Encouraging new players

[Racetyme]

Honestly, the greatest quick gratification I have ever had in cantr was when I was killing off one of my characters by trying to steal everything that wasn't bolted down. I honestly think it would be a good idea for new players to go crazy stealing things for the first couple of characters, provided they steal the right kind of stuff. After that, they will see the value of actually role playing when the other players react.

[SekoETC]

Another good idea IMO would be include a routine that ensures that the skills of newspawns are balanced. For every low skill should be a high skill in return, or at least the sum of skillpoints (do we have hidden skillpoints?) should be the same for every character. The skills would be still random, but noone would be, in respect of the skills, a total looser.

The might still end up being awkward in often used skills such as farming and hunting, and have their expertize in something that might not be available for doing on their spawn region. For example a character spawns in a forest but happens to be skillful in digging, or a character spawns on a desert and is expert in fishing. So even the person quoted in the first post of this topic might have other expertize for his character, he just doesn't know them yet.

...So why don't we show skills straight off the bat? Munchkins who want to figure them out will find means for it, like punching oneself, which is totally unnatural. There might be some more suicidal newspawns but if a person is going to kill off their character if it doesn't have sufficient skills, he's likely to do it even later in life as he finds out the character sucks. And he'll be even more peeved by the fact that he had to waste time finding out. Most people would say well, you're a munchkin and you ought to quit the game, Cantr isn't all about skills. But aren't we supposed to have fun here? Even if one was an expert fighter, he's most likely not going to find big weapons without social skills, or manufacturing weapons skill, how about refining skill to make the iron, and before that you need digging to get the resources. If the person just stares at the fighting skill, they might not realize that maybe they won't end up using it for many years to come, maybe some other skills would be more useful in the beginning.

Another option would be having newspawns awkward in everything (maybe bound with the lowered spawning age) but with an increased rate of learning that would gradually approach the normal learning levels as the character is nearing 30. At least in my opinion, skills are too hard to train - there is no instant satisfaction because you can't see the development. If skills used during the initial years would grow faster, you could adjust to the things prevailent in your society. If you need to hunt every day then you'll become a skilled hunter, if you need to gather a big stock of food then you'll be a good farmer. Or you might end up being hired by a smithy or tailor's shop and develop the correspondent skill.

[Zanthos]

i have always held the same train of thought as just stated by Seko. I also think that skills should be at least partially affected by envitonment, say give a +1 modifier to "forrest" skills and a -1 modifier to "grassland" skills if spawned in a forest, ect... This would require at least a general classification of skills into seperate subgroups, and could make it easier for people to achieve success in their respective environments.

for example, i spawned an awkward hunter in burgeo. had it not been for the tribe in the area, i would have died for sure. i was at 60% within a week.

[Piscator]

Normally a person spaning in a forrest should have a higher skill level in forresting, simply because his parents have spend much time in a forrest gathering wood. At least it should work this way. To work properly, skills would have to adapt much faster to the life circumstances of characters, wich would require of course some kind of unlearning of unused skills to keep the balance. But that's not really the thread topic and it was suggested somewhere else anyway, I'm sure.

I'm still thinking that balancing your starting skills would be a good idea. Even if you are awkward in the skills you currently need, you have the freedom of looking for a place where this skill is needed, at least in civilized areas. And all in all it's still better to excel in a skill you don't need, than sucking in every skill you have.

What would you think of choosing a favored skill with rised base level and/or better learning curve when generating your character. That way people would get characters closer to the mental images they have of them.

And at last, I think we really don't need all the wannabe conan-the-barbarians slapping there faces seconds after coming into existence. Just because we need new players, we don't necessarily need everyone. Some people should stick to WOW.

[Leo Luncid]

Perhaps there could be a little tutorial for firstspawns, just some pop-up notes or the like explaining basic game mechanics and the interface when the respective menus are accessed. Basically the same as the wiki, but people wouldn't have to browse for it. I think the least part of firstspawns bother theirselves with reading the wiki.

I prefer this kind of introduction to new players than having to implement a seperate tutorial island(RuneScape-esqe much?); I personally don't want to see the possible impression that tutorial islands are something that's cemented into our roleplaying-world.

Tutorial or not; they should optional as well, as there are people who lose their accounts, ect.

[Frits]

I definitely agree racetyme, starting out a thief is good, you learn a lot, you get noticed and it even doesn't have to decide your future.

About skills, there's a mental image a player might have and then comes the confrontation with a lot of randomly generated things, it will often not work out. Apart from the skills it might be too sparsely populated or too dense.

I'm still toying with an idea skills exist but will not be shown, but i suspect known skills have a lot of appeal for new players. How about making it something you achieve as a new player, like after 20 days of active, and more or less interactive play you get to see your chars skills?

This could coincide with a noobisland. I was thinking some teaching characters could be of old age, or indefinite age, and be logged into by all who volunteered. So they don't die like chars normally do (well often anyway) and they don't get inactive or even abandoned. Only one player at a time can log in to a char of course.

[Chris Johnson]

Merged post on same subject by Leo Luncid

Since we're currently exploring ways to encourage new players to join the game, we could discuss the maybe-issue of it's opposite.

Is having a negative or evil outlook on your characters ever really a problem? Was being a character with an annoying attitude (reasonable or not) ever one of the causes of fewer players?

There are players who could be oversensitive, but where does discouraging newbies cross the line here?

In my brief opinion, it's okay for your character to have a negative influence longs as your character has a reason for it. Maybe we just need more tolerable players; those who can't stand the unecessary stress they're getting maybe better elsewhere.

[tiddy ogg]

This is merging, too, with the support thread about matey stuck in prison. You can't expect chars to change their personality to suit a new player. Most chars in Cantr seem very friendly, and the game needs a few nasty b***ds to liven it up, so, unfortunate as it may be, the newbie may strike it unlucky... but at least they are getting some interaction, not being ignored which I feel from experience is the most likely reason for quick quitters.

[deadboy]

Can we get a figure on the numbers of players left, and the old ones again?

[SekoETC]

Thinking about what Leo Luncid said, I just recently ran into a guy who seems rather innocent, he told me not to swear because it ruins the game for him. But the particular character happens to be my most ill-behaved character, it would be against his character to mind his tongue. I've been trying to watch it since there weren't that many other people around, so who would I be acting to? Still kinda it ruins the game for me if I can't say the f-word and the s-word and the b-word.

[Leo Luncid]

You can't expect chars to change their personality to suit a new player. Most chars in Cantr seem very friendly, and the game needs a few nasty b***ds to liven it up, so, unfortunate as it may be, the newbie may strike it unlucky... but at least they are getting some interaction, not being ignored which I feel from experience is the most likely reason for quick quitters.

Of course characters won't radicaly change their personality for player-reasons, but maybe starting off with more good-influence characters than bad-influence characters would likely set off a more friendly tone over time. I'm not saying that people should change their character-generating ways right off the spot, but if having annoying/evil characters was ever a Cantr-appeal concern, that would be the least they could do.

Thinking about what Leo Luncid said...

That reminds me of a similar situation I've had: I can only remember that I was getting a tad bit oversensitive when one of my characters' best associate starts saying something vague and open to wrong interpretations (of which I followed; sorry I'm not being anywhere near specific). When I start looking back at that frustration now, I always get the realization that it's just a game.

Maybe one should realize that whatever's said from one character to another is said from one character to another, not to the player. Understand that they have their own past, and therefore, their own reasons; none of which relates to anything outside of the Cantr-world. The exceptions are for those who wouldn't mind bordering to going past the Capital Rule.

Either he should realize that, Seko, or hope that he doesn't mind "censored" swears.

Again, tolerance maybe best for Cantr to strive on.

[SekoETC]

The person said it OOC so I couldn't accuse their character of being a sissy or anything. But I wasn't planning to stick around for too long anyway so it didn't take too much effort to avoid heavy words until I got to leave.

[Sekar]

Have you guys noticed that there are a couple of people out there who are giving newspawns a bad name? Like experienced players, spawning characters, and doing things totally rediculous, that you know they are just fucking around. This happened twice to me, in two different locations. This person spawned, and then would make tons of projects that couldn't possibly be completed, or that were against the rules. Alot of the time new players aren't the biggest troublemakers..newspawns however are, but many of those newspawns who are troublemakers are often not controlled by new players.

[Valsum]

How can you prove that, Sekar? I can't imagine an experienced player creating useless projects.

[Sekar]

Can you disprove it? Is it so hard to imagine that there are players out there just looking to annoy other players?