.

Many also felt very cagey about expressing their grievances with it because - well, the owner's in the faction, and when they already feel like they're being treated unfairly they are not going to want to be vocal about it in that light because of the implication, whether or not it's even warranted.

Now as far as why Goldlight fell, that might be like... part of it, but that's not really the whole.

Goldlight had hit an awkward stage in which it was bereft of the massive champions that had made it what it was in the past and hadn't yet attained anyone on that level again. That is, as was mentioned, part of why a few people had to fight mercenaries as was said. I do love Bansai and their player but let's be real she's not the strongest fighter. There was no Garret, Kastore, etc. Sarina and Anya were pretty strong, but the nation had sunset in its strength rather heavily. Most of their soldiers didn't have much in the way of gear or sigs anymore, and a not insignificant portion weren't the best in a fight in terms of sheer skill. It was far from as invincible as people thought, and I could see the writing on the wall in the sparring sessions. A few strong characters were coming up that could've been, but they weren't there yet.

In other words, its mega murder scary-ass characters aged out, without a replacement by the time they were challenged.

----------

A few other good points have been made and I want to give my thoughts on each.

Empires rise and fall in like five minutes, and nobody remembers them IC and sometimes OOC because there's a profound lack of history in setting. Some things are in fact crazy expensive like synths. Rozen is right about the despair argument etc, focusing too much on things outside of your own character story or obsessing over the state of the world just gets you wound up into a ball of bitterness.

They have a point that a lot of stuff gets just obliterated in these and it just- disappears. The only characters that can tell you about the existence of something were those who were physically there when it happened. Ruins pop up in the area, but like- you should be hearing stories about the crescent island for hundreds of years after the place fell down, people should generally know what it was IC as just a basic 'common knowledge' thing. Everyone should know who Varrach was, or have heard stories about Xarxes, Jokul, Ragnarok.

Maybe part of that is a lack of wonders or significant, settlement wide differences?  Not in IC, in mechanics, as most settlements are functionally just a 'safe zone' with drip. Sometimes like with the Frontier you see a giant hole in the ground, that's cool. Other times, things just aren't written down IC in books, or they are and those are lost.

I believe it was said that these are to be reworked in a way to give a real 'reason' to be in there more thoroughly. Crafting hubs, iirc. Imagine finding a sword made with like... 'Aegisian Iron' and wondering 'wow where'd that come from.' I know I find old books and wonder. Goldlight, for instance, was just destroyed and there's people who didn't even know it existed IC right now - either due to being new players or just... well, being born after it. That plus the only way for them to find out would be an event- see above. AGAIN, it WAS hinted at that things like such expeditions would be more streamlined in the future. Resource hotspots kind of played into this when they were made from a destroyed nation, I did like those, even if a lot of the resources ended up just being eaten they were still like lore info.

I have seen firsthand that a lot of the time, the reason an old PC is in charge of a country for months on end is because there's just... nobody to replace them. Hell, a lot of the time the person in charge HATES being the settlement lead, but they don't know who to even pass it to that wont immediately crash out or AFK. Keep in mind it takes a long time to get a settlement set up but you can lose it in like two weeks.

I have rarely ever seen a spawn soldier stick around, too. I hard agree with Barnets take that a sense of progression is vital to a character's longevity. A new character having some means of climbing mechanically, and I think that is intended in the future if I'm not mistaken with a lean away from 'app for everything' and towards 'systems to get things.' Because- if you think about it, yeah, time DOES matter a lot in this game. Lets use the monster hunter example: Say I want to make a sword from a sea serpent's fang. Okay, well, I need an event, which could take months if it ever happens at all, and then after that I need to craft the thing, and then I need to app for it, and that could take months, and by then... well. Yet it seems that this is known, and it is intended to be addressed in the future systems and crafting overhauls.

I also do think that while lore being FOIC is in some ways good, after a certain point a level of objective knowledge needs to be available to a person. Things like how normies shouldn't know much about necromancy, but once you actually get the class you should. A guidebook or something, maybe not of deep lore, but of direct "It works like this" and "You can do these things." Something tied to the class.

And I still think Tactical, while it'll be rough for a bit, will long-term be helpful. Not just because of PVP but especially for PVE or raids or EC fights. It opens a lot of doors for events, both public and private, as well as other activities, and makes things a little less awkward in big battles even if it might tamp down some dramatic 1v1 showdowns. I do wish we had more... options, I guess, for buildup and conflict for characters than immediately leaping to 'death duel' as the default. It *does* make it hard to care about settlements as a place 'full of people and government and so on' when none of that is really reflected outside of a handful of PC characters and your only real option to engage with it is through those specific characters. Cycle it back to Crownforge, Mordeaux's only options ATP were to either suicide dive into the middle of the city, camp the door and wait for someone to come out, or declare a one man raid if he wanted to really fuck with them in a way that wasn't a months+ wait time approval event.

MBeasts can narrate about burning down villages or whatever but until you walk out on the map and can actually see the small town full of fire and ash and so on, there's not really any 'buildup' there. A knight who wants to go out and protect civilians or common people from monsters, but their only option for that is a full on magic beast, which is like an endgame boss fight once they get moving. Stuff like that will be easier handled, I feel, with the new system - and a few other things spoken of that are planned.

On the whole/personal experience? I have no idea, really. My main is still doing his thing just fine, the wait time for stuff does hurt but its why I've started apping for things as 'systems' or 'repeatables' or ideas with progression, both on him and the alt, so that its not just a one and done, so that once it is put in place I have something to play with and others to engage in that serves as a whole thing instead of just a single use funny or a stat-stick, and so that ideally when others come over with a desire to have some form of progression I can point them at an existing mechanical feature instead of the oft-mentioned 'hit metal 99 times.' I really, really adore the applications for 'systems' instead of direct items, be it the Rust Plague or the new things Grey has, and I intend to stay in that vein going forward because frankly it is more fun and interesting for everyone I feel. In the future I plan to try to go for the ability to just directly upgrade / create weapons or armor that are 'set' from abilities, something that isn't whack strong but follows the gimmick of the character in question and is made with the resources they IC gather up and the systems that they possess. Gives even more reason to engage and a stronger 'identity' to the group, I feel.

[GriddyCannister]

The Sorcerers from spawn have been receiving a lot of hate both IC and OOC for things that aren't even in their control. Imagine spawning in and having people treat you like trash IC while talking bad about you OOC for no reason.

they took 2-3 months to reach the point they've been at. And in those 2-3 months they've took major losses in the beginning, citing them getting demolished in their early days until they grew to the point where they were today. Aetius has always been on the backfoot in any conflict that it's been in, and before the Sorcerers even came about, there was an impossible wall and gap that couldn't be overcome, especially as a faction that was in opposition to Goldlight. 

We didn't have access to resources or events that would help us grow, didn't have access to anything, and we had people dying left and right with the most painful being Uralai who had an unfortunate fight.

---

Sorcery had been introduced before the sorcerers have been about, and for a while at that. It wasn't introduced to kill out old characters, it was to introduce a grey version of witchery that wouldn't instantly lead to you being put at a stake when being found out.

---

I seen something about Aetius being chance's creation... It wasn't. It was made by Uralai, Gideon, Bylthe(?), and a few others. The sorcerers came months after. The sorcerers weren't forced to stay in Aetius. All of them had the freedom to leave as they saw fit, and I believe one of them had already done so. The main reason why they actually wanted to stay though was because again, they received extremely poor treatment as soon as they spawned in.

---

On points about powercreep, I will agree entirely. Personally, from my experience, I struggled greatly, and most of the time, I found it to be because I lacked the stats and uniques that I needed for someone in my position. All I had was a soulbound arcanium staff with +2meta/lightning pow no other uniques. When I got my sig, both the first and second, it felt like things only became harder because I was technically ready to fight stronger people, but because my stats couldn't hold up, I got obliterated.

And to play into the first point, we didn't have resources that would allow us to catch up.

In my opinion, stat providing signatures are cool and fine, but uniques, especially when you have access to anything you may need are waaaay too strong.