Dark races and boredom

[Vaemar]

I take Ungtar's post from the thread with the proposal to bash/destroy/turn upside down the ecl and answer here, because I feel doing so there would really be too off-topic.

I really approve of your passion on this topic.

I will just share my own point of view, which is that ECL is not the reason I do not play my svirf more. It's boredom. They can only feasibly interact with other svirf (of which there are very few) and are supposed to (primarily) stay in the UD.

It gets boring. You're essentially playing a single player game. There may be 30 other people playing on peak, but 29 of them are somewhere you can't go.

What did you expect when you created your svirfneblin?

I don't mean the question to be rude, but it is just sincere curiosity of what your expectations were back then.

Personally, coming from a drow, I was okay with the idea of staying alone often as long as I could play a role I liked.

However I noticed myself the issue of boredom in a while, both with the drow and the svirfneblin. Essentially you stay with them till you hit max level and then, you log, you make a who and you see online people with whom your character not only can't really play with, but sometimes would even have big interest to run away from, and then you log another character. I remember once I made "who" with my drow and I saw, three paladins a certain "blade of the black archer", a dwarf and a few more nature-lovers. Not the buddies a drow would really hang out with unless she is fine with being burnt at the stake.

Now how could this be addressed? Because it is a pity to see such a beautiful setting as we have in this game, being left almost abandoned with really a handful active players.

Let's start easy and in order.

Deep gnome rp and interactions as I see them
I don't think deep gnomes can feasibly interact only with other deep gnomes. I think on the other hand that to really play a deep gnome how it is meant to be you need to interact with other race in some manner.

Deep gnomes are particularly nice because they are a bit like that villain from batman, two-faces. With outsiders they are dour and somber, while among them are much more open. Not outright joyful and outgoing, of course, they are a tough folk from the Underdark, but not so that much different from some grumbling hard-working dwarves, or even humans for that matter. So basically, if you do not interact with outsiders feasibly, you lose the first, more typical face of the deep gnomes, and the whole two-face concept all together.

I believe deep gnomes can very well interact with dwarves and surface gnomes to get nice possibilities for rp. They are not *forced* to do so, but the possibility for healthy interaction is pretty much there. On top of that deep gnomes are pragmatic people and they can interact with anybody, if they keep the correct behaviour, if they have good reasons to do so. Even if the good reason is being paid for a service. The very first entry for the deep gnome in the first edition monster manual states this clearly, explaining that deep gnomes would provide adventurers for services upon payment and would gladly help anybody fighting their sworn enemies the drow. Sworn enemies with whom, by the way, deep gnomes can trade and interact also in a non-deadly matter, upon certain conditions.

More players → more deep gnomes (or drow, or orcs)
Going a little more in depth, the higher is the number of players of the game, the higher are the chances the dark races, and this including the deep gnomes, get more players. This is actually good for the mud in general, but even more so for underplayed races.

Ways to call new players are obviously the ones stated in other threads:
-vote everyday on mud connector
-write reviews there or on other sites
-introduce your friends to the game
-help new players in game both IC and OOC
-introduce people in other online communities, such as forums devoted to rp or fantasy literature to the game (this should be done tactfully of course, but in principle there is nothing bad to let people who might like the game know it actually exists)

This player-side, at least.

On the side of the mud and its staff, some ideas/critics could be these:
-that tutorial is hard, give noobs a way to skip or reset it.
-name approval, especially at the end of the tutorial, is frustrating. You can just sit in that room until somebody approves your name. I would rather find a way to let these guys into the game proper even without approval for a few hours when they are new.
-think carefully before rejecting names to a new player.
-mention somewhere that to meet other characters you have got to go to Waterdeep market square.

There would be also the matter of kismet, but I have come to like the system. It is worth mentioning however that when I came here, with the intention of rolling a drow thief, being unable to play either a drow or a thief from the start made me a little hesitant, and only after trying some 20 or so other muds I decided to try to get a drow here. I would however remove at least the drow gender-class combinations. It makes no sense that a female fighter, who is relatively simple to rp, requires more kismet than a priestess who has a much more complex and difficult rp.

More deep gnomes (or drow, or orcs)
This is a little more tricky, and really calls in question the boredom. In practice, the more active players of these races are there, the less are the chances you get bored.

First thing would be to make so that more players get to try the race and manage to get their characters past the critical levels. This could be achieved in many ways:
-First by reviewing the ecl, and this is why I proposed to abolish it (among the other at least three proposals there).
-Second with the building of some areas to make the leveling a little easier, in particular at critical levels. I believe a drow tutorial for the very early levels would be great. And also an area for svirnebli to go between levels 5-15, when they can move to the Aerie. Perhaps also a drow area to level between level 8-10 or 8-12. I can't say for orcs, having no orc characters (yet).
-Then by adding a few areas, but not just new areas, that once visited the players go back to their boredom, but areas where to solve quests characters need to group and cooperate between different classes. That way they are encouraged to play together, at least at high levels. (whispers: traps, poisons, diseases, super-beefy mobs )
-Organizing events for these races in game.
-Organizing events that involve these races interacting with other races, not necessarily in a pvp fashion. It could be commerce or simple the other races needing a guide, or some dark quests these races could get involved with. Isolationist does not mean isolated.
-Helping actively new characters of these races with spells in game, a.k.a. babysitting. Prath is a wonderful example in this regard.
-Getting a central hub for dark races and baddies to go there and meet, as goodies do in Waterdeep Market Square or in Ardeep. I believe Skullport would be ideal in this regard as it is the most rp consistently place for deep gnomes, drow, orcs, goblins and surfacers to meet and interact all together.

And apart from the first one all the others can be taken care of by players willing to do so.

So, here there is a few thought and opinion I came up with in the time I have played these races and FK in general. They are not real proposals, otherwise I would have posted them in the appropriate board, but much closer to brainstorming. I am curious to hear what are other players' opinions on the matter.

[Ungtar]

Oh my. That's long. I'll have to take it in bite size chunks to digest.

To start with, I don't know what my expectations were. I can't rightly recall. Essentially a friend said, "Let's all make some deep gnomes" and that's what we did.

What we have discovered since though is that the urge to have them lasted longer than the urge to play them. Only a few of us dabble now.

[Areia]

-that tutorial is hard, give noobs a way to skip or reset it.
-name approval, especially at the end of the tutorial, is frustrating. You can just sit in that room until somebody approves your name. I would rather find a way to let these guys into the game proper even without approval for a few hours when they are new.
-think carefully before rejecting names to a new player.
-mention somewhere that to meet other characters you have got to go to Waterdeep market square.

I'm not sure how the tutorial is difficult. Having never played a MUD before, and not knowing a single thing I was doing when I first came here, the tutorial gave me no trouble at all, and I've observed similar from other people.
Name authorization is essential, and out of the probably near thirty alts I've rolled thus far, only one was kept from being authorized for more than a few minutes, and I expect that was because I created at, like, 3:00 AM. But as usual, these are only my own experiences and what I've observed. Maybe it's different for the majority.
There is a mob in the first WD quest new PCs are given who does indeed tell you to check out the MS, and even where to find it.

-Helping actively new characters of these races with spells in game, a.k.a. babysitting. Prath is a wonderful example in this regard.

Prath and another whose name I sadly can't recall were absolutely amazing to my first drow. And when I met your alt on my second attempt at the race, you were just as awesome. I really learned a lot from you guys, and doubt I'd have ever made it as far as I did without that help, either time, even though I eventually gave it up, anyway. So yeah, just as these sorts of people are very good to have on the surface, they are too to have down under.

[Harroghty]

The tutorial needs to be changed to suit individual classes (this coming from the guy who built it) and potentially different player experience levels.

In general, only boring people get bored (wisdom from a prof once upon a time). If you're bored then take action and make it better, be that through detailed suggestions or actual contributions. That's how games like this improve; players rise up and improve it.

[Ungtar]

Notice you haven't been playing Harroghty much lately. Bored with him?

[Yemin]

The tutorial needs to be changed to suit individual classes (this coming from the guy who built it) and potentially different player experience levels.

In general, only boring people get bored (wisdom from a prof once upon a time). If you're bored then take action and make it better, be that through detailed suggestions or actual contributions. That's how games like this improve; players rise up and improve it.

Indeed. I believe those that don't seemingly have a problem with it Areia are those that have the str and dex not to. I nearly died several times with Mers and mostly only got threw with a lot of patience and I had played 3 muds before this one for more than 6 months.

Having never stuck with a UD race fore more than 3 and a bit weeks I can't say whether my form of staying intertained / creating opportunities for the characters around me to do more than sit around are viable down there. One of my favourite things to do here is shamelessly plagerize a movie or book I've read recently and transpose the story here to propose a hunt or activity that can seemingly be done for a while without getting boring. Ditto acquisitions unlimited was born then I got bored with the character more or less being stuck to one city on this thousand+ room mud so he closed it down and I'm considering my next new side project.

Oh and AU wasn't taken from Acquisitions incorp. The Idea was spawned from an anime not to be named because I won't admit to ever have watched it.

[Harroghty]

No, but playing often loses out to staffing as I prioritize my schedule.

The trick to the Underdark is that its most prolific sponsor (Solaghar) has mostly moved on. This is especially damning for deep gnomes because he's the author of all of those areas. A new advocate for that race or the UD in general would do wonders; Larethiel is a good case study on how to breathe life into your feature of interest.

[Vaemar]

Name authorization is essential, and out of the probably near thirty alts I've rolled thus far, only one was kept from being authorized for more than a few minutes, and I expect that was because I created at, like, 3:00 AM.

I have had some different experiences, ranging from alts authorized within minutes, to alts who took up to three or four days to be authorized. But this is not a problem for a player of this game, since they can always play their other alts while they wait.

The issue is that in the Waterdeep tutorial when you arrived to the last room you can just sit there. And I believe that in this timeframe some players could be lost, finding their character stuck. Okay, if they are dissuaded so easily they might not last that much anyway, but still, I would be for trying to reduce the losses. Especially when the fix would be as simple as giving them something to do in the tutorial. Last time I tried the tutorial I noticed that, once I reached the last room, I was just stuck there until I got authorization, without being able even to go back.

In general, only boring people get bored (wisdom from a prof once upon a time). If you're bored then take action and make it better, be that through detailed suggestions or actual contributions. That's how games like this improve; players rise up and improve it.

Basically the matter here is this: it is not that people get really that bored with their UD race, I for example I am always excited when I play my drow or my deep gnome, even if I do rather mundane stuff. But I need to have somebody to play with to do my rp, otherwise, as Ungtar said, I am doing a single player experience. This is not necessarily boring, per se, but in the end I bet most of us are here for a multi-player game and in particular for a multi-player game where one roleplays their character.

So, summing up from above, I see a solution to this lack of players for certain races as:
-increase the number of players for the mud in general (and here come tutorial, votes, reviews, advertising, etc.)
-increase the number of players for these races (and here come building, proposals about ecl, events, etc.)
-get a place to meet for all the dark fellows (and here again building and proposals such as caravans, etc.)

[Larethiel]

The races adressed in your post, Vaemar, are examples of races that provoke more or less extreme reactions outside their
own circle. The appearance of drow and orcs tends to lead to hostile reactions.

I remember once I made "who" with my drow and I saw, three paladins a certain "blade of the black archer", a dwarf and a few more nature-lovers. Not the buddies a drow would really hang out with unless she is fine with being burnt at the stake.

Like this...yeah well....You are a drow, so that seems a sensitive expectation and should not really be any different. If an
elf/paladin/goodly fighter/ranger/etc. cannot be expected to want to tear apart a drow, something's kinda wrong. It is one
of the things you have to take intoaccount before choosing to play a race that is profundly being famed for its evil and dark
ways and the hatred it shares and that it provokes. Special races come with their settings and advantages, but also their
very own disadvantages and will often require their player to go without many things available to the more common race.

-increase the number of players for these races (and here come building, proposals about ecl, events, etc.)

These are actually things you can invest in and that you can do yourself, too. Run events for your race, and keep running
them even if nobody shows up 7 times, maybe the 8th time someone will show up. Or maybe it will take 20 to 50 events
of different nature (lore, sports, party, competition, countless options, really). Tenacity will be your friend. Yeah, it can be
demotivating to be the only drow, svirfneblin, real elf, loxo or just any not really mainstream or "in" race and it will be, but
whatever!

Racial Roleplay is not everybody's cup of tea, so to speak. There is lot of racial lore not all people might want to take the time
to learn or that they really care for and often, you will not meet the behaviour or responses to your roleplay that you might
want to see, but alas, your example might just be the PC that someone will be impressed with. You can always guide others to
explore races and perspectives not yet considered. Do also keep in mind that there tend to be trends in played races of FK.
Sometimes drow will be the race to go with 3/4 of the who list being drow. Another day, Selune will be the faith to follow and
dwarves the new shining stars.

-get a place to meet for all the dark fellows (and here again building and proposals such as caravans, etc.)

You can get into building. You do not have to be a pro that writes code with 5k lines, but you can always make simple
areas with interesting contents, start small, pursue what you want to see in game or approach people to collaborate
with or to teach you the basics. When in doubt or when feeling like lamenting the boredom or lack of activity of the
race/faith you play, there is always something to do instead of lamenting. Building, for example. Collecting ideas to
flesh out roleplays or even quests that you can run yourself.

Proposals are always a nice thing to read and consider but proposals happen on the boards and it takes a time until a
proposal might be implemented, if it ever will make it to the game port. But roleplay rarely happens in the Game Suggestions
or General Discussion thread, it happens game side and the Events section can be a supporting factor.

So, summing up from above, I see a solution to this lack of players for certain races as:

To conclude this: Get active because nobody will get active to pursue your wantings for yourself.

[Vaemar]

Like this...yeah well....You are a drow, so that seems a sensitive expectation and should not really be any different. If an
elf cannot expected to want to tear apart a drow, something's kinda wrong. It is one of the things you have to account
for when choosing to play a race that is profundly being famed for its evil and dark ways and the hatred it shares and that
it provokes.

To be fair I generally choose my races also to play through the prejudices against them, be they rightly earned or not, the thing that struck me as odd the most was a guy who saw my deep gnome with a tiefling, saying loudly she was happily going to a place where she could learn infernal, yet a human who was witnessing the scene told her he had no problems whatsoever unless she was evil. Now my deep gnome is actually not evil, but if one of my goodies, i.e. my elves in my case, had seen such a scene they would have at least a reasonable suspicion on my deep gnome affiliations. However enjoying to play a race who has prejudice does not mean not playing with anybody. Back to the drow, my drow have had really no problems interacting with many iblith. Yeah, they draw the line to some point and they are not going to tolerate being disrespected unless they have a real gain for it, but in general there is no such a difficulty as finding characters dark races can interact with. Even my goblin knows a bunch of people with whom he gets along pretty fine.

The main issue for these dark races seems to be, after the lack of players, the lack of a place where they can go to hang around waiting for people to interact with. Something like... well, Waterdeep Market Square for dark folks. This does not mean all encounters there would be friendly, on the contrary, some conflict might easily spark, as it does, to be fair, in MS, but it would still be rp and much better than solitude.

You can get into building.

I am trying to do so, but it is not easy at first. But I prefer to do things first and speak about what I have done later, when I have actually done it for real. This is why I have been intentionally a bit vague.

Still making a few proposals on the forums, and sharing opinions, does not preclude then acting in the first place to do that stuff myself, it can on the contary be an encouragement. But again, I prefer to be vague about doing things myself, until I have done them for real.

[Gwain]

You don't have to build areas, you can design them, meaning item descriptions, questlines, room descriptions and mobiles etc. Then you find a builder in game interested and they build it. Personally though, I've seen a few things added to the Underdark in the last few months, all good areas for solo adventure or group adventuring. I think one thing that can improve the whole of the area is to change the hard code for the wilderness to take less stamina in travel, right now it is herculean but can only be altered by hard code.