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+--- Thread: Story Railroading. (/showthread.php?tid=191386)
Story Railroading. - Saronsen - 02-07-2022
Hello. By the request of absolutely no one it's me again. Full disclosure if you somehow aren't aware, I am the 1iC of =LSF=.
There was a time when 1ics and 2ics of official factions could work with the developers of the mod, or at yell at each other. It was probably stressful for the devs, just as much as it was aggravating for OFLs to have decisions made against what they wanted for their faction. It happens, you can't get what you want, especially when there is a story in the works. But their opinion made it out to developers at least. The extremely violent reaction to the Lane Hacker cruiser being put into Alaska through dubious story means was heard loud and clear, and it was quickly moved out to Virginia, since apparently they had no idea how vehemently people like myself and the navy factions felt about something just magically appearing into what could, in story for the last 14 years, be described as a 'Fortress system'. How could they? They never asked us if it made sense.
Of course, story leaks happen, and the developers at the time decided it was best to just drop that discord entirely, and move story requests to the forum. Where there'll be no transparent discussion of it at all.
You see on the discord, people could bring up their concerns, comments, and suggestions in a regional chat that could then be yelled down by others in the region with the usual facts and logic. Was it messy? Absolutely. But again, at least the factions in the region were capable of discussing the possibility of something. But here on the forums, there's nothing. There's no subsection for regional faction discussion, there's zero visibility in the story changes. This had become an issue a while back when entire fleets would be destroyed for a dramatic story. And then the glassing of Leeds which, while a pretty hard hitting moment, was quickly handwaved away. Gallia suffered zero consequences, the Enclave was allowed back in to Gallia despite being the killers of literal billions, and no one was allowed to wage war with Gallia properly unless the devs allowed it.
In an effort to make Liberty do what Liberty does best, Bretonia contacted them when Kusari was attempting to invade Gallia. What was meant to happen was a potential breaking point between Liberty and Kusari, or Liberty and Gallia, as they would be over-reaching and sticking their fingers in other peoples business. It would be disastrous if Gallia was to gain royalist sentiments again after being invaded so soon after pulling out of the war, and it would be almost as problematic if Kusari gained a puppet state to boost their power on the sector map. I talked with Bretonian government members as well as all of the Liberty Government at the time, and we sent our ultimatum to the two parties. Stop fighting, or we're getting involved. Trade sanctions, possible intervention, the works. You know, in proper meddling super-house ways. And with such actions, we could possibly have real, organic consequences from that decision. Kusari could withdraw, then instead suddenly strike Liberty, who would never expect them to do something like that. Or, Kusari could have embargoed trade, or even H-Fuel, and forced Liberty to invade instead, being cut off from a major source of fuel, or being forced to pay an enormous premium for it to be routed the 'long way' through Rheinland. There's even more consequences that could have happened from any of this. A real, player-driven conflict.
Unseelie approached me in Discord and said 'no story doesnt like it' and our communique to Kusari and Gallia was invised. Possibly at request, I don't remember. I saw myself out of the Discovery Work Group a couple months after that, having to pull teeth for over two months just to get a vote on having the LSF base Battlecruiser Lehigh moved to Tau-23 to observe the event. Three months after asking it to be moved, suggesting it possibly ambushed mid-move by any sorts of pirates or other hostile entities like the Enclave, it was just simply moved. No event. An asset I want to go where it really shouldn't be has an opportunity to be stopped or even sent with its tail between its legs back to Liberty limping and burning, it instead just happens.
"Okay, what's your point??"
I don't stress out over Discovery any more. The Devs have made it very clear (warning, bad words!!!) for a long time they do whatever they want, and any time they ask for opinions its usually just lip service, and promptly ignored.
Have you ever played Dungeons and Dragons? I haven't. Not in a serious context anyway. But I have been a roleplayer for 15 years, and in that time I learned how to "Dungeon Master" roleplay stories with friends, on private MMO servers. And it works much like Dungeons and Dragons and other similar roleplaying games. You lay out your setting, the current events, the plot. Then, your adventurers set forth. They're out to do their thing for a while, but they find out about the big bad. Assuming this is the plot the DM had in mind, they start to follow it. But then they're distracted. A side dungeon! A bandit warlord! Not wanting the players to entirely lose the plot, or be distracted for too long, what does the DM do?
A) "No! You are not supposed to be doing that! You are to follow my story exactly how I laid it out and only react to it how I want you to!"
B) The DM kills one or all of the party members as punishment for exploring. Here's your CR 15 demon, enjoy.
C) The DM adapts, letting the side plot take its course, and slowly guides them back into the main story.
If you picked A or B, you've likely lost your audience. But that's okay, you have had some good stories before. Others will be interested!
Repeat ad nauseum.
Very few people enjoy the story railroading. There's some who just ride the flavor of the month and couldn't be bothered if systems just all suddenly exploded. But most of us who've dedicated a ton of time into our factions don't. Most of the factions in Liberty are running out of active players. We spent years with no active development within Liberty (All outside, Gallia War with the odd event in Liberty.). Then the Insurgency happened! And then no development for another two? years.
And in the last few months this event was in the works, someone could have said to the Insurgency and Navy/LSF/LPI players that, hey, there's going to be development. You should interact with each other! We have been waiting for something to do, after all.
Now, almost all factions in Liberty are on life support, with [LN] going first. A month before this story beat was revealed. Would having a new purpose, a new story in front of them have saved one of the oldest factions on the server from just wasting away from disinterest? I couldn't tell you. My faction is not any more active after the story beat, but some of them are in Insurgency, some are Xeno players. I don't mandate any sort of play-time quota to be in =LSF=. But I will say I'm sorely disinterested in the story, and my limited interest is just being involved in the shooting at this point.
Earlier, I contacted Reeves. I had heard that LSF assets were being moved. Okay, cool. I just want to know where. Perhaps I could offer a suggestion? I don't expect to be listened to, but it gives us that opportunity to discuss this as DM and Player. You'll know how one player feels. Perhaps the player who's been trying to think about how to handle the LSF for the last two years could have some insight on how they would react.
Instead, of course, my information was wrong. Queue the hunt among players involved with developers and, a couple of hours later, the information I was told turned out to be true in the Hotfix.
No! You must not know about the development process, despite story doing whatever it wants for the last decade anyway! We must find who partook in this vile act of LEAKING information instead of discussing with representatives of the remainder of our dwindling playerbase about possible story developments!
No players were involved in this, not the leaders from any faction anyway. No one from IN|, no one from the Navy factions, no one from LSF. Perhaps Bretonia? I haven't asked.
Do you think this is better? Do you think these story beats that do not include the players in any way will keep us interested? Because the only Liberty players reacting to the Insurgency are pirates. None of the lawfuls.
People WANT to roleplay out their stories. They're invested in their factions, their characters, their house. They don't want to just sit on the sidelines gasping and ooh-ing and ahh-ing when something out of their control happens. We don't want to be shut down and told we can't do that because story disapproves. I'm not roleplaying when you railroad a story with no input from those involved, I'm just watching a sub-par drama that really makes me want to change the channel, and play something else.
Something's gotta give, or the disinterest will lead to abandonment.
Thanks for coming to my ted talk.
RE: Story Railroading. - Typrop - 02-07-2022
Quote:I don't stress out over Discovery any more.
see: the rest of the 1k word essay
RE: Story Railroading. - HanCloudstone - 02-07-2022
whistles
So that's how people's influence on house events died. And here I was worrying about my schizophrenic RP having little to no effect in general. We do need competent game masters that create stories with the players.
Instead we have people from the ivory tower.
This song is not for you,
This song is just for me
La dolce vida in the city by the sea
RE: Story Railroading. - Reeves - 02-07-2022
I was wondering when my refusals to feed you inside information when I hang out in VC would lead to an outburst.
RE: Story Railroading. - Saronsen - 02-07-2022
(02-07-2022, 09:34 AM)Reeves Wrote: I was wondering when my refusals to feed you inside information when I hang out in VC would lead to an outburst.
I want to know what you're doing with my faction. It's not all about you, Reeves. This has been the dev teams schtick for as long as I've been here.
RE: Story Railroading. - Toaster - 02-07-2022
I have always been baffled by how little impact the roleplayers roleplaying on the roleplay server have on the story that they are roleplaying in. To be fair, I have never paid any close attention either, since I play almost exclusively as freelancers and other non-faction-aligned characters who aren't really impacted by story beats anyway.
But nevertheless, player actions by and large being ignored by story developments has always struck me as very odd. Sure, there are stories planned out by the dev team over long periods - stories that they try to ensure are of high quality (though, frankly, they regularly fail at that). Yet there must certainly be a balance that can be struck between pre-planned, developed stories and player-driven stories. See Lucas' recent attempt to create some tension between Rheinland and Liberty in Hudson. See Saronsen's attempt to do some political shenanigans as he described above. See whatever is going on in Kepler. Hell, even Lemon's strange dicking-about in Nu when Core| disbanded. These are all opportunities for interesting stories to be further developed by the dev team with input from the players and their inRP actions. Not doing so just seems wasteful and, like Saronsen said, will lead to a further decline in interest in the stories that are being developed and the mod as a whole.
Yes, integrating player-driven stories into the mod or even listening to player feedback in regards to dev stories will likely lead to a drop in quality of the story beats that are provided, but I frankly prefer stories where player actions actually matter - at the cost of quality - over constant railroading where nothing we do outside of events matters and we don't get a heads-up ahead of time to at least adapt our roleplay to coming changes.
RE: Story Railroading. - DarkTails - 02-07-2022
I figure I'd weigh in here since I lead the faction in question this stuff is primarily revolving around. I figured eventually that this would happen, but even so I was unprepared. Even as IN slowly decayed as the players willing to play waned, I wanted to try, even when I couldn't find it within myself to log. There weren't many, but there were some who enjoyed it, or atleast tried to enjoy it, and tried to make something of it all. Even before now, foundation was being laid to look toward the future of IN as a faction. (See: Peace Talks) We had no true indication of what was to come or happen. While I am sad and disappointed, I figured this was going to happen sooner or later, no I couldn't have, known known, but I imagined it was the fated end regardless. We can do what we can to make the end fun.
We were all blindsided by it, and I can personally say I would've like atleast more forewarning than finding out at the beginning when it's more or less set how things will go down, at the very least to plan a reaction or some form of coordination of the end, really see the faction go down how our few players would've liked and appreciated, but that's just how it is I suppose. It does disappoint me, and I am saddened with how everything plays out and I can only hope Insurgency goes down taking as many Navy as physically possible in it's death throes. A force backed against a wall will do incredible and unexpected things, after all, and I can only hope the closing pages of the Insurgency reflects that.
I have no idea what will happen to the assets or ships. I know that refunds may be offered to owners of ships, and SRPs are at owners discretion to do as seen fit. Insurgency/ex-hellfire ships that people want to keep I don't know what will happen to personally, they might go to some other faction or something, again I personally don't know, that'd be a question for the staff.
I wanted to thank the people that showed up for Insurgency, and it's predecessors Harmony and Hellfire over the years. It's been a fun ride, and thanks for the memories made in these factions. I disagree with and am disappointed on how the end is handled, but I can't change it now, and so, make the last fights we can give memorable, for we'll be gone soon.
RE: Story Railroading. - Tenshi - 02-07-2022
Each developer has their own idea of where the game's story should be going and how it should be going there.
Certain developers strive to get to their goal - driving it with player-made roleplay and essentially giving every player the ability to influence, in one way or another, the way the story of the specific series of events unfolds.
Other developers completely ignore the mere existence of a playerbase or any sort of player-driven roleplay and make decisions based on their own judgement and what they themselves consider garbage.
I feel genuine secondhand embarrassment for every other lead developer that has to share the same title as Reeves.
RE: Story Railroading. - Chuba - 02-07-2022
(02-07-2022, 10:27 AM)Toaster Wrote: [words words words]
Yes, integrating player-driven stories into the mod or even listening to player feedback in regards to dev stories will likely lead to a drop in quality of the story beats that are provided, [more words words words]
realistically speaking, I can't remember the last time there has been a "quality" story arc that sparked naturally or in any other way. It is a little unfortunate and I did enjoy what little experience I had with this whole funny Nomad yuri Kepler(?) schtick but besides that, I don't think the quality would drop any lower than it has already.
well, not that it was ever high though.
I say this as a non-jab to devs or whatever, be offended or not, I do not give a shit, but it's just that in my 10 years here, Disco has never really had ultra-high quality tier story or events. It's the weakest part of the mod in my very humble opinion. I enjoy my personal RP and RP with FRIENDS and randoms.
RE: Story Railroading. - Markam - 02-07-2022
Going to wade into this a little despite my best instincts saying not to.
For the most part the overall point Saronsen is making is not a bad one. Story interaction with the playerbase is poor, and sure it feels like railroading due to lack of communication.
However, the screenshots he showed of myself trying to, back in October, encourage the Liberty player base to interact with the movement happening in Penny was an attempt to hint at where story is moving, so they could interact with it. I was told to uh, well, I was not welcome. There is a little more to the conversation where even more colourful language is used, but its honestly tame for Saronsen.
I am sure however the main gripe is not being able to direct story as players. Unfortunately, this cannot happen in the way perhaps Saronsen desires. The story department must absolutely dictate where story is heading, that is their job. We have attempted in the past to do player written story through a discord group, and the results were frankly appalling. It was nothing but a mess of arguing, lobbying purely for ones own faction, and Story "developments" which were nothing more than singular changes that did not fit into any proper narrative and were very short sighted. I know its ideal that players can help decide everything and we can have a super interactive story, but people are generally only invested in their own given faction, which creates very poor story development.
Instead, what we are trying to do is have a general story decided with a start, middle and end largely set out, and have player roleplay intertwined within this story, and some events that change the bells and whistles.
In relation to the story to player interaction issue, and the story influencing power of official factions (re; veterans), story has been hard at work over the last few months to develop a Story to Player interface system that works within RP, where players can make their suggestions to Story within the confines of roleplay (no discord) and Story can hand out direction and orders in roleplay.
I am sure this won't make Saronsen any less mad, but I do not know what would. Hopefully we can have this released sooner rather than later, but we want to make a good start to remove the stigma that is story.