Events / Event Coordinator?

[tux9th]

Hi there.
A few days ago I checked the Wiki and found out that there is a thing called „Event Coordinator“ I didn't know what that was so I asked people in IRC about it. Frost told me that it was once planned to be sorta like a GM who only does events to entertain people. But because of internal discussion weather it was good or not the job kind of died.
So here I am reviving that idea.
We talked about it in IRC and there are a few questions I want to ask you (the community) and there are a few things I want to tell you I'd like to chance and realise.

As far as I recall most events have been spontaneous. A few of them were announced in the Forum. So manly events take place completely unregular, when a GM has time for it or some Player organizes one on his own. Frost also said most of the fun events took place when a bunch of GMs were online and then they had an idea and made it an event.
I would like to change that. I would like to have events sheduled. So that everybody knows when an Event is going to take place and can attend it. Because in my opinion it's frustrating when you come online and see 60 Player stitting in Hurnscald talking about how awesome the event which just ended was.
I had in mind that about one event should take place a week. If it's only one event a week, it could be a series of 4 events rotating every week, so that every event will be repeated once a month. I think they wouldn't get old if they're rotated this way. Of course the schedule can change over time. That's just an idea. So mainly one event per week.
That doesn't sound to hard, you could say. Well making an event isn't easy but it's doable. I even have lots of ideas which I could realize (check below). Some of them will come into play sooner than you think.
I don't know if anyone here attended my little trivia event I hosted last Thursday but what was hard about that event, wasn't getting the questions ready, it wasn't getting someone to announce it, what was hard for me was to decide what prices to give, because I'm poor . I gave away some crap but I think people enjoyed it nevertheless. But if I were to host an event every week how would I pay for it?
So here comes the question I want you to think about. What if the prices weren't farmed or donated by someone but created by an admin / GM. Would that be acceptable for you. I heard that there was a discussion about it, which ended in not wanting to create items for events. I would like to introduce that to the game!
How do you feel about that?
The next question at hand is, would you like to reintroduce items that are currently „No longer obtainable“ as event rewards?
I think that would be a great idea. Making one of these items which are no longer obtainable a prize for some events would be great. They are rare as it is and if there are one or two more a month, that wouldn't change much I guess. But it would make those gone items obtainable for new players who weren't playing at the time. Next thing is, we don't have to many people who GFX new things which are actually implemented in the game. So no longer using items which were created, designed … is a waste. I wouldn't suggest that every reward for every event is a rare unobtainable item. Maybe once a month or so we could reward someone with some rare stuff to bring some spice into it. I just counted how many unobtainable Hats there are. It's 27!! We could go for 2 years without giving one away twice.

We could of course create new items which are only obtainable through events!

Conclusion:

• I would like to make regularly scheduled events
• create Items for events and give them away as a price
• reintruduce items which are no longer obtainable as event prices

I think I would have the time to organise and plan one event per week. What I cannot do is get a nice reward for the winner of each event every week. I simply don't have the time to ask farm so long as to make the rewards intersting.
And I would really like to bring events to Tulimshar. The city is DYING and nobody does anything about it. Noobs spawn, run into a enormously large city and nobody is there!

All of this is a suggestion. I'm really looking forward to your input!!

• Events I would like to do:
• Dropparties
  in PvP Zones
• Spawnparties
  in PvP Zones
  everywhere else
• Races
• Trivia
• PvP-Events
  This are just small headlines for the events.

[mistergrey]

I would like to ask for input from the other GMs, and from Administrators if possible, on whether an Event Coordinator could be used. If so, I believe that merits a discussion into whether they would have all they need with the available commands, and how to remedy the situation if the available commands will not suffice. I do believe that the item spawn command should not be allowed to most, but at the same time it is a bit ridiculous to expect an event coordinator to do well when they can only do events without prizes, or with the few they have time to gather themselves.

So, is Event Coordinator still considered a valid role, that we want somebody to fill? If yes, what is that person expected to do? Is it a plausible option to have someone with the correct access spawn prizes for certain events, to aid this person, if someone were to become an Event Coordinator?

[Chicka-Maria]

Though I do not agree with unobtainable items being released and used for events regularly as suggested, I do like the idea of there being events and the idea of certain items being made just for events only. I think it would be much better if there were items as such Events are fun but we don't want to over use events as well or it might get boring. Once a week seems cool maybe rotating days so everybody can try and get a chance to participate.

Regards,

[Crush]

Why do you all focus so much on items? I think a great roleplaying experience is more important than just handing out swag for free. Sure, a price item is a great motivator and a nice memorable of an event, but it shouldn't be the only thing events are about.

Now regarding the role of the event coordinator. The spontaneous events we have at the moment are not a good thing, in my opinion. Everyone should have the opportunity to partake in events, not just the people who idle in town when the GMs are bored. Planning and scheduling events in advance would allow casual players to participate too. The planning should be the most important part of the event coordinators role.

A report with screenshots after the event would also be nice as an advertisement for future events.

[baseballboy]

In the few MMOs that I've played I've never really seen many events as you guys speak of, but there are things like I've brought up before like, double EXP weekend or double drop rate(s) for X amount of days. Who said we have to hand out items during events. From a player perspective I would take XP over an item ANY day.

-BBB

[tux9th]

Okay I think I got an idea of what you feel about creating items for events purposes.

@ Crush and BBB
Of course I have plans for events without a the price beeing an rare or any item. I'd also like to do events like "Let's all meet at 8 at the GY and have fun for 1 or 2 hours." Or PVP events, to make PVP more appealing. Everything should be announced and days and times should be rotated so that everybody gets a chance to take part.
In general my idea is to bring together lots of people. A big motivator are rewards though. Up until now all the items which were given away in events were donations. My questions goes simply to: Would you like to change that or keep it the way it is?! (Because you can't stop me from giving away my own stuff as rewards lol^^)

@BBB
Double XP Weekends would be cool. It just doesn't lie within my power to do that. We could discuss that too. Just what I didn't understand: Do you favour my idea or are you against it. I think you weren't clear about that or I just didn't get it.

@Yubababa
As you know I'm pretty new so I don't know how many rare unobtainable items there are. If you say it would change gameplay and prices alot to bring back one item a month I believe you. It was just something I wanted you to consider. I think there are a lot of different items which could be used as prices and are valued but still obtainable. (We discussed that in IRC)

Lastly which I didn't comment on in the first post. I definitly don't want the individual events to stop. I just think that gamemasters who organize spawnparties etc. should announce them. They're part of the management and I think the managemet should at least try to treat everybody the same.

so far
tuX

[baseballboy]

I definitely favor the idea, just should be /all/ about the items.

[Chicka-Maria]

From a player perspective I would take XP over an item ANY day.

-BBB

+1 double xp weekend would be awsome lol

[tux9th]

@ Cody
Tell me if I got it wrong: You want nothing to change except you want more players to host events andyou want to motivate people to make new quests.

What is the "Electricity Boss Cave"? I have never heard of this and I couldn't find it in the forums as well.

I don't know but nobody I talked to seems to remember any "Event Coordinator" I'd like to know what the last one did. (not what s/he did wrong) Could you tell me/us about it?

I also know that it can be hard making good events, and there will always people who will hate it and some will ike it.
But I think it's worth a shot and if it doesn't work we can stop it. But if we never try how would we know if people would have liked it or not?
The issue regarding items as rewards and if the items are created is a subquestion I want to discuss. If you do not like that idea it is okay!
I'm stupid please don't write mysteries, which I don't understand !

[tux9th]

Yes, of course. I had much fun during events. One thing I don't like is giving a player a GM level for making events. Maybe there could be a new account created that gets @50? That account could then be used by everyone who schedules an event.

I think an account which could be used by everyone who creates an event would be even make more abuse. And then nobody could tell who is hosting the event. I thought about that too but I didn't like it at all.
If you go through the hassle of organizing an event you should at least get the credit for making it.
I don't like it giving a player Gm level 50 as well. I just want to know if this is a position worth looking for someone to fill it. There are GMs, should there be Event Coordinators as well? If we answer this question with yes we should make something similar to the GM - application. But that is somethin to decide later.

best regards
tuX

[Crush]

If we answer this question with yes we should make something similar to the GM - application.

Using the current GM nomination process for a position where you have a perfect excuse to hand out rewards to the people who voted for you seems like a really bad idea to me.

I think the best circle to recruit event masters from would be the developers and contributors.

[o11c]

I think a safer approach would be to implement events via NPC.

It wouldn't hurt if current events were better scheduled (prsm has done this well on a few occasions recently, but there's still the issue that you can't have everybody be online at a certain time so some large scaled organization would be beneficial).

[Chicka-Maria]

You can also plan events on the forums ahead of time so people can prepare and give you comments. http://forums.themanaworld.org/viewtopi ... 12&t=15935

[mistergrey]

I do understand that not all events should focus on item prizes, but at the same time, they do provide a big motivator, and encourage competitive spirit.

Besides events for prizes, there could be spawn events, pvp events. Guilds can arrange to compete against each other, as well as parties, in various events, either for reputation, prizes, or plain fun. Players could arrange to do different things, such as use the tic tac toe area in Tulimshar, or try to organize a group to play some other board game.

Truthfully, there are endless amounts of potential ideas, but many of them involve someone competing/winning, and when this doesn't involve a prize or some other benefit/reward, you often have a bunch of players complaining.

In the long term, if an event coordinator was named, and they were very organized about it... players who win a minor event could be given points of some kind (recorded by the event coordinator, and updated on the forums, of course), usable to redeem event specific items later, or to have a chance to participate in a more involved event (such as having the option to use points to purchase event items, or to participate in an event with a greater reward).

If this still sounds too "item oriented", feel free to post suggestions for events that do not require a winner or competition of any sort. I still think that while events should not always focus on prizes, it would not hurt if an admin were allowed and willing to create a prize on rare occasions for very large events organized ahead of time.

[Chicka-Maria]

(such as having the option to use points to purchase event items, or to participate in an event with a greater reward).

I acctually really love this idea, using a certain amount of points to buy event items would be awsome. Would be like earning tickets in an arcade to get a prize