a multiplayer game of parenting and civilization building
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I do like this idea and i think it could bring some much needed stability which we are lacking. The issue will arise with tap out area of tarry spots and etc.
Not a bad idea. Its been suggested a handful of times before i believe. That said im more into hard resets that throw us all for a loop and have to start from square one somewhat regularly. Arcs that last months are not cool. The current arc has been going on for 92 days. A long arc in the rift was maybe 5 days. Short ones were less than a day. I enjoyed that cycling. It seems ridiculous to have this running push west when the majority of fams dont last more than 50 gens. Longest one in the rift was over 300 gens. Families had to survive there or it would reset. Once there was only one family it would start over and allow eves to spawn. Eves could spawn for 8 hours then we would be locked with those fams till there was one left. How long the arcs lasted depended on how we played and how hard people worked to keep families alive or destroy them.
I hear you there. Im in the same frame of mind. At least on here its not as wild as the discord. You couldnt pay me to mod there.
In terms of resets or culls, it takes about a week and no one can render the area. Dont know the full details but it would be near impossible to pull off on the main server.
If i remember correctly culls used to happen every 24 hours, but dont quote me. If that was still the case then it would be easily exploitable.
Might as well change your name at that point, make it harder for the mods, and everyone else, to tell who you are.
Though i think its easy to tell who people are by the way they speak and their overall viewpoint of the game. Especially the regulars.
Honestly destiny you'd be a pretty good forum moderator. You're on here enough, you're level headed, and know when to make and take a joke. Might be worth an email to j-ball.
Nah you just need an email. The code to sign up is the same for everyone and can be used as many times as you like. But I would never do something like that, this is definitely my first account on here I promise.
Make that three destiny. When will villanelle 4 be released? Summer of 2022? Hit movie of the year? Emmy award winner? Certified fresh on rotten tomatoes?
I think the issue here is less about villanelle's behavior and more about the mods behavior. Someone who is a position of power should be held to a higher standard than someone who's just generally in the discord or on here. That said, if we went digging through all the mods chat history we would find a lot of disturbing things, especially from some. Should these people be moderators? Probably not. Do we have any better options? Not really. I miss jord.
Bathing with a toaster, in reference to anyone, should not be in a mods vernacular. It doesnt matter if they told them to kill themselves or not. They were mocking them and mentioned bathing with a toaster in reference to them.
Well this turned into a hot mess.
I do think its a good opportunity to reflect on how we hold ourself as a community though. There is a lot of hate that gets thrown around over just a game. How someone plays hardly defines who they are, but many people get treated poorly for relatively silly behavior. We have lost a lot of our compassion and become hardened to one another. Its ok for people to be different, its ok for them to make mistakes. No good change has come from raw spite.
On a second note i dont see why villanelle's first account was banned. I dont recall them doing anything ban worthy, at least on here. If mods simply banned them to silence them thats a major abuse of power. Especially since jason has made it clear he wants as little mod involvement as possible.
If they were misbehaving on discord and got banned, ok. But that shouldnt translate to the forums, especially if they decided to hold themselves differently here.
Im with dodge on this one. I do think there is a line. Though i think its far thinner than people like to admit. I agree that the game in its current state disables a lot of organic behavior that brought a good amount of spice to the game.
Catching the thief that keeps sneaking into town and taking your iron is far more interesting than catching the nephew who hid the bellows. Or getting raided by another village and having to run away and start fresh somewhere new. Perhaps even going to war with another family because they keep killing anyone who enters their village. Killing a cult leader who has been preforming regular human sacrifices.
These are all interesting things that used to be pretty common in the game. But because each family is codependent upon another they're essentially all the same. Stealing from another family, attacking another family, its essentially shooting yourself in the foot because it damages or disables your ability to function tech wise. Any form of that chaos, that used to be fun and interesting, is only dysfunctional and damages the servers ability to function as a whole. Its turned into people who wanted to survive vs people who desperately wanted the spice mentioned above. Sure some were purely destructive, sometimes in the most boring ways, often as boring and repetitive as the base game itself.
Its true jason has made efforts to deter griefing. Kill mechanics, curse system, leadership, etc. But it has felt those introductions have been more to appease the community rather than aligning with his ideology. But who know that's just a guess. But i know for a fact there are some in this community who would prefer people get permanently banned if they don't play exactly how they want them to. Luckily jason cant legally do that, but you can see attitude of some. Its become a war for them, to extinguish all ability for people to play chaotically. To remove their ability to play the game by any means necessary. Methods that frankly i find disturbing and are a main reason i stopped playing.
Anyway, there is a dominant sect of vets that are very zealous about destroying any element of chaos or instability. I do think their hearts are in the right place. In their eyes they're fight for peace. But peace can be boring. Its resulted in a relatively sterile environment. Where the griefing is so limited its basically the same shit every time because its all they can get away with. And on the other hand boring repetitive lives with little to no substance beyond doing tasks endlessly like drones. Sure some elements of the tech tree can be fun and fulfilling, especially at first. But many of them are too convoluted to teach and often the town is too unstable to take the time to do so, especially niche stuff. Anyway, the game used to be much more alive and diverse two years ago+. I miss those days, every life felt different and left an impression. The ones with hardship especially. There is something incredibly cathartic about overcoming hardship. Though the hardships in the game in its current state feel very artificial and flat. Bears being brought into town for the 1000th time, some idiot stealing babies, someone scrapping engines or stealing a truck and supplies. Its all the same thing, over and over again. Just like every element of the game currently. Its sad. I hope jason wakes up to this.
Its all good i was mostly being sarcastic. I can make a pretty good guess.
I wonder which mod said that? Lol
To be fair ive seen what Villanelle is talking about countless times and they're not wrong. If they were simply presenting their view or making counterpoints it shouldn't justify a ban. Defending your point of view shouldn't be something to silence. Even if its unpopular. Its not easy to have an unpopular opinion on the discord and it usually results in the same kind of behavior. People calling them children, losers, etc. The difference i see is when someone blatantly comes on and brags about killing a family or town to instigate an argument. Then precedes to name call and etc. Considering Villanelle hasnt done that in the forums and seems to have a passionate and thought out viewpoint i struggle to see them behaving in that way. Though i could be wrong. That said, i wouldnt worry Villanelle, the discord is a pretty noxious place to be in general. You're better off avoiding it.
Permanent bans are very rare. At least they used to be. That said you would have had to have said something pretty awful or done something terrible in order to get banned like that. Even still. Its not like a ban really means anything, its easy enough to make an account on here. If TheRubyCart had a serious issue with the ban they could always contact jason to have it lifted. If jasons not game there isnt much that can be done.
Lol I wonder which mod was bullying you? Unfortunately that behavior has always been a part of the discord. I dont think its going to change any time soon. There is a great deal of anger in this community. Try not to have it rub off on you. Personally i dont think mods should have a bias towards different peoples playstyles. The issue arises when grief style players instigate arguments, use excessive profanity, or say hurtful things. Which was very common, maybe it still is. Same can be said about the opposing side but there is a bit of a double standard with that. And that double standard does come with a level of reason. Constructive playstyles will always garner more sympathy and respect than destructive ones. Its just how people work.
That said if you were not intentionally flaming or using excessive profanity, I suggest you email jason. If he agrees with your viewpoints you might see the change you're looking for.
jasonrohrer@fastmail.fm
I mean it makes sense. These forums have always been pretty quiet in terms of discussion. But if you look at the index page youll see that there are often a lot of guest online. People who are not signed in but are checking out the forums. These forums have a suprising amount of activity considering the state of the game and the minimal discourse happening here. Most of the charged discussions in these forums surround changes to the game, for which we havent had any in a long time. The discussions typically revolve around two *cough cough* or more people debating opposing viewpoints while others lightly chime in. Spam, shit posts, and meme threads usually dont get much traction. I think fugs request is fair, especially if the spam was pushing active discussions away. Like someone did a few months ago by necrospamming and pushing active threads off of page 1. A behavior that did the opposite of keeping these forums alive.
If you think you've been unjustly banned i suggest you email Jason. Posting on here wont do much to help your situation. Discord bans are typically short, especially if its your first offense. That said, you can never be banned from the street.
As much as i think the current kill mechanics are boring. I really dont think they play a major role in the player count. I'm not sure how the current curse culture is these days. But if i remember correctly it was quite toxic. People would stalk players info and make profiles on them. Share it within the community and if they knew they were playing a bunch of people would hop on and spam curse them. People would often convince people in phex to curse someone, if it was warranted or not. That said its more of a community problem than a mechanical one. Not much jason can do about that.
Villanelle wrote:OHOL is about stories. Always was about stories from the start, that's why Jason used to publish user stories and that's why OHOL game reviews are full of stories.
Sure I can agree with that! That is why I think trading can be a part of this. If your family needs rubber and you sent a young man on a quest to find another family and get a few buckets, and he returns an older man, with the rubber, which saves the family, that is a good story.
Thats a nice thought but its unlikely. 90% of those essential resources are made and cycled to the different families by veteran players. Its also promoted by an artificial system which im sorry, does not promote stories and if fact discourages a lot of behavior that used to enable organic stories. Race restrictions promote one type of story "aw man i cant dye my clothes yellow because im black..". Which is extremely immersion breaking. Trade does not happen, its been a joke since the beginning. People used to help or hurt other families because they wanted to, not because they were forced to. The game was very different before artificial structure and mechanics were added. I wish you could have seen it. I doubt you would carry the opinions you have if you had. Race restrictions are not the cure, they're the disease. Artificial mechanics have only limited the total experience of this game.
What it sounds like is natural human behavior that has persisted and been a part of our history for thousands of years. Wars, raiders, and the brutal realities of survival used to be a major thing in this game.
If your entire family was dying and desperately needed steel. You found a village with tons. You're telling me you wouldnt sneak in to take some for the benefit of your family? Is that griefing when you're hurting to help? Maybe, but at least its a natural behavior prompted by real emotions and motivations. Rather than just wanting to be destructive.
Now say your grandma went to another village to make peace with them. After a good while she does not come back and you and your family grows worried. You, your mother, sister, and niece all travel to check if she was still there. On your arrival you see a bloody pile of bones. Confused you go up to ask someone what happened. Suddenly the person yells in a strange language and begins to run around the town repeating the same word over and over again. Villagers begin to grab weapons and hurry over to you. In the confusion your mother and sister were stabbed. Still in a state of shock you grab your niece and run as fast as you can back to your village. Gripped by heart ache and resentment you rally some of the villagers for a counter attack. Your town doesnt have many weapons but it has some. You march to the village, stopping at the outskirts. You stage a plan. "Acquire the medical supplies and any weaponry to disable their defense and offensive capabilities". Kill anyone who tries to attack you. The battle is short. Several casualties on both sides, but the towns ability to attack again have been disabled for now. Most of the townsfolk ran into the woods. You return the healing supplies to their former position. Satisfied with your revenge and with the knowledge that the village will not be as much of s threat in the future you head back home.
These kind of situations happened often. They were interesting and always left you with a unique emotional reaction that used to be a defining trait of this game. Were you the grandma who was killed for peace. The mom or sister who were killed for fear and xenophobia, the niece who lost most of her loved ones, or one of the villagers who was rallied to avenge your family? Perhaps you were in the other village and had to flee from your village after the attack. These kind of interactions made for unique lives. They left a mark. They also balanced progression stages because families were always chipping away at each other. Which im sorry, is what rival villages would do. Griefing or not. Peace did happen, some families lived together in peace, but it was very rare. Just like true peace is rare irl.
As someone who played over 500 hours before they were added, believe me they dont. Race restrictions really only slow down tech progression and force artificial interactions between families. Organic interactions used to be much more along the lines of raiding and pillaging each other. Blood feuds that would last generations. Trust me it was a better system for late game. As soon as a family got too powerful or too rich another family would ride in and nearly destroy them. The survivors would be given the difficult task of rebuilding their family back to their former status. Some families would be driven from their homes and forced to start over somewhere in the wilderness. Believe me, this was a much more interesting and dynamic late game situation. Forced cooperation has only made things boring and removed these types of interactions.
You play the game before they were added? Did you enjoy tool slots as well? Its been expressed in excessive detail by hundreds of people for almost two years. Sure you might be in the 1% that likes them but the majority dont. Sure jason doesnt owe us anything. But ignoring your community and their voice is different. When the majority of people dont enjoy something you're doing it might be worth taking note of and adjusting things. Is that unreasonable?
To chime in on the iron and water notes, and honestly oil as well. The dominance of lay lines also was quite damaging to diversity. Iron veins, water(w/ pond system), and oil used to be quite random. Meaning some areas of the map could be extremely resource rich while others were quite barren. The change to have everything on lay lines and equally distanced removed a lot of that diversity. It was much more exciting to have it random. Especially when the map was truly random. The possibility of having a tarry spot a few tiles away from a well was there. That would make for a unique town and experience while playing. A town could be positioned next to a vast badland with tons of iron to give them a jump start and dominance. A lot of these systems have removed the diversity of experiences in this game. Sure they make things easier on us, but they do that by making things more predictable.