Vigesimi Banquet

[Illysia]

In the game Mabinogi, every Saturday at 7pm server time is the Royal Banquet. It is an in game event that spawns, if you will, in a specific room of the Royal Castle in the capital. Players get periodic exp throughout the event just for being there, and there's some other mechanics, but it accumulates a large amount of players every week at a specific time for the exp gain.

I thought it was a perfect idea much better suited to an RP game. RPers would actually RP being at a party rather than blather in chat speak and sling arrows across the banquet tables during the event time. I wonder if something like this can be implemented for PS? It would reward people for showing up and hanging around. However, my idea needs the PP system to work.

Here's my version for PS(if it can be automated like in Mabinogi):

The Vigesimi's Banquet. Twice a day on Saturday or Sunday, a party set up will spawn in a specific location; furniture, decorative items, some food, and so on. It will happen once during European primetime and once during American primetime. Once the event is over, everything spawned disappears. Might be good to have some event attendant NPCs to both mark the event area and serve as an explanation of why everything disappears.

The event area will be contained within a buff radius. Once within the event area, players will receive some amount of PP for every 1 minute of the event they attend. People who leave early will obviously cheat themselves out of some PP gain. However, while everyone is together in the event area, they may as well RP and interact.

I like the idea of bringing back PP because it can be spent on whatever skill players want to put it towards. If PP could be reworked into an Event reward system that would be great. Players could get PP for participating in various events be they automated or GM run. Then they could then spend the PP to advance progress a skill like practice points and have some reward for taking time out from training.

[Emaline]

We do award PP for GM Events.

The main issue I see with this the PP gain per min. what is to stop be me from stepping in the 'zone' and going afk and not actually RPing or attending the party at all?

[Illysia]

Alright, so the PP system wasn't completely phased out.

Nothing prevents that, but the idea is to provide incentive for people to gather together since removing maps would not likely be a real consideration. I'm not suggesting that the event gives them 10 levels in a skill each week, but rather that it gives some modest reward not spending all of one's time chasing trainers.

It's clear that even people who like to RP will often default to just running around Yliakum once they get in game, so why not put out a little bait to see if we can lure players into a smaller area for a bit? All games use incentives to help nudge players towards various features, this is one I can see working in PS.

[Jessamine]

I've managed to do something sorta like this I guess?

I've hosted so far 2 big dinner parties, the last not so big simply because it was a surprise party so I had to keep the invites IC only because it was a surprise OOC to for more fun and a challenge.

People keep asking me when the next party will be. hehe they are a bit of work to put together and I thought if I did them too often they would become boring and mundane. and people would not show up. I also am lacking an IC reason to throw another huge party   But Jess has a few thoughts up her sleve

[Illysia]

Yes. That's good, but the difficulty of pulling this off weekly is why I like the idea of an automated system. This way it never falls entirely on one person to organize.

The way you'd adapt the base mechanics to a more roleplay flavor would be to have various players "host" the party each week and maybe suggest themes. For instance, everyone would know what time the event starts and the pp gain kicks in. Therefore, Player A announces that they want to host the party next week or whenever. When people start to show up for the event. Player A is there to greet people and lead them into RPing for the duration of the event, and hopefully past it.

The mechanics would be there to support the RP. However, the mechanics would be simple enough to where it could be easily tailored to a specific character's party needs. So, tables, sparse decorations, food would be provided in addition to the pp gain. If you want to have an ulber party, you can bring and place your own ulber furs and parts around the area. Or if it is an everybody says Kormi at the end of every sentence party, or everyone dresses in Klyros clothing, or whatever the actual theme is.

People want to gather and interact, some just need a nudge to do so. This could provide a nudge without removing maps, having to chase people down, or having to bog a single player down with planning parties.

[Jessamine]

Right my first party I thought would be lame and no one would show up because I had no real reason other than Jess wanted to cook for people and share her food....surprisingly tons showed up and I think it lasted like 7hrs people were able to come and go as they could and just sit and eat and socialize, I really liked how it turned out but yes it's not something *I* can personally do all the time when they take all day. (I had to ask off work for the day haha) But I do plan to do more at some point...or offer to cater for anyone else who wishes to throw a party.

[Illysia]

It's definitely a good idea. Long long ago in the past, i used to hold impromptu new player picnics in the plaza.

[Eonwind]

This kind of events can be done, but they require the collaboration of GMs and players alike.
The GM team is always helpful, but it can happen real life things happen to them too, therefore an extra hand from player is more than welcome.
The GMs, can reward players with both experience and money so it should be some thing worth having. It would also be possible to award skill points (but imo there would have to be an IC reason: i.e. Banquet with a show from an entertainer showing people how to play music).

[Illysia]

But can it be automated? It seems time is something players who organize events and GMs are both short on, or they can't necessarily be around at the same time. The idea is to have a regular event that players will get in the habit of congregating for. Yes, it would be an OOC reason in the case of some but PS doesn't have the luxury of being picky about that anymore.

[Eonwind]

But can it be automated? It seems time is something players who organize events and GMs are both short on, or they can't necessarily be around at the same time. The idea is to have a regular event that players will get in the habit of congregating for. Yes, it would be an OOC reason in the case of some but PS doesn't have the luxury of being picky about that anymore.

so you mean a server event. The answer is not exactly easy to come by. Many features required for what you're asking are present, but to really make it happen at predictable time (every saturday evening) it would require a server event scheduler, something we don't have yet. At present day the npcclient can schedule events on his own, but it's not made to be predictable nor stable enough for this specific purpose. I tried to explain as easily as possible.

[Illysia]

I see. Well, I can see this idea being tabled until there is an event scheduler, but it will be a good idea to put such a scheduler on the development docket. Such events are a common feature in MMOs now, and they are extremely useful for making sure that players have specific things to keep themselves occupied with. The nice thing is that they don't rely on staff to run them.

Mabinogi was great with it's events like the weekly cooking contests, the fashion show, and the banquet, not to mention their larger events. Star Trek Online had several combat related events throughout the day that ran at specific times, as well as harvesting boosting events. I think Star Wars: the Old Republic had such a system with their monthly Bounty Week event. Wurm Online now has it's Rift Events... and so on.

Also, keep in mind that as awesome as truly open sandbox games are, they are really hard for some players to adjust to. While I think PS should never be put on rails, things like automated events can provide something to aim for and latch on to for those players that find "you can do whatever you want" a daunting situation to start with.