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Inactivity as of late - Feedbacks!
#46
CUSTOM. LORE. EVENTS. Remember Sin'Sholai? Remember Stromgarde? Remember Retaking Echo Isles? Those were great and let us do our own thing and explore WoW more. People REACT to that stuff. Every character with every personality around reacts to that stuff. Compared to basic lore, they just do their thing, but when someone suddenly declares martial law or something they react. They roleplay out their reactions. Good guys set up rebellions. So many stuff could branch out. Etc. Etc.

Or at least, do stuff that's been overlooked by Blizz. Lots of 'what happens next this this guy?' stuff comes into play. Khadgar, Northrend, Stromgarde, Kul Tiras. Heck There's so much to explore.

Also, story progression. We need a timeline for our own thing that eventually culminates in the defeat of Deathwing, preferrably not by players. Heck, playing in events where Lore characters lead the way might be fun.

Yes, it's pretty boring knowing what actually happens next if we stick to the lore faithfully.

Those are my suggestions at least. Have no idea why people are lackluster nowadays since I just returned myself, but I have noticed a lower degree in RP quality (No offense to some people). I remember I was pretty bad too about 4 years ago, but I tried emulating the big ones, GMs, and event leaders in how they RP and that helped me a lot. Which is why RP quality isn't much of a problem in my book.

I remember suggesting years ago about big GMs or at least player coordinators who would do events per Race; like a racial GM leader to spread out activity. I forgot the reaction of the people to that, plus I dunno if it could apply to CoTH now.

But anyway, hope to stay and help this time with whatever I can help with.
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Riggs Ravenhook - Swarmy Old Goblin Thief and Corporate Nuisance
Gorudo Goldforge - Goldforge Clan Remnant and Ranger
Turic Carsten - Stormwind Regular

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#47
(10-04-2013, 02:22 AM)Diethe Wrote: CUSTOM. LORE. EVENTS. Remember Sin'Sholai? Remember Stromgarde? Remember Retaking Echo Isles? Those were great and let us do our own thing and explore WoW more. People REACT to that stuff. Every character with every personality around reacts to that stuff. Compared to basic lore, they just do their thing, but when someone suddenly declares martial law or something they react. They roleplay out their reactions. Good guys set up rebellions. So many stuff could branch out. Etc. Etc.

Or at least, do stuff that's been overlooked by Blizz. Lots of 'what happens next this this guy?' stuff comes into play. Khadgar, Northrend, Stromgarde, Kul Tiras. Heck There's so much to explore.

Also, story progression. We need a timeline for our own thing that eventually culminates in the defeat of Deathwing, preferrably not by players. Heck, playing in events where Lore characters lead the way might be fun.

Yes, it's pretty boring knowing what actually happens next if we stick to the lore faithfully.

Those are my suggestions at least. Have no idea why people are lackluster nowadays since I just returned myself, but I have noticed a lower degree in RP quality (No offense to some people). I remember I was pretty bad too about 4 years ago, but I tried emulating the big ones, GMs, and event leaders in how they RP and that helped me a lot. Which is why RP quality isn't much of a problem in my book.

I remember suggesting years ago about big GMs or at least player coordinators who would do events per Race; like a racial GM leader to spread out activity. I forgot the reaction of the people to that, plus I dunno if it could apply to CoTH now.

But anyway, hope to stay and help this time with whatever I can help with.

The problem is that too many people here don't like the idea of custom lore. I don't see it, but it's their opinion, they're entitled to it.
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#48
I think continuity is a problem. Despite all the doomsday talk of how changing things will confuse new players and be difficult, etc., I think it's required. There's absolutely no structure where it matters - ICly. The Northshire events and the Twilight Highlands events are happening simultaneously, for instance.

http://www.conquestofthehorde.com/Thread...Storylines

My view on this stuff. Nobody posted in it so I'm assuming it was an awful thread, but it's got a lot of words and I feel bad when I don't have a lot of words.




Move him into the sun—
Gently its touch awoke him once,
At home, whispering of fields half-sown.
Always it woke him, even in France,
Until this morning and this snow.
If anything might rouse him now
The kind old sun will know.

Think how it wakes the seeds,—
Woke, once, the clays of a cold star.
Are limbs, so dear-achieved, are sides,
Full-nerved—still warm—too hard to stir?
Was it for this the clay grew tall?
—O what made fatuous sunbeams toil
To break earth’s sleep at all?
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#49
(10-04-2013, 02:22 AM)Diethe Wrote: Or at least, do stuff that's been overlooked by Blizz. Lots of 'what happens next this this guy?' stuff comes into play. Khadgar, Northrend, Stromgarde, Kul Tiras. Heck There's so much to explore.

Also, story progression. We need a timeline for our own thing that eventually culminates in the defeat of Deathwing, preferrably not by players. Heck, playing in events where Lore characters lead the way might be fun.

For the first paragraph; I think that's a great idea. The second? Fantastic idea.


(10-04-2013, 02:22 AM)Diethe Wrote: Have no idea why people are lackluster nowadays since I just returned myself, but I have noticed a lower degree in RP quality (No offense to some people).

I agree to this sentiment entirely. This is also a big reason I don't log in any where near as often as I do. It's disturbingly disheartening to see COTH fall back onto... nigh retail quality roleplay.

I've had numerous instances in the recent past which repel me from wanting to be on COTH at all where I've pointed out that a character acts so drastically contradictory to their race that it even contradicts the profile they'd had approved, causing me to wonder if people just put in profiles that staff want to see and then RP what they want. The poor grammar and spelling (from native speakers!) I've seen all over doesn't help, and from grunts, nonetheless.

I try to gently push people in the direction of roleplaying their race well, but I'm often met with... disgustingly hostile or disrespectful actions in return because they take criticism FAR too personally. And frankly, so long as they don't say anything blatantly disrespectful, they can still act blatantly disrespectful, and there's nothing one can do about it. I almost don't care for the server anymore due to problems like this. It... really is becoming retail quality.

Something needs to be done about that. Desperately. Standards need to be enforced by staff, and fast, otherwise it looks like the poor quality is just building up; people who absolutely refuse to hear what peers (or lower staff members) have to say in regards to their roleplay need to addressed to fix this problem.

An additional - and very important note - This means the GM team needs to become more involved in the community, since players only desire to hear from them, rather than peers. I don't... desire to point fingers, but "let him who is without sin, cast the first stone" (albeit I'm no saint)...

The poor quality and attitude, I have and MANY others have come to find, generates in a cliche. If nothing is done in regards to enforcement of standards and rules, they're left by GMs to do their own thing with the thought of "If they keep acting that way they'll lose their friends and no one will RP with them until they fix themselves". That's very wrong; it may have been the case in the past, but not now. They've their friends to roleplay with that make up the vast majority of the active server at the moment. The poor quality and attitude will only continue to manifest within itself until some serious actions are taken.

This is the majority of the reason I've lost my passion for COTH.

(Edited to tack on a paragraph I felt was essential. Also had a strange sentence in there. Sorry for the wall of text.)
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#50
A somewhat rushed response, but I do see where you're coming from, @Rini

I understand your concern. Reporting problem players would be appreciated. If we could find a way to enforce quality, that'd be great. Following a report, the player could receive guidance. But frankly, people won't learn if they don't want to learn. It's problematic, because I feel it's difficult to deny people the right to RP simply because they're not . . . Excellent.

I do think many people are often very tired when they log on - even lethargic, maybe - and don't put the same effort into their roleplay or learning process as people did before. They don't have the energy for it. Maybe taking a pause can help people get things sorted out and restore their energy.
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#51
(10-04-2013, 04:16 AM)Rowgen Wrote: I do think many people are often very tired when they log on - even lethargic, maybe - and don't put the same effort into their roleplay or learning process as people did before. They don't have the energy for it. Maybe taking a pause can help people get things sorted out and restore their energy.

Definitely not the case in most cases. Glad to see you get what I mean, however. And I'll be certain to toss logs all over concerning the low quality, in hopes that the GMs will take action. *Nods*
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#52
I know about this one AddOn that's really great for logging (I'm so subtle). Do take logs if you can and send them in to the GM team on Skype, in PMs or post them up in PD. We do try to be online to see for ourselves, but when we can't... Logs are very useful!
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#53
@Rini Krest will never be a true elf! It's inconceivable! But I get what you mean. And sometimes I feel it's true.

Anyway, more on the topic of grammar. Well, language. Swearing language. I've seen this -way- too often. Language in almost every chat. Rude, degrading language (Don't worry loxxy, I used that app there to report it) that have caused me to just log off. I come on wanting rp, see what people say, then just leave. But not before saying something. I don't think just the GMs should enforce the language. People drop subtle hints like "Careful dude, don't say stuff like that" or their blunt and say "Don't say that man, it's rude." But people get ignored. Blown off. Which is the most frustrating part to me. So I've adopted a new stance. If people are going to be rude and swear despite you asking them not to, ignore them. And I mean the /ignore.

I won't stand for it anymore. I've noticed it over the years. My first year here, my first -month- I got wrung out because I swore. Stern talking to. Then a year later I went to Booty Bay and just watched the general chat fill with profanities. It got better over time, but it's going back. I can't say I've drifted away from coth and don't rp as much because of those reasons, but it turns me away from rping characters that at first I wanted to.

Rule number one guys. I'm not saying everyone does it, but that needs to be enforced. Strictly. By -everyone-

Thats what I have to say. Back to 15 hour work days, see you guys soon!
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#54
Gonna be honest in here, and say in some ways the respect thing is a two way street. While some feel that there is a lot of lackluster RP, that's something that's always happened on CoTH.

It feels like that there's a major problem with the way profiles are handled now-a-days. Yes, I know this is a hotbutton issue, yes I know people will disagree with me... but I think we've started to take things to a degree where it's -difficult- and -too time consuming- to get a profile done. A typical profile these days has PAGES worth of changes. Even a year or about two years ago, profiles had a stipulation where if you were the person approving them, you would let some of the grammatical errors slide, and these days it seems like every detail, significant or insignificant is pulled apart and examined to an almost silly degree. I'm not blaming any one single person, or even the forum helpers as a whole, as that's a standard that at some point was set for them, or was told is okay.

Quite frankly, it's off putting. Even if someone is one of the "low quality RPer's", they still deserve to have their characters approved in a timely manner, and to be helped rather than hindered. I suggest that now, if someone has a qualm with a profile, they try to wrap up their issues in one post instead of over the course of five or six, which seems to be the standard these days. Makes stuff go a lot quicker than every other post being "Okay, well now I need you to change this." "Thanks for that, but now you need to change this."

Also, I'm just going to say this... punishing people for low quality RP is a bad thing. It's hard to blame CoTH's decline in population on a group of a few people, when in actuality... crappy RP is something that's everywhere, and doesn't exactly mean it's something punishable. It just exists, and it takes a bigger person to say "I won't participate in it" rather than the on that says "YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG!".

Because honestly? Imagine if someone did that to you with the RP you enjoyed and thought you were doing good with. Would feel really, really crappy.
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#55
I'm still pretty inactive but when I log in the server does look rather empty. I don't know if any of this is going to be helpful feedback or even insightful. Maybe WoW has just gotten boring? Maybe we're a bit too tired of it after the Xth year or something? I just feel like half of it is just the setting hasn't inspired me which is why I moved on to original universes or Guild Wars 2. I think someone mentioned the lack of continuity and I do feel like just having the game environment alone doesn't really mean the world is ALIVE to us and things are going on. I think I would find myself rping again if there was some active thing (I am not sure what thing) that many players were a part of that made us work together and get to know one another. Cataclysm is a world event and yet it's hard to feel like we're part of the world storyline.

Rigley and I did some rp together on GW2 (and I am meaning to do more) and we found even when it's us two just the nature of the world events and the number of players makes it lively. I really don't know if such a thing could be emulated on coth but it's an example of just being able to go out into the hillside and things happen! Lots of things! And it would be neat to have some way of getting out into the world and have spontaneous things without having to arrange a date for an event and such. I do feel like we have to pre-plan any spontaneous rp and it could be what bogs things down.

I also wonder if it's natural for roleplay servers to have a "cycle" with high and low points. And I'm not talking about school versus summer, but more just the feeling that a lot of people may need a break. That was the feeling I got (though right now I also have a job along college so it's been rather busy).
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#56
Quote:It feels like that there's a major problem with the way profiles are handled now-a-days. Yes, I know this is a hotbutton issue, yes I know people will disagree with me... but I think we've started to take things to a degree where it's -difficult- and -too time consuming- to get a profile done. A typical profile these days has PAGES worth of changes. Even a year or about two years ago, profiles had a stipulation where if you were the person approving them, you would let some of the grammatical errors slide, and these days it seems like every detail, significant or insignificant is pulled apart and examined to an almost silly degree. I'm not blaming any one single person, or even the forum helpers as a whole, as that's a standard that at some point was set for them, or was told is okay.

As someone that has been reading profiles since I joined and now actively moderate them, I think I'm in the best position to respond to this. Yes, we are harser on profiles now than we were a long time ago, but the primary reason for how slow things go is that profile quality has dropped hugely. This is partly an effect of the new Cataclysm lore - people don't know the new stuff like they do the old, so it's easy to make mistakes - but it's also gone hand-in-hand with the general decline of RP quality, so I'll leave you with that.
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#57
@Harmonic

No one is suggesting punishing players, but instead tutoring them and showing them the ropes! The mistake made in the past - I believe - is namely that new players tend to stick together with people who joined about the same time as them. This means that a lot of people learn from and only interact with people who . . . Really aren't that much better than them. Many players do improve, but others seem to carry on, blissfully ignorant of what people think of the way they play their characters. The point isn't that these players should be punished, but that people who do have experience roleplaying take responsibility for their fellow community members.

Truth is, I feel there are certain players who could've benefited a lot more from kind words and gentle guidance than the silent contempt and avoidance the majority treat them with. Telling them that they are doing it wrong is not constructive, I agree. Instead, trying to suggest ways they can improve their characters - by adding depth and well-portrayed emotion in them - or their writing - by for instance giving them examples of good writing and encouraging them to learn by mimicking it - can do so much more.

My point is that these players don't need to be punished. They need to be stimulated so they can evolve, grow and improve. We need to take responsibility.



As for the matter of profiles, I'll add this to what Zhaei said:

Sometimes the players are told to rewrite a paragraph because of Lore inaccuracy. When that paragraph is done, we can't leave it as grammatical Swiss cheese.

Though, if the same text is repeatedly corrected, I agree that it should've been done initially.
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#58
(10-04-2013, 08:55 AM)Zhaei Wrote:
Quote:It feels like that there's a major problem with the way profiles are handled now-a-days. Yes, I know this is a hotbutton issue, yes I know people will disagree with me... but I think we've started to take things to a degree where it's -difficult- and -too time consuming- to get a profile done. A typical profile these days has PAGES worth of changes. Even a year or about two years ago, profiles had a stipulation where if you were the person approving them, you would let some of the grammatical errors slide, and these days it seems like every detail, significant or insignificant is pulled apart and examined to an almost silly degree. I'm not blaming any one single person, or even the forum helpers as a whole, as that's a standard that at some point was set for them, or was told is okay.

As someone that has been reading profiles since I joined and now actively moderate them, I think I'm in the best position to respond to this. Yes, we are harser on profiles now than we were a long time ago, but the primary reason for how slow things go is that profile quality has dropped hugely. This is partly an effect of the new Cataclysm lore - people don't know the new stuff like they do the old, so it's easy to make mistakes - but it's also gone hand-in-hand with the general decline of RP quality, so I'll leave you with that.

To back Zhaei up on this point - if there's an issue with how a profile is handled, such as for example, going through multiple posts to cover a profile, this can be taken to the forum helper handling the profile, otherwise we don't view it to be an issue nor an inconvenience to anyone. Grammar is (in the cases of Zhaei and myself) only "picked apart" when the text makes for a very difficult read. An example would be excessive run-on sentences or large clusters of spelling errors. In regards to lore, COTH upholds a standard of quality that other servers do not. This indeed makes profiling a bit more strict, but it should not come as a surprise.

Edit: I'd also like to remind folks that the reason profiles are taking "pages these days" is due to the amount of new users we've had coming in submitting their profiles. They're a bit greener than we are, and some times just need a little extra help! :D
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#59
(10-04-2013, 08:55 AM)Zhaei Wrote:
Quote:It feels like that there's a major problem with the way profiles are handled now-a-days. Yes, I know this is a hotbutton issue, yes I know people will disagree with me... but I think we've started to take things to a degree where it's -difficult- and -too time consuming- to get a profile done. A typical profile these days has PAGES worth of changes. Even a year or about two years ago, profiles had a stipulation where if you were the person approving them, you would let some of the grammatical errors slide, and these days it seems like every detail, significant or insignificant is pulled apart and examined to an almost silly degree. I'm not blaming any one single person, or even the forum helpers as a whole, as that's a standard that at some point was set for them, or was told is okay.

As someone that has been reading profiles since I joined and now actively moderate them, I think I'm in the best position to respond to this. Yes, we are harser on profiles now than we were a long time ago, but the primary reason for how slow things go is that profile quality has dropped hugely. This is partly an effect of the new Cataclysm lore - people don't know the new stuff like they do the old, so it's easy to make mistakes - but it's also gone hand-in-hand with the general decline of RP quality, so I'll leave you with that.

Still, it's not even as bad as when we changed from BC to WotLK---meaning the lore changes, the profiles were horrible to do as there was a handful of us and we had a lot of problems back then while setting up new systems practically over night--- but eventually it evened out, and we got back into the swing of it.

It's been a while since we've switched to Cata now, some of us that -do- have a firm grasp of lore are having to go through pages of changes. Some of them are things that just never would have come up before, a -majority- of it is grammatical. People will say using proper grammar is a rule here, to which I say YES. Yes it is, but we are also not a College. We do this for fun, so it's okay to let some things slide, especially if the profile is overall good. Creating pages and pages of changes for a person is frustrating to them. Beyond frustrating.

And, I was a forum helper for a while, as well as an X-gm that used to handle profiles, and for a while was the only forum GM. I say this a lot, but I'm quoting from my own experience (pretty much all I have to go on, guys. Sorry if it looks like cane shaking but how else can I draw conclusions?) with profiles and handling them. Some of the rules we use today I helped come up with, both spoken and unspoken.
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#60
Mm. It seems to me there's a split here.

Because by what I read, a drop in quality rp is what's causing inactivity, and thus we should be harsher. At the same time we're also being too strict and killing the mood for rp at the same time. I really don't know what conclusion to draw from this.

Personally I'm still just put off by a lot of the arguing and generally unfriendly behaviour I keep running into. And I don't necessarily mean that as stuff aimed at -me-. An environment need not be hostile to you specifically to be hostile. A lot of debates seem to be very 'personal' on here, and that doesn't seem healthy. Or conducive to a friendly environment. Even in this thread it seems like you can't discuss a personal opinionated view and idea as to why the server is lacking appeal without it becoming an issue that could possibly offend another person.

...And I don't like that. It doesn't make for an inviting forum.
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