Ever since I can remember, Lusternia has been a place of different forces opposing each other. Light/Taint, Wilde/Wyrd, and so on. Obviously the last event has made for some unlikely allies. My question is this, does anyone else here think this is making Lusternia lose that little "spark" that made it what it is? For instance, this. (Mods, this is not flaming, merely to prove my point.)


An illithoid bloodbonding a kephera? Before this event that wouldn't have even been pondered. Am I wrong in thinking this event has gone far enough in blurring the edges of who we are in Lusternia?

Would have added a poll, but I don't know how.

I don't think your example really proves your point because there have always been examples of people like that, since day one. It doesn't prove much.

However, I do think your original point does hold. The turn-everything-around thing sounds good on paper, it's the kind of thing people think they want, but in practice it doesn't hold up that well over the long haul. Everything just ends up fractured and the stuff that really got us excited about our roles tends to melt away and (and this is the damning part) not really get replaced by anything else. It also tends to toss the balance of conflict versus everything-else askew. It works in short bursts, as the exception that proves the rule, that makes the norm feel better when you get back to it. But it's gone on way too long now.

What was the event?

There are countless places in the wide and wild world of the internets to find polarized conflict. Dropping blame for what I am assuming the woes of low voter turnout at the feet of an actual change in intrigue doesn't really line up.

More than likely, it is several factors. Probably the change to the forum had something to do with it. I mean, it was even mentioned that part of the reason was that people were "playing the forums" rather than the game. Looks like that may have been true, who knows. If it is, perhaps some of those people just stopped voting.

We've also seen a radical shift in where combatants are, with Glom becoming quite the clot. I would hazard that people who like to play for a powerful organization have made alts to play in Glom, and quite possibly are just less likely to vote while playing on a character with a more causal investment than their main. At least, I for one, when I play an alt, am less likely to vote than when I'm playing Akui. But this is just more speculation as well.

Basically, you can take whatever you want to happen that isn't, or whatever is happening that you don't want to happen, and say "Look! See here! See what is causing us to drop in ratings!" If the admin really wanted to figure it out, they could maybe do something like an in-game survey (since the active forum population has been seen to be a poor measure of overall player sentiment).

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying this specific event is making Lusternians not log in as often (though I know some long time players who have stopped playing their Celestian mains just because of it. ). I'm just saying that this "blending" or reshaping event has had some adverse effects.

I agree, Mag and Celest should start fighting each other again, hop to it.

Before anyone else chimes in, Glom and Seren have been pretty much doing their own thing for weeks now.

Yeah, but some dumb ape decided it would be magical to go ahead and try the city part again. Thus Glom and Seren are happy again.

Besides that, we have to defend Celestia. There's not many other people who do.

Yeah, the event that made the Celestians stop playing really took a toll on Celest. Many just don't come back! I miss Meliana and Faragan! But yeah, like Shaddus says Celest usually has to call for Magnagora to help defend Celestia. We are really lacking players! I try really hard to make novices feel welcome, but I feel it isn't cutting. I don't think it is the events fault. I think we are just losing players. We need to focus on that first I think. Lol, so I check out trends and see how many times Lusternia is searched in comparison to other IRE games.

Google Trends Analysis

a bit more interesting...

http://www.google.com/trends?q=Lusternia%2...=all&sort=0

Faragan will return shortly, he's been having computer issues. He should be back up and running in the next five days or so.

I find it interesting that I have been hounded by players since opening that there was too much of a light vs. dark mechanic, and many professed their disgust that there wasn't more of a cities vs. communes theme. With the advent of the alchemy and enchantment updates, we've finally released a mechanic where communes and cities can choose to fight each other and now there's complaints that we've lost our identity!

Le sigh!

I like being with Mag.

Of course I wish we were more on the winning side of things at the moment, but that's life.

In this case, it's complaints of 'Overwhelming Glom zerg plus Serenwilde sweeping over Magnagora (putting up a decent fight) and Celest (being the cheerleaders)'

Edit: Actually we're pretty much doing our own thing at the moment. Which appears to be nothing.

Pretty much. Something like 2/40 Serens were involved with re-enacting the Rite.

Well even then, as Xenthos said, the last rite was pretty much all Glom except for the nut.

The latter is just the classic excuse for fighting somewhere you've got no business fighting in to begin with. Everyone makes it, I do too!




There is truth here.

Often these are different players, though. The people who liked how Lusternia was before the sea-change weren't asking for the sea-change, and are sad about the intensity and apparent irreversibility of that sea-change, and so complain. But there's another group of people who didn't like what Lusternia used to be (and only stuck around hoping it might become something they would like), and some of those people are happy about the change, and thus not complaining. Every time you change things, you simply swap which group of people are unhappy. (You should have that sentence framed on your wall, maybe!)

However, in this case, I bet that a sizable chunk of the people who wanted this kind of change are finding it's not nearly as good as they hoped. I always thought that this particular event would be like that: it sounds good on paper, people think they want it, it's "new and refreshing and different", but it's not sustainable. In short bursts, it shakes things up, it's neat. But just like any event in which the normal paradigm of how things work get set aside, you can't sustain that; the normal paradigm was there for good reasons, it made sense, it worked, it had lasting power. I'm guessing a lot of the people who wanted this change are disappointed by it; and thus, this particular change probably didn't just trade one group of unhappy people for another, it traded a small group for a much larger group.

(That said, due to intense work pressures that are finally slowing, I've been a lot less active the last month or two, so take what I say with a grain of salt.)

Hmm, the rite should be impossible to be done unless both commune leaders agree to it. If that's not the case, please let me know immediately. If that is the case... well, I guess we know who the nut is!

I think the problem stems more from player apathy at this point. You can blame alignment shifts all you like, but if a kephera and illithoid are bloodbonding for a sustained period of time, it's likely because they are receiving no pressure from their peers. Perhaps that should be examined first.



Asmodea was one of those 2/40 Xenthos mentioned. Unless there is something else implied here I'm missing.

The leader was involved, it was just Glom that did all the work/killing.

Lavather is furrikin now and I doubt he knows about the whole Kephera-Illithoid relationship thing.