Sirken Live! Ventrilo Interview on stream 6:30 EST

[Tiggles]

Full interview here in its entirety
http://www.twitch.tv/tigglesp99/c/2557703

Please join us on http://www.twitch.tv/tigglesp99


for a Live interview with Lead GM Sirken as he answers YOUR questions live on Twitch.TV

[Sirken]

confirmed true

[kbnexus]

oops

[Woahnelly]

Hey Sirken, what's it like being in bed with Tiggles? Is he hung? Does he cuddle afterwards?

[Karafa]

Hey Sirken, what's it like being in bed with Tiggles? Is he hung? Does he cuddle afterwards?

Rude, we all know a gentlemen doesn't kiss and tell.

[Ele]

http://www.project1999.org/forums/showthread.php?t=97723

5.6.1 List of Customer Service Limited Zones
Sleeper (sleeper)
Temple of Veeshan (templeveeshan)
The Plane of Fear (fearplane)
The Plane of Growth (growthplane)
The Plane of Hate (hateplane)
The Plane of Mischief (mischiefplane)
The Plane of Sky (airplane)
Veeshan’s Peak (veeshan)

[Splorf22]

Yes, but does limited customer service = trains ok? I thought that meant they just wouldn't summon your corpse. Which I'm pretty sure the staff would do here.

[Ele]

Yes, but does limited customer service = trains ok? I thought that meant they just wouldn't summon your corpse. Which I'm pretty sure the staff would do here.

That's the unanswered question we had in the last thread. :(

[arsenalpow]

so if ST and ToV are going to be "No CSR zones" (which has been the same for VP, which means legalized training) what is the incentive for a guild to continue playing this game into velious knowing that the high end zones will turn into a train war? It's absofuckinglutely retarded policy.

[Gadwen]

1 Star thread

[Sollix]

so if ST and ToV are going to be "No CSR zones" (which has been the same for VP, which means legalized training) what is the incentive for a guild to continue playing this game into velious knowing that the high end zones will turn into a train war? It's absofuckinglutely retarded policy.

[YendorLootmonkey]

so if ST and ToV are going to be "No CSR zones" (which has been the same for VP, which means legalized training) what is the incentive for a guild to continue playing this game into velious knowing that the high end zones will turn into a train war? It's absofuckinglutely retarded policy.

http://www.project1999.org/forums/showthread.php?t=97723

Because "no CSR zones" never meant "harrassment/zone disruption allowed" back on Live, yet somehow that isn't recognized here, much to the delight of one guild.

[Ele]

so if ST and ToV are going to be "No CSR zones" (which has been the same for VP, which means legalized training) what is the incentive for a guild to continue playing this game into velious knowing that the high end zones will turn into a train war? It's absofuckinglutely retarded policy.

[Tiggles]

Full recording of Interview will be up on my Twitch

http://www.twitch.tv/tigglesp99

[Reguiy]

Enjoyed the interview. Hoping to see more in the future from Sirken and maybe even other GMs if they are willing.

[Splorf22]

so if ST and ToV are going to be "No CSR zones" (which has been the same for VP, which means legalized training) what is the incentive for a guild to continue playing this game into velious knowing that the high end zones will turn into a train war? It's absofuckinglutely retarded policy.

Why do I find myself agreeing with Chest?

And when they say Temple of Veeshan do they mean not only NTOV but East and West? I mean thats not even a high-end zone really by our standards.

[Nirgon]

eh heh heh heh heh

[Splorf22]

Actually reading Yendor's link the VP ruling makes no sense. Fear/Hate/Sky are also on the list of CSR limited zones.

[Calabee]

keeping shit classic am i rite?

because it so how live was...no csr for those zones mentionned, :rolleyes:

[Vandy]

Exactly so if they are following these rules as they see them then all the planes are trainable zones. But Non-CSR doesn't mean you can do whatever the hell you want it just means that if you screw up and lose your corpse the GM wont help you. Doesn't mean you can train everyone.

[t0lkien]

So billions of plat were removed from some asshat who had created/duped/accumulated it, and who then offered a real money bribe to the GM to be able to keep it? What sort of people invest so much of themselves in a free private server of a 14 year old online game? I mean, I love it too, but really?

The "top end" people on this server include the most determined nerds I've ever heard of.

[Tiggles]

So billions of plat were removed from some asshat who had created/duped/accumulated it, and who then offered a real money bribe to the GM to be able to keep it? What sort of people invest so much of themselves in a free private server of a 14 year old online game?

The "top end" people on this server include the most determined nerds I've ever heard of.

Actually, majority of the Plat sellers where not in any raiding guild.

They are EC sellers not raiders.

[Turp_SmokinPurp]

Trains will stall the sleeper being woke. Sirken said yes to PvP all those zones but other staff/community want trains.

[xarzzardorn]

CT is in pofear which means training isn't legal. and it has the most leeway in response time of any encounter other than VP. instead of being forum warriors who want to blame everyone but themselves, try attempting this mob

[Fael]

Its kind of a catch 22. casual gamers will never see the original ST unless its trainable. they may see it, but they likely wont kill anything if it is trainable.

Dolic

[Phats]

Why is the fat slob Tiggles, who was handed gear from Uthgaard even allowed to post shit like this?

[Tiggles]

Why is the fat slob Tiggles, who was handed gear from Uthgaard even allowed to post shit like this?

P99 celeb bro

[Splorf22]

keeping shit classic am i rite?

because it so how live was...no csr for those zones mentionned, :rolleyes:

Then fear and hate should be no-csr zones as well. CT just got a lot more interesting.

[Splorf22]

Also I like Sirken. He works very hard at a thankless job for which he receives no salary. I just think he doesn't understand that a solid majority of the people here are not interested in train wars, spending 10+ hours a week sitting at a blank screen hitting the track button, and getting up at 4AM to slay pixel dragons (there is a vocal minority who will go off on irrelevant tangents glorifying this as 'competition').

I know that there were some servers that had rotations and some that were more . . . vicious. I know that some GMs allowed train wars in VP and some did not. But considering that this is an emulated server 12+ years after the glory days of PixelQuest, why should it be so hardcore?

I would even be in favor of keeping variance if every guild had two tokens to spawn raid bosses every week.

[Tiggles]

Also I like Sirken. He works very hard at a thankless job for which he receives no salary. I just think he doesn't understand that a solid majority of the people here are not interested in train wars, spending 10+ hours a week sitting at a blank screen hitting the track button, and getting up at 4AM to slay pixel drageons (there is a vocal minority who will go off on irrelevant tangents glorifying this as 'competition').

I know that there were some servers that had rotations and some that were more . . . vicious. I know that some GMs allowed train wars in VP and some did not. But considering that this is an emulated server 12+ years after the glory days of PixelQuest, why should it be so hardcore?

I would even be in favor of keeping variance if every guild had two tokens to spawn raid bosses every week.

Tokens? Take your casual trash tokens and go to that shitty sleeper server if you want to raid with hand holding tokens

[fuark]

casual trash

Been waiting for this thread to turn into something worth reading...

Btw why do all the GMs seem to be in love with this guy? I've never seen him be anything but offensive as hell on the forums and freak the fuck out in tells with people.

[Splorf22]

Are you suggesting what I think you're suggesting? Or are you not aware of the rumors surrounding Tiggles and certain previous GMs?

[fuark]

Are you suggesting what I think you're suggesting? Or are you not aware of the rumors surrounding Tiggles and certain previous GMs?

Nope wasn't suggesting anything. Genuinely curious. Was gone from Project 1999 for quite a while (year and a half?) and only recently returned.

[Briscoe]

Or are you not aware of the rumors surrounding Tiggles and certain previous GMs?

[Nlaar]

Are you suggesting what I think you're suggesting? Or are you not aware of the rumors surrounding Tiggles and certain previous GMs?

The more things change the more they remain the same.

When is the TMO & GM Staff summer BBQ again? I think I lost my invite. I swear we'll avoid the Trichinosis outbreak this time around.

[Ruenaros]

1 hour 23 minutes? oi. where's the TL;DW?

[Tiddlywinks]

Nope wasn't suggesting anything. Genuinely curious. Was gone from Project 1999 for quite a while (year and a half?) and only recently returned.

Here's a quick briefing:

In-game Tiggles is known as "quickfingers". He kept this as a secret to all but a few for as long as possible.

The character, "quickfingers" was provided to him by former-GM "Uthgaard" in return for Tiggles "spying" on the guild "Dark Ascension" a band of the largest hackers/cheaters/exploiters to have ever graced the server.

After his covert-ops affairs he re-joined TMO, whom he had disbanded to join DA for "spying". Shortly after and a couple of re-births later most of the core from Dark Ascension merged with TMO.

Uthgaard was removed as a lead GM, and a lot of dirty things came to light such as the spying scandal, his connections to quickfingers, quickfingers having epic items before they had been implemented etc etc.

Amelinda took Uthgaards place as lead-GM, and was literally Tiggles e-girlfriend. Tiggles and TMO courted her favor to do whatever they wanted on the server. Amelinda was eventually found out to be accepting bribes to look the other way on RMT done by the guild IB as they left the server as well as TMO. This is when it was revealed that Tiggles had been e-dating Amelinda for sometime.

After this period Tiggles took a bit of a break, only to come back to the server ~6months ago. He had lost his job (he claims he is a certified PI that had a state job I believe) and has been working at a games and hobby shop for the last few months, selling kids magics cards and dealing with obese nerds for near minimum wage.

He is very fat, poor, and believes him-self some sort of P99 e-celebrity. He is now courting Sirkens favor.

Sirken, if Tiggles has proven anything other than the fact that he somehow has not been banned from all of this shit, it is that he has ended many a lead-GM career. Proceed with EXTREME caution.

[falkun]

Note all "quotes" are paraphrased, but I attempted to capture the essence of what was said that I wish to comment on.

~9m45s: Sirken: "Players need to dictate the raid scene"
Players can only be forced to follow the bare minimum rules. This is why you see Knix asking questions about FTE shout changing the mechanics of FTE. This is why we have the shitty raid scene we have (a certain guild cannot be held to follow any rules above those dictated by CSR).

FTE shout is fantastic for self-moderation, I'm glad its getting implemented and I hope it saves you many hours, Sirken & CSR co.

But players are horrible at dictating the raid scene. This is why the server is as shitty as it is, this is why other MMOs have gone to non-interference instances.

How can the majority of the server dictate the raid scene when the barrier to entry is absolutely insane:
1) Variance encourages absolutely insane guild sizes.
2) Old accounts seldom leave the game, they just get new owners.
3) Droppable/MQable BIS means farming raid spawns never becomes a waste of time.
4) Server rules infractions receive slaps on the wrist. With the extended variance (using 200 hours into window VS spawn), a two week raid ban could cause a guild to miss only a SINGLE spawn and that guild would come off raid-ban before the mob even went into window again. That's a single mob out of the ~50 that will spawn in the year.
5) A single person can steal legitimate kills from other guilds with "the fastest jav in the West".
6) "Respectable raid sizes" for P99 are 40-50, all L60 with near BIS gear. Everquest: Kunark was originally tuned for 18-30 (3-5 groups) with an average L54-57 with lesser gear. Even classic Velious wasn't tuned for the "respectable raids" we see here on P99.

~12m15s: Tiggles: "Minimums should be set for all current raid mobs for FTE."
Sirken: "What if a guild has bigger balls and wants to attempt with less?"
Thanks Sirken. Last BDA/Rapture/Divinity Talendor was 22 persons. TMO's Talendor yesterday had 35+. Now we know who has the balls.

~16m45s: Tiggles: "Variance in Velious?"
Are you going to variance Vindi, who's an 8-hr spawn but a small raid mob?

~17m20s: Sirken: "Variance is good for the server"
Variance benefits one type of guild, the super large guild. Nilbog posts the question, "Why so large raid guilds?" and then permits additional variance...What's the disconnect? Can you elaborate on why Variance is better when CSR uses FTE to solve everything anyways? If everyone showed up when things spawned, FTE shout will take care of who gets loot anyways. You, Sirken, said earlier that you want players to dictate the raid scene, yet we are limited in policing ourselves because Variance dictates when the policing can happen (players' greatest recourse in dictating the raid scene is denying other players spawns).

~19m0s: Sirken: "If variance didn't exist, TMO would push mobs into off-hours"
1) That's why you have server resets, to move mobs back into normal windows.
2) Even if its off-hours, if people know when something is going to spawn, they can plan ahead. You can't plan ahead for Variance other than pre-camping and playing an alt.
3) "Any single guild can show up and get Trakanon." Pre-camping sucks. Most spawns are inherently off-hours ANYWAY because "on-hour" is a short window in US evenings (~4-11PM PST, give or take). So now the off-hour spawns are TMO's, and the on-hour ones are TMO's because no-one else bothers to pre-camp and TMO does. Without Variance at least people might consider showing up to the on-hour ones and TMO would still have the off-hour ones uncontested.

~20m15s: Sirken: "Or a guild can poopsock a mob and hope you guys [TMO] aren't there for it."
If its a mob TMO wants, they'll just come join the sock. Poopsocking just forces more people to poop in their sock, its a sick cycle.

~20m30s: Sirken: "Without variance guilds could only kill mobs TMO allowed them because TMO could push mobs to off-hours."
Most spawns already are off-hours, without TMO going through the effort of pushing them there, thanks server devs for making TMO's job easier. Guilds could plan ahead if they knew when things were going to spawn, even off-hours. I'm sure the 14 BDA, 7 Divinity, and 5 Rapture that are usually on at 3AM could work something out where they split loot at the Sev that's going to spawn at 3:15 if they had a few days to make those arrangements. 1 loot per guild is better than no loot, or worse, having TMO sell you that loot the next day. Also, with even monthly server resets (still fewer than classic), mob spawns wouldn't get pushed by more than 2 hours (figure half hour to kill a mob for 4 weeks (and that's being generous if everyone knew when the spawn time was going to be)).

~22m00s: Sirken: "Nihilum keeps mobs on lockdown by pushing mob spawn times."
1) Nihilum can do that because no other guild(s) bother to kill the target. I doubt any target would stay up for more than 12 hours even if TMO didn't kill a single mob, even with current variance. There is more competition on Blue, people will come if they know the mob is up. Evidence: the last time TMO was suspended, the only targets to stay up days were Naggy and Vox because BDA said they'd leave them up indefinitely. BDA eventually led an open raid on Naggy and Vox. All other targets were killed within 3-4 hours of spawning, even with variance.
2) Nihilum can do that because nothing resets spawn times. Everyone championing "no variance" is ALSO championing "server resets." You can't push a spawn time way out if it comes back to some known value once per {some defined interval}.

~26m30s: Sirken: "No-CSR limits in ST/ToV have not been discussed yet."
http://www.project1999.org/forums/showpost.php?p=844885&postcount=2
Non-CSR does not mean 'anarchy reigns' as it currently does in VP.

~29m00s: Sirken: "Server repops have been greenlit by staff."
Fantastic to hear. And that would help keep respawns in line without variance.

~31m20s: Sirken: "Some of staff are advocating for a piecemeal release of Velious (Withhold ToV, PoG, for later)."
This is already going to happen. There's a single flashpoint in Velious that all content will get locked behind because each player needs to gather materials to pass past that point. If you thought Chancellor was bad, wait until you release Velious. Also, Kunark is two years old and people are yearning for something different. Velious does a wonderful job of splitting up the raid scene by offering different tiers due to factioning and difficulty. Since the raid scene is an admitted shithole, why would you want to artificially prevent allowing the tiered raiding to do its intended job? Please explain the advantages of piecemeal release, the only possible advantage I could see at this point is that X is complete, but there is still some work to do on Y and Z, so those will get released later.

{edit}Ambrotos believes piecemeal Kunark (VP's later release date) damaged the raid scene: http://www.project1999.org/forums/showpost.php?p=638600&postcount=2. Piecemeal is not the way to release Velious.{/edit}

~38m30s: Sirken: "Piecemeal release of Velious would allow it to last longer."
Fair enough.
As you quote Nilbog though, its not Classic. And it defeats the tiered purpose of the raid difficulties and factions.

~41m00s: Sirken: "Guilds that do not want Sleeper woken will have to prevent that. Assuming ST is non-CSR (which Sirken is leaning towards), you can train people."
Taking Zeelot's word for ST (I've never personally seen ST), that won't matter much. The latter half of ST, where the warders are, has little trash, so training is difficult. Also, TMO are already very proficient at counter-training in VP, if they wanted to wake the Sleeper, I don't think its difficult to draw the conclusion they'll be able to counter train in ST to accomplish their goal. While I understand waking the Sleeper has benefits (different items), its also going to be whatever outgoing guild's "Fuck you" to the server. "Some people just want to watch the world burn."

~42m30s: Sirken: "We've taken over 2 billion plat from Platlord."
Ephi, the Seventh Hammer. Good to hear P99 staff, thanks for the effort in that!

~46min: Sirken: "Uthgaard was really good at GM events."
Is that stuff super hard to code? How much of it was coded ahead of time and how much was on-the-spot GM command "#spawnmobnow" type deal? You also said Rogean is the only person with that kind of access these days and I've read elsewhere that access has become more divided so people cannot game the server/system (as much). Is there a method by which a person could become "GM event"-only GM, should a person want to do that? Or since Uthgaard's departure that would not be possible due to the divided dev/GM/etc. powers? What would be the best route to pursue that course of server-support if a person wanted to?

~51m: Sirken: "How we caught Platlord."
I don't know if I feel you said too much or if you did a good job at scaring would-be RMTers.

~53m10s: Sirken: "Account trading would be fine if people didn't screw each other over so often."
Account trading is horrible for the server. It keeps old items in the economy longer, it allows players to more swiftly mobilize than porting and running when they can just have a character camped at all the raid encounters. The latter point may be less of an issue in Velious when there's more encounters, but that just means more strategy in deploying accounts.

~57m30s: Sirken: "Stuff beyond classic, all AA code has been ripped out, no Luclin, select PoP zones 'may' be released well beyond Velious."
http://www.project1999.org/forums/showthread.php?t=11879

~58m20s: Sirken: "World-changing events. Possibly having lightsaber weapons."
Rogean. But what advantages do lightsabers have, would they be ranged? What type of world-changing events? Like Freeport2.0 (or whatever damn version they're on now)?

~01h00m00s: Sirken: "Stabbyjoe was the one who came clean and provided information about Platlord to CSR."
Just thought it'd be worth putting into my "minutes" of the chat.

~01h02m00s: Sirken: "We don't reveal bans to allow those players a fresh start (3 strikes), we don't want the karma to come back to us (dick pictures on the forums), and Sirken sometimes makes mistakes that you can bring up to him in a civil manner. Some people who get banned send in info that aids staff in better securing the server."
Just thought it'd be worth putting into my "minutes" of the chat.

~01h03m30s: Tiggles: "Perma-bans aren't permanent."
Sirken: "We'll give you a second chance if we feel you won't do it again. Kinsawt is still banned, Sirken denied Kinsawt's appeal, but they can still roll new accounts/characters."
I bet IB would do it again in a heartbeat. I also know there are damaging in-game offenses committed by some players who just keep receiving limp-wristed suspensions. At what point do repeat offenders of non-bannable but suspendable offenses get a player banned? IE: I personally feel Sericx is much more toxic for the server than Kinsawt.

~01h09m00s: Sirken: "I love Gukta frogloks. I never learned U/L-Guk."

~01h12m00s: Sirken: "We are not EQEmu. P99 are a different staff from EQEmu. P99 is the wrong forum to post login server account issues."

~01h19m30s: Sirken: "Only Rogean can undo some bans & why."

End of Interview.


Thank you both for doing the interview. I've added my questions/comments near the appropriate comments above.

[Tiddlywinks]

~17m20s: Sirken: "Variance is good for the server"



LOLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL

[Skope]

so if ST and ToV are going to be "No CSR zones" (which has been the same for VP, which means legalized training) what is the incentive for a guild to continue playing this game into velious knowing that the high end zones will turn into a train war? It's absofuckinglutely retarded policy.

Why do you expect anything less from a couple of retards? They're pushing patch notes for zergs and poopsockers and you seem surprised that dumb shit like this rears its head?

Expect it. Expect it and don't respect them, because other than keeping the server afloat they don't know what the hell they're doing anymore

[Tiddlywinks]

Why do you expect anything less from a couple of retards? They're pushing patch notes for zergs and poopsockers and you seem surprised that dumb shit like this rears its head?

Expect it. Expect it and don't respect them, because other than keeping the server afloat they don't know what the hell they're doing anymore

You're under estimating them.. these people are not drooling retards. They are intelligent.

They know EXACTLY what they're doing.

That's the problem.

[Splorf22]

"If variance didn't exist, TMO would push mobs into off-hours"

I understand why Sirken believes this because he spends a lot of time on the Red Server and Nihilum can do that there. But there is no fucking way it would ever happen on Blue. We have probably 500+ raid-level players with tons of epic/sky/VP gear. "Casual" guilds like Divinity or Rapture still clear 1-8 in Sky despite the Bee Queen and Eye doing Avatar of War level damage.

Put this to the test sometime: pop a Trakanon and tell TMO (maybe even FE as well, since they have a ton of toons camped at the ledge) not to touch it. If you send a few tells to the other NINE guilds we have on this server I guarantee you he will be dead within two hours. It would be 1 hour except that 200 people will show up and crash the zone multiple times.

Players need to dictate the raid scene

Again I can understand why Sirken has this position. Some servers were more competitive than others; why not let the players decided how P1999 should be? The problem with this is that we have an unprecedented overcrowding on the high-end. Everyone knows how to form groups and which classes are good and which aren't and where stuff drops and most people tend towards the hardcore side of things anyway, Tiggles to the contrary. Give that playerbase 2.5 years of Kunark, and suddenly the "casual trash" have L60 toons and the hardcore have 4+ max level toons with full vp/epic gear.

With such tremendous overcrowding, it's no wonder that the raid scene is such a shithole. Here's another suggestion: if you consider tokens too carebear, repop every raid boss 4x a week at known times. Make them spawn with 1 item always instead of 2-4 (so only a modest inflation in the actual number of items). This way the "casual trash" might actually get a shot at trying some of these encounters.

[Tiddlywinks]

I understand why Sirken believes this because he spends a lot of time on the Red Server and Nihilum can do that there. But there is no fucking way it would ever happen on Blue. We have probably 500+ raid-level players with tons of epic/sky/VP gear. "Casual" guilds like Divinity or Rapture still clear 1-8 in Sky despite the Bee Queen and Eye doing Avatar of War level damage.

Put this to the test sometime: pop a Trakanon and tell TMO (maybe even FE as well, since they have a ton of toons camped at the ledge) not to touch it. If you send a few tells to the other NINE guilds we have on this server I guarantee you he will be dead within two hours. It would be 1 hour except that 200 people will show up and crash the zone multiple times.



Again I can understand why Sirken has this position. Some servers were more competitive than others; why not let the players decided how P1999 should be? The problem with this is that we have an unprecedented overcrowding on the high-end. Everyone knows how to form groups and which classes are good and which aren't and where stuff drops and most people tend towards the hardcore side of things anyway, Tiggles to the contrary. Give that playerbase 2.5 years of Kunark, and suddenly the "casual trash" have L60 toons and the hardcore have 4+ max level toons with full vp/epic gear.

With such tremendous overcrowding, it's no wonder that the raid scene is such a shithole. Here's another suggestion: if you consider tokens too carebear, repop every raid boss 4x a week at known times. Make them spawn with 1 item always instead of 2-4 (so only a modest inflation in the actual number of items). This way the "casual trash" might actually get a shot at trying some of these encounters.


I don't think any of the server staff, or the "hardcore" players give any shits whether or not the "casual trash" get any shots at trying some encounters.

In fact, they probably prefer you don't. That would mean they were slipping in some way. If casuals had the same chance at the pixels/mobs the hardcores did then what justification could they possibly have for investing as much time as they do when you did it so much easier?

They created this environment, and they need to maintain the status quo. If you want to see these encounters, they expect you to do exactly what they did to get there e.g. not be casual.

[Splorf22]

Why do you expect anything less from a couple of retards? They're pushing patch notes for zergs and poopsockers and you seem surprised that dumb shit like this rears its head?

Expect it. Expect it and don't respect them, because other than keeping the server afloat they don't know what the hell they're doing anymore

This is just silly. In my experience Nilbog, Rogean, and Sirken are all fairly intelligent, they just aren't doing what you want, for various reasons:

Rogean is busy with other things.

Nilbog wishes all the players would just grow up so he can get back to working on Velious and ultimately his classic-from-the-start-with-very-few-bugs server which will be released in 1-2 years or so I guess.

Sirken is a PVP/competitor type and likes the current situation.

[Skope]

You're under estimating them.. these people are not drooling retards. They are intelligent.

They know EXACTLY what they're doing.

That's the problem.

They have no fucking clue what they're doing anymore.

*Rogean adds another variance on top of one that never worked. This time poopsocking has stopped, but the both of them have admitted that it was to the detriment of everyone else... Thanks a lot, really.

*The response to people poopsocking on a spawn was to change the mechanics to every NPC in the game shortly after spawning. So they've addressed the 3-4 idiots using mouse and keyboard recorders - by not banning them or punishing their guilds, apparently, because that would be harsh and unclassic - but by changing every NPC in the game. Worth it.

*Now we've got an FTE rule that isn't going to work (and that never would have worked) as the only olive branch presented to the rest of us (the vast majority of the server), but the rest of the raid rules that were promised are nowhere to be seen.

*Both nilbog and rogean admit that the patch notes aren't to everyone's benefit, and in fact are to the detriment of most of P99 playerbase, but nilbog has the brass to claim he's got a classic server, or anything close to it, and that he prefers classic mechanics and rules. One can only assume that nilbog is suffering from dementia and a multiple personality disorder

At this point, the only thing you two are doing right is keeping the server afloat and adding the code *slightly* more in line with classic, all the while doing your damndest to screw the biggest portion of players on the server and implement a completely unclassic environment.

You're not even trying anymore.

[Tiddlywinks]

This is just silly. In my experience Nilbog, Rogean, and Sirken are all fairly intelligent, they just aren't doing what you want, for various reasons:

Rogean is busy with other things.

Nilbog wishes all the players would just grow up so he can get back to working on Velious and ultimately his classic-from-the-start-with-very-few-bugs server which will be released in 1-2 years or so I guess.

Sirken is a PVP/competitor type and likes the current situation.

Good post, and I essentially said the same.

The only thing I would add is, don't pretend to know their individual intentions. It may comfort you to think you know them, but when you step back and take a look at the big picture and what goes on I doubt they're all as pure as you made them out to be.

One man can never truly know anothers intentions.

EDIT: That sounds tin-foily as fuck, but it was not intended to be that way. :)

[Swish]

Just keep clicking the Google ads :)

[Ephi]

~42m30s: Sirken: "We've taken over 2 billion plat from Platlord."
Ephi, the Seventh Hammer. Good to hear P99 staff, thanks for the effort in that!


~51m: Sirken: "How we caught Platlord."
I don't know if I feel you said too much or if you did a good job at scaring would-be RMTers.

I think Sirken did a fine job of walking the line between scaring and saying too much.

RMT is big business for some people and we know that. Given our volunteer nature, there's only so much time we can dedicate to the task of taking down RMTers. It's a large part of my role now, given that I generally don't handle regular CSR type issues anymore (corpses, raid issues, etc.). But still, it generally requires a lot of time in the database, cross referencing information and getting things down to the source.

That said, we know who's doing it. We know who continues to do it, and we continue to ban accounts for those who do. The database has a wealth of information on who is doing what, and no one who RMTs is safe from the banhammer.

I'll admit that we generally go after the bigger fish (platlord, others) and don't spend a lot of time focusing on individual trades (Soandso RMT'd his account omgbanhim). But we look at all reports that come in, and hit them as time allows.

[Ele]

Rolling out Velious anything but the whole is a huge slap in the face to everyone that has been waiting and will only further compound the overcrowding of high end zones.

Holding back ToV, Plane of Growth and Plane of Mischief denies 4 of the 5 alternatives for class armor upgrades piling everyone into Kael for Thurgadin based armor.

[heartbrand]

If plane of mischief will push back velious several months I can't see why launching without it is a bigger deal than the current stagnation we have

[sanforce]

I thought it was a great interview and explained the GM's lack of intervention in the current raid scene.

It is for the server to decide how we want to handle raid mobs, not the GMs. The current mechanics are in place to allow others to compete, if they so want. The fact that the more hardcore guilds don't want to band together and compete with TMO is nobodies fault but their own. FE's recent attempt was a good one, but they have seemed to fall apart recently.

FTE shouts will be a good thing to let everyone know who is currently engaged, so guilds aren't assisting other guilds without knowing until 10 minutes after the mob is dead.

Simulated server restarts will open up raid mobs because the top few guilds can't be everywhere at once. If they fail to position themselves prior to a simulated patch, or fail to down a mob, it is their own fault.

[Karafa]

Staff works hard here, and I appreciate Sirken going out of his way to do the interview. A+A+

[Handull]

Rolling out Velious anything but the whole is a huge slap in the face to everyone that has been waiting and will only further compound the overcrowding of high end zones.

Holding back ToV, Plane of Growth and Plane of Mischief denies 4 of the 5 alternatives for class armor upgrades piling everyone into Kael for Thurgadin based armor.

i completely agree. if they release velious bit by bit, then one guild can continue to dominate that specific content and move on to the next zone when it is added.

i also think we could do away with variance all together when velious starts and see how it goes. Might have to bring it back after a while, but I really don't think it will be needed at least for a bunch of old world content. Mobs that have niche drops might still need variance, but most stuff classic-kunark won't

[Stinkum]

i remember when everyone was saying the exact same thing about kunark supposedly being the penicillin cure for raid overcrowding

it didnt end up being true then and it wont be true for velious

stagger that shit

[Alarti0001]

i remember when everyone was saying the exact same thing about kunark supposedly being the penicillin cure for raid overcrowding

it didnt end up being true then and it wont be true for velious

stagger that shit

Kunark offered 5ish new targets without VP. Who said it would be the solution for overcrowding cause they are an idiot. Velious offers 55+ new targets.

[xarzzardorn]

Whats worse? Tiggles voice or the having to listen to him suck up to Sirken for an hour?

Real talk.

Honest questions would be helpful to the server... just saying.

realtalk you're a dumbass

[Estu]

Whats worse? Tiggles voice or the having to listen to him suck up to Sirken for an hour?

Real talk.

Honest questions would be helpful to the server... just saying.

Tiggles asked the questions that people told him to ask by sending him tells or posting in the stream's chat room. If you want "honest questions" then ask them yourself.

[Noselacri]

Having listened to the interview, I find it disconcerting that even a veteran GM can be completely oblivious to the cause and solution of the endgame congestion issue. Sirken is clearly of the opinion that it's the players' problem and that they should find the solution, but he fails to realize that the problem is not created by the players, it's created by two factors:

1) Emulated servers have a vastly higher proportion of endgame-qualified/seeking players, i.e. players who are able and willing to raid the high-end content. Back when EQ Live was relevant, these players were a tiny minority, so few that it didn't really cause this problem at the time.

2) There were twenty-something servers to choose from, and if one server was overcrowded, you always had the option of moving to a different one. There was enough content for everyone if you looked beyond the server borders.

P99 has been the exact opposite in both regards. There's only one server's worth of content for an amount of high-level players that could fill three or four classic servers' worth of raid guilds. It's ridiculous to call this an issue that players must solve amongst themselves. Sure, GMs didn't swoop down to tell people how to play the game back then, but that's because there was no need for it. People got along because if they didn't, they had alternatives. If there just wasn't enough raid content for another guild, those players could move to a different server. If the servers were getting too crowded, SOE would open a few new ones.

The total lack of regard for this is the reason I no longer play, and is the most frequently cited reason for people quitting the server. It's the reason P99 has always struggled to break 1k players despite being literally the only serious option for classic Everquest. It has been a source of constant complaints, of disputes so severe that generations of GMs have quit over it, and of so much bad blood between players, from the very infancy of the server; and the problem ultimately stems not from the playerbase's inability to cooperate but from the staff's ignorance of the reason for this problem and unwillingness to acknowledge that it's caused by something other than players being idiots.

It's holding P99 back, keeping it from becoming something truly great, and it has robbed so many players of the full experience that they could have had at no consequence to the server and at no additional cost to the owners. The quality of the server itself is amazing, it's a near-perfect replica of classic Everquest, but the way it has been handled made me lose hope in the possibility of improvement because the administration simply won't accept that the problem cannot be solved by the playersbase. What are players even supposed to do about the fact that there simply isn't enough content for them? They can at best take over as the new top raid guild and thus push the issue onto somebody else's plate, but they'll only have shifted the problem around and saddled somebody else with it. Players cannot solve an issue that cannot be solved by any action on their part. They can't create additional content, and it would be unreasonable to expect guilds to refrain from raiding out of courtesy to others.

As long as this ignorance and misconception remains the staff's stance, nothing will improve. It's such a shame and a waste because hundreds, possibly thousands of players have tried P99, found the quality to be fantastic, and still quit after realizing that they wouldn't be able to do what they wanted because there simply isn't room. It's even partially responsible for some of the other issues, because the server would not have become so economy-centric and thus RMT-plagued as it is if not for the fact that buying high-level tradeables was the only way for many players to progress after a certain point, due to the fact that raiding is unavaiable to most. It's the elephant in the room, the #1 problem, the defining conundrum of P99, and yet the developers have always refused to acknowledge it.

Do the right thing, if not now then at least by the time Velious comes out. Find a solution to this fundamental problem instead of blaming the players for something that is neither their fault nor in their power to resolve. I recommend creating shards that contain only the high-end raid content, and then giving each raid guild free access to transfer to and from their own designated shard at will. It wouldn't dilute or compromise the main server because there would be no reason to stay on these shards after a raid session if there is no other content. It would adequately simulate the existence of many servers without ruining the population of the one. It should be easy to implement restrictions that prevent abuse from guild-hopping and double-dipping and so on. If you don't do something like this, P99 will remain the server that has amazing content and quality but is forever held back by a fundamentally broken premise.

[kickinit]

Appreciate what Tiggles is doing here and thanks for Sirken for giving his time.

I also was watching Sirken Twitch last night (mostly while in sky/hate). It was pretty interesting just watching him float around and change over to different characters. Was pretty cool to see what goes on behind the scenes.

[sanforce]

Sirken is clearly of the opinion that it's the players' problem and that they should find the solution

Yes, clearly, and we all knew that was the staffs stance before this interview.



The total lack of regard for this is the reason I no longer play

So you couldn't handle the server "rules" and left because of it. Also, you no longer play here so your opinion doesn't matter much.


I recommend creating shards that contain only the high-end raid content, and then giving each raid guild free access to transfer to and from their own designated shard at will.

Not classic, play WoW or create your own emulated server with your own set of rules. The content on this server is great immitation of the classic game and the creators/staff have decided to take a "players set the raid scene" stance.

The raid scene didn't have to turn out like this, but this is the direction that players have decided to take it. The server is top heavy, and mechanics have been implemented to give everyone a fair shot. Yesterday, for example, FE got FTE on Sev, pulled the dragon across the zone, and then wiped due to insufficient numbers. If the FE officers had done a better job at managing their up and coming guild, they would have probably had enough members present to down the target. If BDA/Taken/Divinity had some sort of raid alliance setup, competed for FTE (completely fair system), and had some sort of mobilization strategy, they too could have competed for the target. As it stands, FE failed to down the mob, TMO was ready, and got the kill (damn you TMO!). [edit - I got to watch this encounter due to Sirken's stream, thanks Sirken!)

I fail to realize how your casual play style is a good excuse to be given raid targets without competition, when there are other people who are willing to compete.

[Ruenaros]

Variance created this 8 minute scramble->kill environment which promotes the massive guild instant-response system (or as i call it, Everquest: Unemployed Edition). The players may have suggested variance originally (years ago - in a totally different situation) but they weren't the ones who implemented it. To undo that now would require a new implementation.

[Ruenaros]

Also anyone suggesting that a multi-guild effort could compete in a race vs these single-entity supermassive guilds clearly has not tried to do so before. The single guild has way too many advantages in terms of communication and coordination.... that would be why they are guilded :)

Did you think they all just love each other that much?

[sanforce]

Also anyone suggesting that a multi-guild effort could compete in a race vs these single-entity supermassive guilds clearly has not tried to do so before. The single guild has way too many advantages in terms of communication and coordination.... that would be why they are guilded :)

Did you think they all just love each other that much?

No, I don't think the smaller guilds have tons of love for each other. But if smaller guilds are ineffective at tracking and pursuing raid targets, they either need to change their ways to compete or stop complaining about their inabilities. If BDA and Taken were to have a raid alliance, a joint batphone system for those who want to sign up, and some sort of loot arrangement (tracking guild gets first choice at loot item, /random for first choice at loot item, etc), they might have more success. As it stands, I see a lot of the "we aren't capable, plz hand us raid targets on a silver platter" attitude.

[feanan]

First, playing a 13 year old game has a limited audience to begin with.

Of that limited audience, there is only a small percentage of people that have no jobs, or no life, or nothing better to do besides hoping the batphone will go off. The majority of those people are all ready in TMO.

If any of the people in these smaller guilds wanted to be on call 24/7 for some 13 year old pixels...they would all ready be in TMO, not trying to form some 4 way guild alliance or some shit.

This is why nobody can "compete" with them. There just aren't enough people left who want to deal with that shit.

The problem here is strictly stagnation. If it was like classic eq, with a new expansion coming out ever 6-9 months, TMO could move along and leave the older stuff to the "casuals", and there would be fewer problems.

I'm curious to see how velious will really work out for the server. Time will tell.

[sanforce]

If any of the people in these smaller guilds wanted to be on call 24/7 for some 13 year old pixels...


I'm not saying people have to respond to 24/7 batphones. That is extremely unrealistic for a video game, and I'm sure there are plenty of people in TMO that refuse to do that as well. But receiving a text message and/or email is not that intrusive. I'm sure there are multiple guilds that are capable of killing all of the Kunark content that is available. But if a group of people want to "kill" 13 year old dragon pixels on this server, then some level of organization and reaction time are required.

[Nirgon]

The single guild has way too many advantages in terms of communication and coordination.... that would be why they are guilded :)


Are you trying to say that the most skilled and organized guild with the most available free time gets most of the raid mobs?

HOW CAN THIS BE. WHAT KIND OF WORLD ARE WE LIVING IN.

[Ruenaros]

No, I don't think the smaller guilds have tons of love for each other. But if smaller guilds are ineffective at tracking and pursuing raid targets, they either need to change their ways to compete or stop complaining about their inabilities. If BDA and Taken were to have a raid alliance, a joint batphone system for those who want to sign up, and some sort of loot arrangement (tracking guild gets first choice at loot item, /random for first choice at loot item, etc), they might have more success. As it stands, I see a lot of the "we aren't capable, plz hand us raid targets on a silver platter" attitude.

The problem is with speed of execution. When you're talking about 7-8 minutes total from spawned to dead, it is of great advantage to be mobilizing one single force, verses a combined one... if you can't see why that would be then I guess I'm wasting my time here. If that weren't the case then TMO would already be split into 2 or 3 smaller, allied guilds themselves.

[zanderklocke]

I'm not saying people have to respond to 24/7 batphones. That is extremely unrealistic for a video game, and I'm sure there are plenty of people in TMO that refuse to do that as well.

Wrong. TMO members make it to any batphone they can. That is how they get DKP to earn items. You have to have around a 30-40% attendance to raids to maintain membership in TMO. Granted, I guess that means you could miss over half the raids, but you wouldn't be first priority for gear.

[Waedawen]

Are you trying to say that the most skilled and organized guild with the most available free time gets most of the raid mobs?

HOW CAN THIS BE. WHAT KIND OF WORLD ARE WE LIVING IN.

"Most skilled and organized.... most available free time"



Someone doesn't know how MMO's work.