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etrayaooc2024-06-20 06:47 pm
etrayamods) wrote in etrayaooc2024-06-20 06:47 pm
Entry tags:
JUNE FEEDBACK POST.
| Hello, Etrayans! We're now three months into the game! While Etraya was originally meant to be a smaller-scale game, we are very excited about the growth it has gone through, and all the players who have joined us! However, we've also noticed that some players may be struggling to engage with the game given the pacing. As we're a low/no AC game, with a massive boon of players who have joined us (and have been maxing out our ten players per app round limit over the last two application rounds), we wanted to get your feedback on the pacing of our mission logs, if we should be adding logs in between them, what you, the players, would like for us to add to the game to make it easier to engage with, and engage with between mission logs. This is a shared game, and we want to ensure our players are having fun and finding things to engage with! Please feel free to leave any feedback on this post; if there's feedback you agree with, feel free to +1 it! This post is unscreened, and comments are open. We're going to plan on putting one of these posts up every three months or so, to see where we're at! Thank you, Etraya Mods |
no subject
Just wanted to drop a line and say: You guys are awesome and I love the space you've created for us to play in! AC stresses me out sometimes and can really suck the fun out of a game for me when I have to do a bunch of math just to be sure I pass, so the way you guys have it set up is excellent, IMO! I love a permanent AC page that I can drop things on at any time tbh.
I think you've done an excellent job of building in plenty of hooks in events to play with as well. I like the missions for more meaty-plotty things, and I also like the mingles for CR-building!
That said, I did feel a bit overwhelmed when we had both in one month? So I think my only suggestion would be maybe do one bigger, plotty mission thing one month, and do a chiller, more CR-building/connecting thing (like the "mandatory" coffee dates!) that's more optional another. In a sort of alternating schedule, rather than ending up feeling almost like we have 2 events in a month. That might not work with how your overall bigger/meta plot is worked out, but my 2 cents~
Other than that lil preference, I just think you guys are excellent at letting players influence things. The winners of the maze "choosing" the next event was a really cool touch! I LOVE seeing stuff like that, more of it in the future would be super fun!
~Kayla
+1
no subject
+1
+1
but i also like the idea of alternating plot heavy/plot lite months, or even shorter events like was suggested below. i think diving straight into The Horrors was great for establishing new cr, and will still be going forward, we just may need a bit of time built in for emotional fallout opportunities.
+1
I'm in love with the mod squad's zippy, fast, and detailed communication answers whenever I (and everyone else) have questions about the FAQ, Locations, Game Mechanics, or how we might interact (/collaborate) with a new plot/game change.
+1
Especially this!
Alternating between heavy and light sounds like a good idea to trial. I'd love to see how this goes as someone who would love to run my own plot but wouldn't want to add to everyone's thread loads. I found that I couldn't really engage in the mingle log last month because I was already meeting my thread limit with the labyrinth, so I'd love to see how we go with alternating between missions and mingles. (You can always blend the two whenever it suits as well.)
+1
+1
no subject
I'm not totally sure how to accomplish this, but something that could encourage smaller logs/more activity from the players outside of the big event logs are things that can foster more of an idea of what people's everyday lifestyles are like, and how they might intersect. Maybe establishing a place where characters have to attend, like a training arena or attending lessons or something that provides a hook and some sort of routine could help with that? Just some food for thought. Thanks for all your hard work!
+1
with the missions being so important to things it does feel a little like everyone just waits for those to drop and maybe figuring out how else we could utilise the downtime would help. i like fey's idea and want to add about possibly adding more locations that would be freely accessible to everyone. there are a lot of player locations, but because they're player introduced there's an automatic barrier to using them freely as setting.
More Suggestion Idea than +/-
I think this might be a really banger way to meet the needs of both groups. Because then, in the game, you could have plot-heavy-month 1, chill-month 2, but in the background, there's that optional TDM mission if you'd rather be diving into a next plot-heavy mission on month 2 as well.
no subject
I think it'd be nice to have some kind of setting in the game that would encourage more blind or group interactions maybe (since people don't really gather in any single place, I don't think), with a particular purpose. idk like... maybe making more points or investigating something about the points, a place to exchange their points or something...
I'm guilty of requesting a building that might not really be conducive to that (the x-mansion lol) and I know characters are going to be naturally suspicious and cautious, so there has to be some kind of draw to make people want to gather there and not stay in the places they got from their own world in between events! the scavenger hunt was a fun idea, maybe something like that but with a result or prize to share when you find things or do certain tasks? idk if I'm making sense 🥲
also, when things are less hectic for me, I'd like to run a small mingle log to open the X-Mansion pool for a summer open-to-everyone mingle haha. if that's ok!! ❤️
+1 to 2-3 things in this & An OOC Idea
[ (....but it's very much something I'm going to think about as I plan for future interactions with other characters and players. How I set up abilities to reach that character in more ways.) // +1 to loving this whole post and how it's getting me thinking about the mechanics of how the game is running, and how my own gaming in it is running.
What if we had player-to-player/character feedback and loved cheering posts like this for the first 3 months' wave on the meme comm, too? >_> Can I toss up something like that? ]
I love scavenger hunts, car key match-ups, and all sorts of social things, too. (Like the Tea Party in the last mission, where even some of the mission stuff is cr-based and not only action-run. I'm a dabbler, which you'll find out across my +1s on these. I like a lot of everything options.)
Addition:
The more I think about this, the more I like the idea about their being things that rack up more points, or places they can discuss them, or exchange them, or etc, too.
no subject
re: PCs choosing missions—
I agree with Kayla re: it being cool that characters got to choose the next mission. I think this would be a great mechanic to include if the mods feel it's appropriate and something that they can support. I'd love to see more of that as I think it could have some fun IC consequences if it becomes ICly known that PCs are choosing the missions, and it's not just Aurora pulling the strings.
re: events—
Is it possible to break missions up over two or so months? (I say "or so" because I imagine some mission ideas could span three.) I'm unsure how feasible it is, so I'm spitballing here. Using the labyrinth as an example, we could've split it up over two months, with the first month being about entering and the second month being its exit.
Splitting missions up could allow for more player involvement/impact and make the missions feel like they have a bigger footprint. At the moment, they feel like they exist in their own bubble and it currently lacks a ripple effect to play with. (For example, what if Character A did something that destroyed a portion of the labyrinth and it couldn't regenerate itself? That would be something a lot of us could play with in the second month and prove to be a further obstacle.) I play a character who would accidentally and intentionally press the button that says "Do not press" and I know I'd love that to have a wider consequence beyond it existing between my thread partner and me. (I appreciated knowing Beebo could destroy buildings in Etraya for the plushie event. I'd love to see more opportunities for ripple effects!)
re: IC "downtime"—
I know I've brought in a player location that I haven't had capacity to do much with, so I think it'd be great if we could have some downtime to be able to explore Etraya and let characters interact without the high stakes of missions being involved. (It might also allow for player plots and player-driven activities. I know I'd love to run a few plots once I'm more settled!)
I think with the current pace of the game, allowing for some breathing room will let the missions feel less like they're being stacked with us having to "rush" through threads or feeling like we're "late" to logs, and I think it'd let more opportunities for interaction and impact to occur.
Others have covered this eloquently, so I won't go into detail about my thoughts.
re: IC knowledge re: missions—
I'd also like to say that I think alternating between mission and mingle every month can also be switched up so PCs don't grow accustomed to "Oh, it's the second month, it's mission time!" if appropriate/suitable for the mods' calendar.
*
I hope some of this is helpful. Thanks for giving us an opportunity to provide some feedback! ♥
+1
Also yes. Hard agree on the breathing room. IDK how we are as a whole group, but I am personally a slower tagger, and definitely end up feeling behind/late/etc at times b/c of it
no subject
To that end, I'll be doing a post this weekend. :) No idea what it is, of course.