[Ar7]

I apologize up front for not reading the entire thread, I may repeat some ideas or speak of something already said, but after reading Acacea's post I just had to write something (even though I haven't played for a long while)

If I think back to my experience with Layonara and the people I interacted with, then many people experienced a change of goals after a certain amount of time had passed. Whether or not they experienced such a change depended on how much they valued RP, but for the example's sake we shall only speak of the ones that did, otherwise such a change never happened and people simply left.

After reaching a certain level, 14 in V1 or epic in V2, people began to ignore levels. They faced a situation where benefits from another "point" were a lot less than the effort it needed. Instead it became more prestigious to try and influence the various events of the world, through active participation on quests, creation of guilds or recruitment of followers. That way a character stood out from the majority and not due to having killed more monster or sat through more quests, but by having done something that none came close to.

It was this urge that made Layonara what it is - a rich and different world.

But one cannot break the logical development, due to the level based system of NWN there will always be a development of goals, certain phases that a character and the player go through.

Levels and experience -> to gain certain freedom in the world, to know that you aren't the weakest and won't be killed while gathering corn.

Crafting and social networs -> in order to make a living for the character and make him known in the world

"Soft goals" or influencing the world -> to lift a character above others in the world.

Such an evolution cannot be changed due to the nature of NWN and it is actually quite realistic, in some ways it resembles how a person goes through life.

What is the point of this blabbering?

If you wish to further enrich the world then offer more possibilities for the character to influence the said world. Of course in Layonara there are posibilities to do so, but they are limited, framed. Here is what I mean by that.

When we enter the world, the major roads are already created, there is a villian, a King, a high cleric, a god and so on. Players can only sway the development by choosing one of the predefined roads (e.g. either help the High priest or King), but they can never "create a new road", as such their role is to carry out orders, they do not create history, but follow a script.

Now a totally different situation of possibilites would arise if players would be allowed to create "new paths". Imagine if Blood was a PC, King of Dregar was a PC, High Cleric of Rofirein, again, a PC. They in turn would depend on other players, creating a rich network of roleplaying situations, people would actually be in charge.

This of course has the consequenses of going terribly wrong and ruining the world. But this is where the DM team comes in, their role should change from creating stories to creating an system of balances, a self-regulating environement.

This probably sounded confusing, I always have trouble clearly expressing myself, so I will bring an example. Imagine a planned economy and a free market economy, in the former the government controls everything, in the latter the government creates a system where people can act freely and acts as its guarantee. In Layonara the government is the DM team and it currently functions like in a planned economy.

I believe if such a change was made Layonara would become much more lively and vibrant, but one must remember that creating a self regulating system is extremely hard.

Hopefully I managed to get my idea across and not loose people in a lenghty confusing post.

Thank you