Now that the Greenest Dolphin has been wrecked and gameplay has moved to the locale of St. Loomis, we've entered in on what you might think of as Second-Stage Alpha.
Since leaving the ship, we've seen some decline in game activity. This is understandable -- the atmosphere has relaxed and become less charged, the main plot has slowed and moved more into the background, and PCs themselves are spreading out and slowing down more. This is a pretty natural consequence of concluding the high-intensity pressure-cooker of the initial ship plotline, and also simply of the fact that we've moved past that first rush of novelty from opening/playing a new game. So there's nothing really surprising or bad about this. We as staff are obviously always really happy to see people out and about in Avaria at all hours, and to see what you all get up to with one another! Still, a somewhat lower level activity isn't all downside for us -- it does give us quite a bit more time and opportunity to actually fix things that are broken, add more features and content, and generally work towards making Avaria more functional and fun for its eventual beta phase. But since the slowdown and sparser population might feel disappointing (even for us too sometimes), we wanted to take the time to talk a little bit about what can be expected going forward.
It's always a given that alpha phase of a game is going to be a little rocky -- especially a game as ridiculously overcomplex and ambitious as this one. We know it can pose a challenge to play a game when there are so many bugs, not to mention incomplete documentation of lore, an in-game world that isn't fully built out yet, a small population, and all those other alpha limitations. We deeply appreciate those who've put effort into the ongoing stories so far, and those who continue to do so. This has genuinely been a HUGE help to us in finding problems of all kinds, and getting new ideas for how to create a world and a game that is rewarding to the kinds of players we want to see in Avaria -- in other words, you guys and others like you! We hope many of you will stick with us through the months ahead and continue to help the game's development as you play out your characters' stories -- even if it is at a slower pace.
That said, here's what everyone can expect to see for the next while.
Player Stories and Big-Picture Plots
- First off, we're going to issue Presence refunds for the current crop of stories that was gathered a few days ago, because right now the script runs very unreliably and a lot of players didn't manage to make this round of story collections (there are only 16 stories in the list, and Pilgrim is aware of a few people who wanted to join this round and couldn't). After that we'll set story collection to happen very reliably at in-game sunset on the 1st of the month every month.
- We will address PC stories with sensible progress. PCs might be developing businesses or magical abilities or greater leverage in crime networks, building a reputation among the locals, improving their skills and equipment, gaining access to a private NPC space, or whatever else it is that they're focusing on. These are great things to develop story around, and things we can help with.
- Here are some important notes we want to make when it comes to PC stories:
- You can change your COMMENT to include information about what you're hoping for, OOCly, in regards to a character story. This can help us to address your stories in ways that feel especially meaningful and rewarding to you.
- You can use QUERY to request specific NPC interaction for a story.
- Stories can include logs with solo RP -- not always just in groups -- and also character reflections.
- When there's something you imagine happening in the background of your character story and you want to see some tangible in-game development from it, you can use IC fiction posts. For example: if your character meets a VNPC they want to hire as an apprentice for a market stall they're hoping to open, then an IC fiction post would be a great way to show that.
- We can only give your character what makes sense for them to have, based on their interactions and activity. This doesn't mean that we will refuse to address a story, but how momentously your story progresses is up to you. If your character is aiming for something in particular but hasn't done what they would need to do in order to achieve their goal, we will just address the story by giving opportunities and potential hooks rather than granting the end achievement.
- One example of this is magic. Magic is very unique and personalized in Avaria -- so if you want your character to have magic, and magic is a goal you're really interested in, you should roleplay about it. We can't address an empty story by randomly giving your character magic. We have to know your character better to do that, and your character needs certain dynamics to be developed and established, in addition to pursuing these things via stories. Developing a real handle on magic is also something that should be expected to take quite a lot of time, and be a story in itself.
- As far as big-picture plots go, there are plotlines still going on that tie into the broader background lore of Avaria, which PC stories will be able to affect and change. We'll probably have a staff-run RPT roughly every month about these things. You can also still expect to see small interactions with SPC/NPCs like Pomeroy, Tig, Sassafrass, and others who may show up in the the future around the St. Loomis area. We may have a lot of other work to do but we still like roleplaying!
Staff Focus
This is going to be on fixing bugs and developing the game. This includes a whole heap of coded and creative things we'll be working on:
- Crafting abilities and support
- If you rolled in as a crafting character with non-functional skills or abilities, these things will be filled out -- and we actually would love to hear from you regarding your feelings of playing that crafter and your thoughts about what you'd like from the skillset.
- More shops should show up in-game, along with more items and equipment. There will also be more forageables added, more plants, more animals, etc.
- Combat abilities and support
- We're still working on the combat revamp, which will come with better functionality in combat and make it easy to fix currently-broken combat abilities, while adding more unique moves and special unlockable combination abilities for combat-focused characters.
- However, as Song of Avaria is not an extremely combat-heavy game, and combat is currently working (unlike many other things), this is taking a backseat and will be coming along slowly.
- Character generation
- One of the reasons we don't want to fully open again is all the bugs associated with character generation. So, while a slow trickle of new players may be coming in (those who ask specifically to try out the alpha phase through other platforms), we won't be able to handle any real quantity of incoming players easily until we thoroughly fix all the bugs in character generation.
- We'll also be slowly working on adding the other heritages to the game that will be available in beta -- and maybe even previewing some of them as NPCs!
- Solo activities
- VNPC club functionality: Different club types will be added (hunting, crafting), along with more local rankings, reputations, unlockable abilities, and maybe some other fun miscellaneous rewards.
- Job errands: Ideally, all jobs should have some errands that PCs can do, so that people can actively roleplay some parts of their character's job when they feel like it.
- Bug fixing: Many systems currently aren't working perfectly, such as rumors, and these large-scale features need to be repaired in a more comprehensive way, along with the hundreds of reported bugs. BUGS!!
- Building: There's still a good deal of building to be done before beta is ready to open, so we'll also be focusing on that in the background, and this will happen without changelog notifications unless the building is being done in St Loomis. You can expect to see new (fairly small) outdoor areas added in the St Loomis vicinity too, so there will be more places to explore and hunt/gather resources.
- Lore documentation: There's a lot of background lore in Avaria that just hasn't been written up well yet, and lots of questions come up regularly. So we will be continuing to add new material to the wiki while also answering lore questions via the forums and OOCmail.
Community Culture
- Before beta, we'll put some more focus towards documenting culture and guidelines for the next opening. In the meantime we'll keep posting roleplay guideposts once in a while to make sure Avaria keeps developing according to our vision for it.
- If any players want to post their own helpful suggestions and guidance towards culture that they like, that will be totally welcome, and we can hopefully have some nice discussions over these things.
What probably CAN'T be expected anymore:
- Logging in to always find other players online, immediately accessible and available for roleplay.
- There's still quite a bit of activity at peak hours and some more scattered throughout the day, and people are still doing and scheming interesting things. But most likely you won't find a whole mob of other PCs at all hours all crammed into the same space together at once.
- Fast-paced main plot.
- On the ship, the story moved at a pretty hectic pace, but in St Loomis we'll be going slower. This gives us more time to work on the other things we have to do -- that loooong list of stuff outlined above -- and it's also a more sustainable level of activity for us as staff.
- So, rather than weekly RPTs, RPTs will be more of a monthly occurrence, or even a bit less. Again, though, staff-played NPCs will be available for personal stories via queries, and you'll continue to see them out and about around St Loomis as we have time, interacting with PCs and advancing the plot in smaller ways.
- Answers to individual queries or petitions regarding story activity will overall probably be slower, too, as the main staff involvement in plots will come through addressing monthly stories.
HOWEVER, you can mitigate these things and continue to play your character regularly by:
- Cutscenes: Public ones for just downtime roleplay, or private ones with people you're hoping to advance personal plot with. With a big-picture plot that's moving more slowly and everyone not jammed into that one tight space, this should make it easier to integrate cutscenes into ongoing stories.
- Using rumors, lifestyle details, plot notes, and other tools to let others know what you're up to and what's going on.
- Using couriers to send letters.
- Engaging in solo activity such as exploring, crafting, and competing in rankings (there are currently fishing, performing, and brawling clubs in St Loomis).
- Writing IC fiction on the forums.
- Posting and staging public events, from small-scale ones like foraging lessons, picnics, or birthday parties to bigger things like a Salawi-style athletics competition.
- Just being out there in the world available to roleplay!
Finally -- we sincerely appreciate everyone who's come with us this far and shared their awesome characters and stories with us. We would love to hear people's thoughts and ideas for how to handle and enjoy the continuing-but-slower alpha phase!
