Lusternia stopped being fun to me as a game - It's still quite engaging as a topic to argue about. It does have numerous strong suits, but those aren't talked about as much as the less-than-strong suits.

And yes, it could work - The same way picking the Ascended god through a raffle could work.

Just help Fel become a peace loving Divine, no problems with PK there!

So if I understand that note at the end right, ascended gods won't be able to keep OOC friendships with players?

If that's right, I guess I'm out. Ah well, these tasks don't look like something I could succeed at anyway.

Lusternian day.

Edit: Couple of questions.. Will they have to have a name change? How limited will their powers be? Will they have the full suite of Divine abilities (sans Orb of Creation, access to codebase, et al.)

I hope it turns out well, and in the right hands it very well may....



No, you could be in an OOC clan, if you are responsible I think. There is a divine in my family clan and we talk to him in an OOC way, but they also are a responsible divine who would in no way break silence or help us in any way, shape or form. Yet it is fun to chat with them when they are feeling chatty.



Actually Geb, if you won a seal and wanted to move on to Acension, I would definately support you and help keep you alive for 1 hour with that staff. You are one of the more nuetral players, and I know as a God, you would actually not be one who gives out perma TF's to your order followers or rescue them when they are being attacked, or any of the things that make some gods really biased and corrupted.


I think this will be a fun thing, and I hope alot of Magnagorans make it to the end, since Magnagora had to put up with the brunt of this whole event, I really think they deserve something out of the deal. The event was great, but the people whining from Celestia, while they didn't have to do anything but sit and watch serpents kill Magnagorans shouldn't deserve any benifit from that event. But that would be just my opinion

Yeah, I get where you're coming from. The main concern I have is this...

Many established people aren't going to want any desire of being held to that strict a life. I know, if I somehow won a Seal challenge, I wouldn't go for the final thing. The loss of a lot of what makes this game fun for me, replaced with an unknown...?

Then factor in that established people are the ones more likely to win *most* of the challenges (not quite all), especially as the permanent blessings are going to be of quite some benefit.

This means the pool of people who successfully make it to the final will already be quite small (maybe 3 of the people who win a seal will try for the Ascension). Then... the final task has nothing at all to do with RolePlay, the one thing that they are supposed to be "certain they can do". It's about knowing people from a long time ago who are willing to kill to make sure that you... can't fight with them any more. Now, if you're a newcomer, it will take RPing to get this support-- but an established player, with background and history, is FAR more likely to get a larger, more effective, and more combat-worthy group without needing to bother with any more of that RP nonsense.

The overall structure is fine up until the end, but it seems like there's an assumption that a lot more people are going to want to go the entire way after they win a Seal, and that there will be a lot of RPers who win the challenges and still somehow finagle up the support... which I'm not so sure about.

Interesting experiment, but terrible idea.

I'll at least stick around Lusty long enough to see who gets the position, and which cheap tactics were used to win the final "challenge."

If one of the many people that I expect to get it gets it, then there are plenty of other games which have far fewer design flaws I can switch to. I suppose it's a win/win situation in that regard at least.

Maybe eight Celestians and one Glom will win permanent blessings, and Celest just work it out internally.

Post PYRAMID to newbie character, set location to somewhere on shallamar (still Astral I think?), post pyramid back, PYRAMID there, sit, wait.

job done.

no-one shoot me down now, its a great plan, just like my one to save the basin from current events.

Maybe the support should be OOC...let players make an appeal and then the fighters who want the most entertaining or mature god will team up, sort of like Wargames.

I dunno. I wonder how the combat trial will work. An alternative could be a "vote", where you let the player base vote for the winners. Maybe we could all have a campaign like the Elections in America.

Negative Campaign Ads FTW!

I think this is an excellent setup. Very reminiscent of Avalon's ascendency mechanic. Why I do believe after Sarapis went up that's how IRE got started.. but I digress.

This is an IC mechanic and is should stay IC. I'm glad it's not a popularity contest.

Edit: I also think that unless you karma burned into the seals you shouldn't be eligible! Or at least Celest shouldn't be for refusing to help. Jerks

...

Um, it is a popularity contest.

Just FYI.

I still think this is a GREAT idea and we should wait until after the event to slam it. Worst Case Senario truly is we have a bad divine for a bit. Not the end of the world.

Edit: Who is going to go for godhood?

This is just what I see happening: Guardian goes up and makes hermits to every sphere. Stores in shop. As event is about to start, Guardian grabs hermits and manages to get staff. Guardian then proceeds to hermit (or hell, even use the Pyramid artifact) to bounce around every time anyone gets close. Timeslip pretty much assures he'll be able to do that too. Trigger timeslip firing to fling hermit. So long as you can keep heat off of yourself just long enough to bring back timeslip and make a new hermit, you've got a pretty good shot.

Such a scenario does not an RP-god make.

Alternative Idea Below

Why not put the Seal winners into an actual RP contest? Maybe a sort of labyrinth where the various challenges they will face can only be sorted out via RP? Maybe facing the Vernal Gods of each seal who you have to deal with in certain ways to bypass? Send a single person through the labyrinth at a time (or multiple, whatever), and the person with the most points wins? Scoring system based on Time, Creativity, and Consistency perhaps? All those who wish to enter the labyrinth have to submit to the gods an overview of their character to help craft the trails as well as the scoring for Consistency under pressure.

Now that would be a challenge worthy of an RP god.

I'll field a couple of these questions that have come up:

1. Demigods and Titans can indeed compete and try to become the Ascended God. When the helpfile states that they cannot become true Gods, it refers to normal means (such as bashing). Any player, from level 1-100, is eligible to become the Ascended God.

2. There are a great deal of complaints regarding the Final Test. You are welcome to suggest how it could be improved upon. I can assure you that this is just as much uncharted waters for us as it is for the players, and we are certainly open to your ideas, input and suggestions. I would just ask that you please keep them constructive. Saying "worst idea evar" isn't feedback that is useful to us, particularly since it has already been decided that the event is going forward.

3. From a player perspective, the Ascended God will be no different from an Elder God. The relevant powers and restrictions will all be there, including an Order, favours, (approved) zappings, potential patronships, etc.

4. From an admin perspective, the Ascended God is far more limited than an Elder God. Thus, the Ascended God will be working closely with the Elder Gods (oocly, of course) to run interesting RP events and fulfill their God role.

5. We realize that this role will not appeal to a great many players - which is why we have given you this warning up front and why we are so willing to discuss it openly. If serious RPing isn't your forte, then you should think carefully about whether this will appeal to you. Being a God is often challenging and thankless, but certainly a unique and fun experience as well. If you enjoy storytelling, interacting with others, etc. then this might be down your alley!

6. The Ascended God will have the ability to roleplay through npcs, subject to the same logged supervision that all the Elder Gods and Ephemerals are subject to.

7. One of the most challenging aspects of playing a God is cutting off your OOC connections. I would urge you to seriously consider this aspect of it. There is nothing worse than a God who is blatantly OOC with players - either for the God themself and their reputation or for those players whose immersion is damaged by this. Gods must also be able to separate themselves from their characters. Many Gods and Ephemerals become too attached to their organizations and begin to take everything that happens to that org personally and either use their privs abusively or burn out and leave. This is one of the largest causes of God turnover across all the IRE games. That said, the Ascended God will get the (perhaps dubious) pleasure of hanging out with all the Elder Gods and admins in the Havens, so it's not as though you're expected to sit around by yourself.

Other Alternative- make winning the seals not give a buff. That would prevent the "I want this for buff" mentality :) edit: Perhaps a discripting change could be the reward. I'd do it!

That alternative idea is actually kind of neat.

Would require a lot of effort to make, but is neat.

(To Fallen, that is).

I don't know, I see how the final challenge isn't really related to roleplay, but I would honestly hope that people will be able to recognize who would and wouldn't be a capable roleplaying god. Of course the problem lies in the fact this will become org vs. org, which will greatly limit who people want to support. But I definitely see it becoming a popularity contest.

I'm excited for the contests regardless, I'd love a perma-blessing, I just wouldn't want to become a god.

And random question: What happens to parents/siblings/children/spouses? Would the god still be "married" and show up in a family tree, or would they be taken out of that?

It might require a lot of effort.. but I think giving someone the sort of responsibility they're talking about (without the training Ephs have to go through to even get the privledge of RPing) warrants a bit of work on both sides. This would allow a sort of real-time screening process, while also providing quite a bit of fun, I think. Especially if everyone could watch what was happening inside the labyrinth

Oh, and maybe even add in something for support, for a time before the trial begins, people can pledge their support at one of the seal caves to the whoever is marked by that seal, so that being popular and trusted could also have an effect (though preferably not huge)

Edit: Bah on Xenthos!

However, I think that the labyrinthine RP, plus not having an actual "physical" reward for completing the Challenges (perhaps an honours line and/or an addition to your description instead of the permanent blessing), would both lessen the number of established players desperately trying to win for the Awesome Buffs, and open the field more to people who want to win for RP reasons-- for example, with this change, I wouldn't have a reason to try for the Seal of Death challenge, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense for Xen... but it would make a lot more sense for Daevos to compete for it.

Etc.