If we’re to view these results in a western majority rules-kind of way, the instruction given is pretty clear – “give us what we want – more xp per kill!”. I’m not saying it’s right, but it is the mob’s will. Yet, the wise ruler knows when not to give into the mob’s desires, because wisdom and experience grants perspective and vision.
Why is the opposite true in regards to racial balancing and dare I say, in retrospect, foreversaving items?
Was sacrificing the importance of guilds and guild racks on the altar of new player’s feedback worth it? I believe many agree that it diminished the overall Genesis-experience. I’m willing to bet some in the administration agrees with me on this, which leads me straight to an observation I made the other day - I saw a member of the wizarding community say publicly that if “rollbacks” happened, that was it for him.
An honest statement, sure, but it got me thinking. A wise leader knows when he’s made a mistake, right? He will, if able, lay blame on a blurry vision and poor councillors and revert back to the old ways if his decision proved detrimental to his subjects and/or their reality due to unforeseen side effects.
A more grim example of knee-jerk mob appeasement can be witnessed in a certain country in Asia lately. The leaders thought it was a good idea to be trendy and force its farmers to go full organic. No pesticides, no fertilizer. Obviously, everything went to shit and the leaders came to regret their decision and did a complete roll back. Unlike Genesis though, where everything resets at Armageddon, the country is now facing imminent starvation and an economy in the toilet. The road to hell truly is paved with good intentions.
As a community we’ve endured many changes, and as I wrote previously, many of them have been collectively applauded and stand proud to this day as real upgrades to the game. Simple quality of life-improvements such as recovery mode and new combat descriptors, or enrichments such as the introduction of imbuements and archery are blessed additions. I’m fully convinced that recovery mode probably increased player retention beyond their n’th meeting with Lars drastically.
In life I am a liberal, a radical leftist even by Scandinavian standards, and fighting for change is and always have been my modus operandi. In Genesis, however, I find myself thinking and speaking like a nostalgic, “hardcore” old-timer who fights to keep everything the same. It’s not true, of course, I agree that changes need to be made for Genesis to evolve, but considering the recent rollback to slow experience gain after a whole year of fattening up on quick xp, I truly hope I’m wrong, but right now it looks to me that we as a community can’t handle another ‘nerf’. Let me make a couple suggestions to how to proceed without anyone suffering.
Let me start with the least likely and (probably) least productive; rollback of foreversaving items, or as I like to call it:
Make racks great again
Roll back to saving and unsaving items, forget all about foreversave. BUT, do make a footnote regarding really communicating this mechanic in the tutorial. The communique should even include the thinking behind this very ‘not like other games’ trait that is, after all, ‘core genesis’. It needn’t be a big deal/huge job, maybe a simple addition to the help-posters you need to read to get your first points of experience would suffice? Having Carlsan praise it randomly probably wouldn’t hurt either, now that I think about it. Either way, I offer up my help and type up the sign, ascii art and all. Gladly.
Musings
Based on what I mentioned above, this change will likely come with some negative emotion from some/several in the community. Understandably so. So unless there’s a roaring majority who agree with me that this change took away some of what made Genesis, Genesis and should absolutely be rolled back, I’d say that while it may be the right thing to do, the timing is simply put: bad.
Let’s put this one on the back burner for now, we’re used to foreversave and even though I think we’re poorer off for it, the system works and we’re used to it. Let’s move on to the hottest topic lately:
Equalizing races – the wrong medicine to a made up problem
The racial modifiers, along with racks and guilds, are unique to Genesis. Fundamental stuff that’s always been around and all of us who failed one or more years of our education because of a (probably) unhealthy addiction got this way either because of it or in spite of it. It’s the first thing I spoke of in great detail prior to guiding a pupil or friend through character creation, it’s the reason the hedonist in me play a goblin character and it is the reason there lives a racist in me who can’t stand dwarves, simply because of their dex penalty (stupid, right?)
I think Goirbagh raised some interesting points in his reply, so forgive me but I’m just going to point and go “What he said!”
Now I’m not going to channel more energy into this Jordan Peterson-esque post-modernist far leftist culture war argument. It is interesting, however, and it makes me wonder who Genesis is for in 2023 – Boomers or Gen Z’s? Does a parental role weigh heavy on the shoulders of the former? You decide.Goirbagh wrote: ↑07 Jan 2023 07:43Giving everything to everyone. Making everything fair and balanced. Being afraid of generating the smallest bit of frustration in the player. Being afraid of requiring some effort on the player's end.
I do not like - actually, let me rephrase that - I absolutely despise the posts on racial changes, saying that it shouldn't matter so much for combat.
It's a trendy, modern, post-modernistic, inane way of thinking about things.
Some races are and should be way better at physical combat, maybe even combat in general. This makes the choice in and of itself interesting. If all races are equal in every way except for the text used to describe them (because that's what you're reducing them to if you equalize everything) and possibly emotes, then why even have races?
...
Why can't there be an effort-reward transaction anymore? This seems to be a general societal trend. You shouldn't have any advantage because you're a particular race, have a particular education, because you're taller, stronger, more handsome or anything else in life. Well, to me, that makes life extremely dull and uninteresting. It's interesting that those who usually say "we have to make life/game more fair and inclusive" are the ones who seem to absolutely hate the idea of people being different and having different abilities in life/game.
So if Goirbagh wasn’t clear enough, making races equal in all but orthography is an example of a bad idea gaining traction all the way to the top, and like a true sunk cost fallacy it’s been so invested in that re-thinking it isn’t an option anymore. The idea that it is somehow the least bad option cause me to question the competence of our not elected decision makers and leaves a foul taste in my mouth.
Here’s why:
Much like a sudden rollback of foreversave, pushing this change all the way to fruition will produce negative emotions in a pretty large part of the community. You took away our god-like damage and our xp-fix, and the community bled an undisclosed number of active members as a direct consequence. The rest of us are either mourning, jonesing or contemplating an exit. There is no room for more negative emotion, and we sure as shit can’t lose a single more active member to negativity induced from above.
The racial modifiers are pretty favorable towards certain races, ok, ok.. singular. But I don’t think this is the actual cause to the feeling of unfairness. I say it’s the lack of options on the ‘good’ side of the alignment spectrum combined with a conservative and very limited approach to maybe the most adaptable race of all (human) that together brings out the worst in us.
So while I’ve suggested these before, I firmly hold and lovingly repeat that adding more options equals a literal upgrade of the game. I’m convinced that if the following suggestions, adjustments and additions miraculously appeared in the game, not a single tear would be shed, save tears of joy. All behinds free from chafing because nobody’s getting nerfed. Halleluja!
First though, let’s just speak plainly:
* Currently there’s one option reigning supreme in battle, the goblin.
* The dwarf has goblin-like strength and constitution, but suffers a severe penalty to dexterity resulting in a lot of awkward, but super hard (!) holes in the air.
* Being a human fighter is noticeably worse and the game heavily restricts how much we can offset our experience into individual stats. Human fighters experience unnecessary experience leaks into their mentals, and I’m sure human casters would share the sentiment albeit in reverse (let’s not discuss how this isn’t entirely true because casters need con to survive and strength to carry shits.. Not the point, so just chill and keep on reading. You might like my solution anyway.)
The goodies need their abominable choice.
Playing a goblin poses both drawbacks and straight up STOP-signs when attempting to solve the top 15 largest quests/sum total of a series of quests in the game. Experienced players (and new players who take my advice) will start a human character (and keep it good aligned) with the sole purpose of completing said quests and switch to goblin post deed.
Additionally, a goblin suffers both a social stigma and a top-down, disapproving mindset from all the two decade old legends who claim the (non-existent) title “Elite RP’er” simply because they are too lazy or inept at game mechanics to even dream about reaching myth. Some even (true story) hold the belief that their way of enjoying this game is superior to everyone else and certainly the pariah; the classic “min-maxer”. If that wasn’t enough, certain guilds/individuals will flat out refuse to team based solely on the color of its skin.
This is the way of the goblin, and I would have it no other way.
My suggestion then is instead of making the goblin worse, make the dwarf equal to the goblin. It is also looked down upon and has some undesirable traits (stubborn, greedy, prone to alcoholism, slurred speech and an unpleasant appearance). Im sure that a dwarven face smells like piss after a day of walking into crotches while trying to buy some produce, but I digress.
The dwarf is portrayed as a mighty warrior in pretty much any IP available, but in Genesis a dwarf is only truly playable for a good aligned min-maxer if he’s able to join the one guild that is built around the race itself (Neidar).
Said plainly: the dwarf is a natural, typically good-aligned counter to the traditionally evil goblin. Instead of pulling every player in the realm into one giant experiment, make something better and nobody loses anything, we all win something because we get the option to play a dwarf without the masochism. Balance the scales by adding, not subtracting. We can’t take any more nerfs.
Technically, the adjustment would be to remove anything penalizing dexterity, and transfer the penalty to mentals. Or just take away the penalty and leave the mentals as is. Will the average get a little high? Sure, but so do elves’. I don’t think anyone would complain that the dwarf finally gets the gusto he’s always been deserving of. Being forced to sniff crotches all day should have some type of reward, yes?
So now there’s a combat optimized race on both sides of the spectrum, what about the humans?
Quickly, imagine Hafthor Bjornsson next to Gandalf and ask yourself: Do you really think all their stats are equal from birth? That Gandalf could deadlift 501kgs and Hafthor could cast spells if their parents somehow switched them at birth? Surely some are born to do something, so why can’t we choose to be Hafthor or Gandalf? Enter the next upgrade by enrichment and options offering:
The mental-human and the physical-human, side by side with the neutral-human.
Technically they’d all look like normal humans when they enter the realm, but with a significant difference underneath. Logically then the mental-human gets a significant bonus to his mentals at the cost of his physicals. I’d say where there was 100 intelligence before, there is now 120, and where there was 100 strength there is now 80.
Obviously the physical-human gets the same, only to opposite stat grouping. The neutral human stays as he’s always been because everyone loves a good all-rounder, even the casters these days I’m told. The goblin and dwarf are noticeably stronger and healthier than the physical-human, but must endure stigma, discrimination and old balls. What doesn’t kill you etc.
The important part is that instead of pushing an agenda of equality and perceived “fairness” by means that provoke negative emotions, you instead enrich the game with more options. More options equal more freedoms and everybody likes freedoms.
What about the other races?
Well, considering there is Galadriel and Guy-ladriel within the same IP (lol), I see no reason why the elf shouldn’t get the same treatment as the human. Many choose elf to fight, some to do magic so naturally we have the mental-elf, the physical-elf and the neutral-elf.
I’ll leave the offsets and distribution to someone with a passion for weak, frail and vain creatures. I’m sure they’ll be fairer than me.
That leaves the hobbit and the gnome, and when I glance at the rankings I see a kender who’s been their biggest advocate forever. It seems to me he’s doing well for himself: 9th place on Best and obviously first on dexterity. Hobbit/kender have massive bonus to dex, and that’s a great foundation to build an (another?) occupational guild, worthy of a hobbit, upon. Wiz and do it yourself? I see no reason to change the hobbit. It’s a cool niche that is obviously playable and some even say it’s fun.
As for the gnome.. I have very little skin in this game, but I guess it could it be tweaked a little towards more mentals at the cost of dexterity, so that it would become the socially awkward, stigmatized and publicly disliked option that will outperform both the mental-human and mental-elf in all things magical at the cost of looking like a mistake? I’ll leave the decisions and the technicalities to those who have painted garden ornaments interests at heart.
Follow me next time when I suggest that we all go back to newbies and kill each other repeatedly, and I might ramble on about how vampires are secretly conspiring to have everyone nerfed so that they'll come out on top.
TL;DR
Reading into the poll results (Gauging-thread)
The mob isn’t always right
Rhetorical stabs
Ramblings about real world famine as if it were genesis
Introspection regarding conservativism, basically stroking my own ego, all good
Realizing a rollback of foreversave might not be what we need right now, but maybe later?
A good page on explaining why the race equalization project is a catastrophe
Quoting Goirbagh cuz Jordan Peterson
Rambling about nerfs and negative emotions being the death of us
Suggesting additions rather than subtractions.
More humans, more elves and a better dwarf to match the goblin
Options equals freedoms. We like freedoms.
Short part about the lesser.. uhm.. other, races