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The nwn.powergamers.net web site, et. al, has moved from the semi-reliable to the server than hosts uopowergamers.com.
Enjoy.
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Bioware has announced an online convention called NWNCon. You can read about it here.
Here is some information on the event:
Q: Is there a central meeting place, ie a NWCon lobby to hang out in.
A: Many NWC regulars chat via IRC. See this page During NWCon, #NWCon will be the primary hang-out chatroom.[...]
Note that it's already started but you can get in on some of the action.
Enjoy!
Hasta.
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Bioware, as you know, will be releasing it's 2nd expansion to the popular NWN Game.
SoU in so may ways was a successful release.
The Underdark expansion is to be just as good, if not better. Although I am apprehensive about it because of my personal feelings on epic levels, Underdark also raises the cap on player levels to 40. What helps is that the toolset cap is raised to 60 (YAY! Bigger badder monstahs!).
Last night Bioware hosted a chat and a couple of the highlights are:
Quote:
Question from *Prime-G1*
Will the new expansion feature more pretiege classes or more player races?
BioWare Response
BioTom
Hordes of the Underdark will feature lots of new ways to customize your character, actually... We've got 6 new prestige classes: The Dwarven Defender, Champion of Torm, Weapon Master, Red Dragon Disciple, Shifter, and Pale Master.
we've also got a bunch of new player heads going into the game, new portraits, wings for the red dragon disciple, and even a "Customize Character" button that lets you edit your characters after you've created your character
so you can go in and edit your bio and such
Quote:
Question from *DaJeff*
Hi all. Can we expect some graphic engine improvements in HoTU ?
BioWare Response
BioTrent
Yes
the engine has had a few new features added
We've also doubled the polygone counts on the tilesets
It looks much better
I am excited by the release of new Prestige Classes and improvements on an already great, graphically, looking game.
You can find the full chat log here
Look for more updates on my feelings on the previous and upcoming expansions in the future...
Hasta.
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I was asked to approach the topic of Public Relations in reference to online gaming. Now mind you I am not an expert in the field of Public Relations nor will I ever claim to be. To me personally, public relations is too broad and impersonal. So for the remainder of this article PR will refer to Player Relations.
First and foremost you must have an understanding of what a player is as far as definition.
Player: ( n) 1 one who engages in recreation;
2 one who performs for amusement;
3 one who fills a position on a team.
To me that last one is by far the most important one. Players are the most important members of the gaming team. Without players there would not be a need for developers, creators, scripters, managers or ingame support personnel. Yes you read it correctly. Players are the most important members of the gaming team.
Now don’t get me wrong, I realize it is impossible to make every player happy and to give them everything they want. From my personal experience all a player really wants is to know that they matter. That their thoughts and ideas are being heard and considered. That they are being treated fairly and are important to the game and it’s developers.
Now that we have the Player part of PR down pat lets move on to the R in PR… Relations.
Relation (n) 1 connection;
2 the state of being mutually interested or involved;
Relate can further be defined as to relate to, give an account of, to show or establish logical or casual connection between.
PR is simply treating players as you yourself would want to be treated. It is a delicate balance of respect, fairness and open communication. It is the responsibility of the gaming staff to provide open honest information to it’s player base. To treat them fairly while maintaining the best interest of the majority. Listening with an open mind to the players thoughts, wants, needs and ideas. Then sharing those with the development members of the team.
Players should be the primary focus of any PR team. Players are what will make or break a game. No matter what the advertising PR team can do or promise, the word of a fellow gamer is what a player will respect and listen too first and foremost. A player unhappy isn't afraid to share with his other gaming friends that he is unhappy or feels mistreated. Do you want him spreading unhappiness? Would you prefer he shared how fair and just the development and player relations teams are? What it all boils down to is free advertising. Good or bad, it’s the players that share it. Advertising dollars are a waste if the promises are not followed through with.
If you have that player's trust and respect he will come to you with suggestions, problems, praise, support and ideas. Providing you with the valuable tools you and your development team needs for further development and improvements. If you don’t have that trust and respect, he will be heard loud and clear by his fellow gamers and you will be watching as they walk away from you and your product.
I don’t know about you folks but it seems pretty simple to me that when you put the two together, player and relations, you get a common sense, mutually benefiting, informative relationship among a team.
----
A very nice read.
Hope you enjoyed it! I know I did!
Hasta.
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One of the most enjoyable things about Neverwinter Nights is you can create and host your own persistent world for other players to enjoy.
One of the most important things you have to ask yourself is how do I want the players to advance and earn their gold? Will it be through crafting? Will it be through hunting? Will it be through quests? Or a combination of the above?
Unfortunately, I got in late in the game when it came to NWN:UO, our own 'custom' world. I didn't get to participate in those decisions early on, and I wish I had. But, since hind sight is 20/20 and I can't go back, all I can do is work today to make tomorrow better.
And, because of a recent hard drive crash, we actually turned it into an opportunity to make our world truly balanced item wise.
When NWN:UO first started the availability of the highest end items from the basic toolset and from the custom content truly broke the back of our economy and we had characters with literally 10s of millions of gold running around. With that crash, all the work we had done to remove the Gold Fountains paid off. Earning gold within our world isn’t totally impossible, but it’s not like a gushing pool of water anymore either.
So, when you build your world, you should take a look at the following:
-how much gold a creature will drop
-manage your vendors so the buy back rate is not too high (I recommend making your own custom vendors whenever possible).
-make sure any chests you place have appropriate drops per the character level.
-the items given or earned by players isn’t so prevalent that acquiring them creates a gold fountains in and of themselves. For example, if a creature drops a good item repeatedly, players could sell them to your NPC vendors over and over and make a lot of gold. Now, if the player sells it to another player that should not be a problem as that adds to the player interaction of your world. Getting the item should be appropriate to the level of the character or group that is attempting to acquire that item.
-if you do employ a crafting system, in my opinion, crafting should yield a bit higher yield in gold return as crafting can be mundane and can take a lot of work for the average player. That should not take away from the average, non-crafting player, but a crafter can make money selling items and then selling items to the other players themselves. So, again, in my opinion, crafting for the effort involved, should make more gold than the average adventurer.
The single most important thing to do is to find that balance. Where all aspects of the player base you wish to target is defined properly and those players playing within that ‘world within a world’ are happy, fulfilled and can find plenty of things to do.
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Alot has happened in the NWN World.
The goal is to bring at least one news post a day to you from us here at NWNPG.
It seems that the Witch's custom module Bioware had for release has been yanked. An issue arose about it's content and Wizard seems to be involved. I will be emailing them to ask them if they could tell me what it going on.
Also, the Shadows expansion is coming out soon.
This expansion has me very much excited because of the new tilesets, monsters, and placeable. The campaign enclosed isn't as exciting to me since I am more concerned with world building now.
Having the desert, ice, and ruins tileset (along with it's new placeables), allows server admins and world builders to use tilesets that previousely required a Hak Pak installed on the client side.
Dark Sun Online (if it is still around) will benefit from this. Our own NWN:UO world will as well because we have an ice area of our own. The Desert tileset will also let us build the Lost Lands area of Sosaria as well as the Compassion desert. Lots of content is always good for players.
And, thanks to the request of a player, we won't be adding Lag Scorpions all over the place.
That's all, for now...
Hasta.
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