Potential Overcrowding for Finale Quests

[SquareKnot]

I, like most of you, am looking forward to the big finale plot quests this weekend. Which is exactly the problem. Right now, there are three quests each with a generous maximum party size of 18. That's a total of 54 happy questers. Unfortunately, there are 121 people signed up right now, meaning 67 unhappy non-questers. Even if we assume that only 80% of those signed up do in fact show up, that still leaves 43 people getting turned away from the biggest quest of their lives.

I remember back to the quest to free Roldem. A lot of players showed up for that, many making real-life sacrifices to be there. Obviously, not everyone got to go, and there was some confusion over the fairness of how people were selected.

I know there is only so much hardware and bandwidth and only so many GM's and so forth. I don't see how everyone can participate. I don't have any wonderful proposal that will fix this. But I think we all know that if we, as a community, don't get out in front of this situation, people are going to be hurt. At the very least, we need to have a fair, understood, clearly stated policy for character selection, so no one is caught off guard.

[DMOE]

I second this...If it's possible to inform people in advance how the places will be filled on each quest it should reduce upset.

[Pen N Popper]

One thing that might cause issues is XP gained by those that go and those that stay. To be fair, perhaps the server could be set to zero XP mode. Is there such a thing? No quest XP at the end either. The cost of going on the quest is the chance that you might lose a soul strand.
  Another idea would be to post the logs for the three quests every 30min or so on the forums. That way it is almost as good as being there and, in fact, we can all pretend we were!
  Since this event is what we were all called for by the dragon, it is natural to assume that we would all heed the call and head to war. I think it perfectly in-character, then, that we'd know the events ICly.
  What do you think?

[Leanthar]

Right. Please see this poll link and my last few responses (page 2)... same thing questioned.

http://www.layonaraonline.com/forums/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=27179&start=41&posts=43

I am all for good solutions..but really guys/gals it is up to you as a community. We can only do so much. We already have 3 quests with 4 gm's running things. Don't know how else to help out there. But as that thread stated we are open for suggestions.

[Schmack]

Not sure if I should post on the other thread or not, but couldn't you have the three quests run on three separate servers? Of course, you'd then need to have them running the same module, and GM's might have a hard time communicating, but you could always use an IM. This would probably reduce lag though, and might allow more people to join in the quests. Just my two cents

[Leanthar]

@schmack. That is what we are doing. 3 quests on 3 different servers. on top of that I have a plan to split the east up if needed (but I hope it isn't needed).

[SquareKnot]

There's no real way everyone can participate. I think we can concede that point. Here's what I'm worried about:  What if each quest uses a different way to select who gets to go?  

• For example, on the low level quest, the lower level limit gets raised until there are only 18 people left.
• On the mid-level, people roll percentile dice, highest get to go.
• On the high level quest, too many people show up, and ta da, another server is brought on-line to serve the high level characters.  I know why this might be done, and it makes sense. And I also know how this might be perceived. Especially by an angry mob of emotional, irrational people.  Then there's this: People try to make it into the high level quest and don't make the cut. So they immediately log out, and log back in with a mid-level character, who tries to get into the mid-level quest. Repeat if necessary with an even lower level character.  I think the best we can do is this:  
• Each player gets one shot at a quest, regardless of the number of characters said player might have.
• Each player gets one roll of d%, highest get to go on the quest. Must be present to win. No sign ups, no RP, no nothing. Straight up d%.
• If there is going to be a 4th quest group, and there is any way to know this in advance (ie it's not decided by the character choices after the quest starts) and this extra server raises the number of people allowed on a quest, let's state this clearly in advance.  It won't help more people get on the quests, but at least it will help people get the feeling they all got a fair shot.  Thoughts? Official Statements?

[Stephen_Zuckerman]

I, for one, never feel like I've gotten a fair shot when it comes down to rolling the dice. Why? Two reasons. One, I have a huge tendancy to roll very low. Two, if I pour a boatload of RP into getting into some quest, by Lucinda I'm not gonna be happy being kept from it because of my bad luck.

I'm afraid I'm going to be one of those stubborn people who wants to get into the quest, regardless of player limits. There are probably some people out there who're better sports than I am, but... There's likely to be just as many who are as stubborn as I. After all, we've played the game up to this point, put our hearts and souls into our characters...

I think that anyone who wants to go, but can't, is going to feel very, very disappointed. I know that, if it happens to me, I will be, but... *He shrugs slightly.* At the same time, I understand the need for pruning, and when it comes down to it, if I lose on the rolls, I'll step out.

But can we at least RP that we took part in the off-screen defenses? There's no reason for Pyyran to NOT be there... He's already in Pranzis. If I lose on the rolls, what reason would Pyyran have to go elsewhere, and leave the capitol of Layonara without his meager help?

[Schmack]

Fairest way of going about it would probably be, as SquareKnot said above, simply rolling a die (d100?), and the players with the highest rolls would get to go. Although I think that should be the case for all 3 quests, rather than just for the mid-leveled one, and if an extra is needed, it should be for the quest that has the most people.
 
 I don't really think there is a fair way to sort it out, especially for those that have done a lot of RP on it (as Stephen said), but I think the above would probably be the best way of sorting it out. I agree with what Stephen said, characters should be able to RP themself as having participated in it, even if they weren't able to make it due to player limits, timing, or RL issues etc.
 
 Alternatively, you might be able to have each quest run over several areas, and with several parties (eg. fighting on several fronts), allowing more people to join. This might not be all that likely though, as it would put even more stress on the GM's, especially with there only being 4 GM's that'll be running it, although if any other GM's were able to get online, it might be a more feasible option.

[Leanthar]

"...Alternatively, you might be able to have each quest run over several areas, and with several parties (eg. fighting on several fronts), allowing more people to join....."

Agreed. I am sure that is what I will likely do. But it makes the GM'ing job extremlly difficult because you can not watch everthing and you will miss rolls or requests and such. And then players must understand that it happens. No guarantees on what the other gm's do but I do want to state that players need to understand we are under an NwN limitation and are already spreading this out on three servers with three seperate quests--not much more we can do to help with this whole thing.

[ZeroVega]

Make me with I was still a GM to help you out on this Leanthar. I never was terribly good at running them on my own but I could have at least kept tabs on a party for you. *sighs*

Anyway, I have a feeling that the lower level quest will have a serious cutoff for higher level characters and they'll try to get as many low to lower-mid level characters in as possible. Again, I'm sure the GMs want to keep EVERYONE involved, meaning all different classes and levels but it's also the "big one". This is the end, this is the deciding factor of win or lose and if it came down to it (and I've done this before) I'd concede my position to give a more powerful character it (or someone to purposely cleared their schedule to be there).

That being said, I do like the quest log idea, however I'm pretty sure that would take the work of another GM and since it's three quests and four GMs and possibly 4+ parties to keep track of, I doubt they can be spared. Good Luck L!

[Leanthar]

http://www.layonaraonline.com/forums/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=27229&posts=1#M171806