MIdSeason Feedback

[Mickee]

Big source of complaint i have for this event in particular is kind of egregious Railroading. There were multiple points where we pretty realistically had the means to do something unique to further the event or make bold actions but each and every single time other than /maybe/ during combat it was shut down. And honestly worse was the way it was shut down. Being told directly that any tool or strategy I might have would not work purely for the sake of allowing a plot section to play is, and I don't mean to sound rude because that's really not my intention, kind of lazy? I don't know. I think there should be a way bigger focus on avoiding railroading in events because it massively took me out of the experience.

Ofc! I was pretty vacant from this event so I got some reading up to do.

If you wanna post the logs to my DM's I would greatly appreciate it

 

[Smarmy]

Hi guys, I know a few people will be posting here soon. I need to inform you all I'll be busy for an extended amount of time. I have a lot of heavy IRL crunch and this event had to be ran on this map with the elaborate build Abe made.

In the future I plan to allow more agency in the experience. I had a lot of people requesting I close out long term plot lines for quite sometime. I made a lot of those choices off of a couple of factors.


I want to make sure this isn't an excuse, but more so a reason for you to give feedback on what I'll do.


1. The build was highly required for the event and it's map dependant. We move maps every 2-3 weeks and this was the best for my IRL schedule.

2. There were a lot of people who wanted plot closure with Satou. I was worried people would be upset if I didn't garuntee it.

Here's what I think I'll do for changes for the future.

1. I'll try to make endings more dynamic. I want advice on how I could manage the difficulty of balancing closing plot lines with increased agency. I imagine I could've left it entirely in lore custom items if thats what the community would prefer. You should have some better details once those pass around. I partially did that way so people would have a more viceral response hearing it from Satou. I want to make clear to everyone I stand by I did at least an okay job keeping the start of this arc entirely organic. However, perhaps it could have more public involvement? Would people like the happenings of what happened on server with nuanced plots better publicized? It's very easy to suddenly miss some key points in its progression by missing one to two days. Given we have IRL jobs its understandable to not make them.

Given how it was striking a deal with Horizon I had to keep some of it private out of meta game worries. I find this a really difficult balance to express. One of the reasons why subterfuge is difficult is it isn't very public. I am completely open to suggestions on how to fix this. From the moment MoF existed I wanted only i1 and i2 as the work camp ranks as a means to pull more towards inclusion.

@SnowyHart if you want a recap of what happened over these past weeks behind the scenes I'll provide it. I don't feel I can give an appropriate apology in a public forum. I'll apologize to you in DMs once I've better examined why it upset you. I think your complaints you told me earlier in DMs are valid both emotionally and logically.


I'll edit this further when I find time.

 

[AbeBatJes]

Big source of complaint i have for this event in particular is kind of egregious Railroading. There were multiple points where we pretty realistically had the means to do something unique to further the event or make bold actions but each and every single time other than /maybe/ during combat it was shut down. And honestly worse was the way it was shut down. Being told directly that any tool or strategy I might have would not work purely for the sake of allowing a plot section to play is, and I don't mean to sound rude because that's really not my intention, kind of lazy? I don't know. I think there should be a way bigger focus on avoiding railroading in events because it massively took me out of the experience.

I do honestly feel bad about 'hardlocking' some areas. I didn't truly intend to make it feel super rail-roady. For example with y'all trying to get through the hardlight with Satou inside, technically speaking I should've allowed y'all to make a hole and set up the explosive to simply blow the hardlight open, but then the other side of me feels like all the stuff that was 'planned' on being said would've immediately been diminished; it was a super hard spot to figure out what would've been best for all the players, or for some. Perhaps I was overanalyzing it, and I do apologize for that.

Sometimes whenever I make certain events, I try to have multiple outcomes, but I didn't make a bunch for this particular event, and that was a failure on my part.

I also truthfully wished for some players to try out the puzzle game, as it's not really done a whole lot, and it's 'different'.. so trying to skip it all together made me frustrated, but I get it and understand. From the future on, I'll try to be more considerate and mindful. I do apologize; I only wanted to provide an enjoyable experience for you folks and add in some lore, and I feel like I failed at doing so :\...

 

[Smarmy]

This is my reply now that I've better processed entirely what's happened. I think I misunderstood quite a few people's problems after talking with them, and this should help to correct it.

I need to take responsibility for this since it was my event. I simply just didn't communicate the best with Abe. When I'm writing dialogue I simply can't have any noise what so ever in order to focus. I often have to deafen and mute GMOD entirely just to write things out. Occasionally I have to rewrite emotes because someone played a music command. I think I put Abe on the spot when I did that, and it resulted in a lesser experience with others involved. You're welcome to do things however you like in my event. Please just keep in mind I'm someone who has a very narrow range of focus. I'm very good at the smaller scale memory replacement things and pretty overwhelmed adapting the same nuance to an event with a server full of players. I think this is why people felt upset, and if it isn't please reach out.

I would also like to thank @SnowyHart I realized a pretty big short coming in how I write events and think in general. I'm someone with a really strong working memory, but I'm very stubborn and frustrated when it comes to writing down things at a pace someone else can process. This is great for individualized events like memory replacements where I have to think at light speed, but more difficult when I have other admins involved. I simply just need to write down much clearer instructions for others to follow for when I need to lock in and focus on a character dialogue.

I think it's a blessing that you're a community that accepts fault and gives me clear guidance on what you'd like to see for improvements. I was very happy with myself knowing that I kept our core player base migrating from ZRP to HL2. I can't write the stories I want without all of you hear, and I'll do my best to make these adjustments. Thanks guys!