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Forums > Home› PvE Discussion

Suggestion: address evil deities issue in SCA to make it more role-playing friendly

ianthewizard2012ianthewizard2012 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 2,142 Arc User
edited February 2014 in PvE Discussion
First of all, I want to say that I like this mini adventure game, especially its story-telling/narration text. The text are so interesting to read and makes me feel like I'm really in the encounters myself. The writer surely is good at writing.

And while it is a mini adventure game, there are still some role-playing fun for players to enjoy. For example, there is an encounter called Duel of Honor, in which two men are ready to duel and one of them seriously says "Do not interfere" to me. I then think, okay, since this encounter is related to honor and the two men don't seem to do anything evil, I will respect their decisions and won't interfere. Also, there is a treasure encounter whose description text says someone seemed to left a trail of gold coins for marking the path back home. I then think that person won't find the way home if I pick up these coins so I should not do that.

Besides, players being able to extend the lives of their celestial coins, get specific rewards of major event such as winter festival, companion exp ... etc, which all make this browser game well-connected with the actual game. That's nice.

Speaking of extending the lives of celestial coins from outside of the actual game, it's a good idea to implement it as part of this mini adventure game. However, imho the dungeon (The Temple of Reflection) for doing that can be more role-playing friendly. Currently the main problem is that in the dungeon there are two shrines of evil deities - Shar and Lolth, and players have to kneel at all four shrines, including the two said evil ones', in order to complete this dungeon. Asking players to kneel at shrines of evil deities automatically block role-players from completing this dungeon and unable to extend the lives of their celestial coins through this way.

Another role-playing issue in this mini adventure game is that there are dices of above-mentioned two evil deities. For role players like me who don't worship evil deities in the actual game, it's really unpleasant to see evil deities add their stuff on my companions and make them unusable in this mini adventure game. I can't use my rank 30 Ioun Stone of Allure because evil Shar added her dices to it. My Fire Archon is currently rank 25, and evil Lolth will add her dice to it if I further rank it up.

With many good and unaligned deities players are worshiping in the actual game, I don't understand why most of them were omitted and two evil ones made their ways into in this mini game.

So to these issues caused by two evil deities, I really hope that we can have a solution so that every player can fully enjoy this mini adventure game.
Post edited by ianthewizard2012 on

Comments

  • imsmithyimsmithy Member Posts: 1,378 Arc User
    edited December 2013
    But your in game character isn't involved with SCA ,its just a bunch of your companions who wander off to have adventures , can't you RP that they are naughty behind their masters back and disobey him?
  • ianthewizard2012ianthewizard2012 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 2,142 Arc User
    edited December 2013
    imsmithy wrote: »
    But your in game character isn't involved with SCA ,its just a bunch of your companions who wander off to have adventures , can't you RP that they are naughty behind their masters back and disobey him?
    I role play that my companions are all good-aligned.
  • imsmithyimsmithy Member Posts: 1,378 Arc User
    edited December 2013
    Oh I dunno then , good luck with your request though.
  • charononuscharononus Member Posts: 5,715 Arc User
    edited December 2013
    Rename things in your head and just enjoy the game. You are making problems up to make yourself unhappy.
  • ianthewizard2012ianthewizard2012 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 2,142 Arc User
    edited December 2013
    charononus wrote: »
    Rename things in your head and just enjoy the game. You are making problems up to make yourself unhappy.
    Thanks. Many forum members told me that. But I still can't do that. Imho ignoring what DM defines is not role playing.
  • charononuscharononus Member Posts: 5,715 Arc User
    edited December 2013
    ianthewizard2012 wrote: »
    Thanks. Many forum members told me that. But I still can't do that. Imho ignoring what DM defines and pretending they are something else is not role playing.
    The problem is that this isn't pnp with a living dm that will work with you and create a story. You will never ever get that out of any video game. I'm more sympathetic than I sound as I kind of get what you are after but trying to go for it in any mmo will leave you in a chronic state of unhappiness if you can't learn to just ignore things like this.
  • ianthewizard2012ianthewizard2012 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 2,142 Arc User
    edited December 2013
    charononus wrote: »
    The problem is that this isn't pnp with a living dm that will work with you and create a story. You will never ever get that out of any video game. I'm more sympathetic than I sound as I kind of get what you are after but trying to go for it in any mmo will leave you in a chronic state of unhappiness if you can't learn to just ignore things like this.
    Thank you for your understanding. :)
  • kallethenkallethen Member Posts: 133 Arc User
    edited February 2014
    I agree with the outlook the OP is coming from here. I'm a roleplayer too. I just look at SCA as more of an OOC thing, especially since you can't do SCA with others.
    100% of the world is crazy, 95% are in denial.

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  • tanglethorntanglethorn Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited February 2014
    This is the problem with DnD RPGing. The old mindset pidgeon holes people into thinking Good characters can only do good things and evil characters can only do evil.

    The fact of the matter is that a lot of societies still paid homage to dark gods (a small prayer, offering or sign of respect) in order to avoid the wrath of whatever god that was encountered.

    If you really want to role play a black and white personality (boring and uncomplicated IMHO!), you are severely hampering yourself and it really brings into existence a lot of short sighted viewpoints.

    If you saw a shrine of Lolth or whatever evil diety would you risk the chance of invoking said god's wrath or a potential curse by attracting unwanted attention? I would probably do a quick kneel or make a small offering and quickly walk away. Desecrating the altar of a dark god is a quick way of damning yourself or those around you.

    I might suggest players read some Greek mythology and you'll find that this sort of thing happened all the time and it didnt make any evil for doing it. God, I hate the DnD alignment system. Is that garbage system still around in 4th edition?
  • ianthewizard2012ianthewizard2012 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 2,142 Arc User
    edited February 2014
    tanglethorn wrote: »
    If you saw a shrine of Lolth or whatever evil diety would you risk the chance of invoking said god's wrath or a potential curse by attracting unwanted attention? I would probably do a quick kneel or make a small offering and quickly walk away. Desecrating the altar of a dark god is a quick way of damning yourself or those around you.
    While non-good companions have no problems keeling to evils, good-aligned companions don't do that in any case.

    Those evil shrines and forced-to-have, cannot-be-refused evil dices really is a flawed design in a RPG game. Sorry if that sounds harsh.
  • melodywhrmelodywhr Member Posts: 4,220 Arc User
    edited February 2014
    the problem with bringing alignment into a game that doesn't actually include it anywhere means that you are introducing this element into it and by doing so, you yourself are creating the limitations. it makes more sense that since this is a limitation you are introducing, you should be making whatever imaginary concessions you need to to correct the problems. while alignment is a traditional d&d trait, it isn't a part of any mechanics in neverwinter and therefore asking to change the game to fit limitations that you are creating...

    good luck with that. :)
  • cwforumpostercwforumposter Banned Users Posts: 35 Arc User
    edited February 2014
    My toon is chaotic evil. Can you guys make some changes to the game that allows me to stab the auction house dude to death and steal all of the stuff? I don't like that I have to talk to him like he is a person. Also if I could beat all of the small children in the town, that would be great :) thanks
  • twstdechotwstdecho Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Knight of the Feywild Users Posts: 630 Bounty Hunter
    edited February 2014
    Simple solution. Keep to your role playing fun, and refrain from that adventure entirely, as it goes against your characters alignment. It's not a flaw in the game, it's a flaw in your role playing for your unwillingness to accept that the particular task is off limits to you based on your self imposed limitations.

    Either find a roleplaying way around the situation, or refuse to partake based on your current stance. No problem here.
  • mrgiggles651mrgiggles651 Member Posts: 790 Arc User
    edited February 2014
    Actually it is a flaw in the game. Cryptic has said all players are "good", so "I want to stab the auctioneer" is out because we're not evil. Praying to the evil enemy god is indeed evil.

    "But you could just avoid praying" Well these temples are presumably publicly available somewhrre in Neverwinter, for them to be prayed at, why allow a temple to the enemy's deity? Cryptic was all about "we are respecting the lore, we love dnd and play it all the time" in their statements prior to launch.

    It would be much simpler for them to change the text to some reasonable deity.
    I wasted five million AD promoting the Foundry.
  • cwforumpostercwforumposter Banned Users Posts: 35 Arc User
    edited February 2014
    I wasn't making a serious argument xD I just think you RPers are hilarious.

    Play a single player DND game is a good solution?
  • ianthewizard2012ianthewizard2012 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 2,142 Arc User
    edited February 2014
    Yeah, I can't find the source now, but in an article I read a staff of WotC said D&D game is actually a group of heroes go to defeat evils so role-playing evil alignments in fact does not correspond to D&D's spirit.

    In this game, all players are role-playing heroes, too. We know that from quests' objectives and from NPCs who call us heroes in dialogues. Why do heroes who defeat evils order their mercenaries to keel to evil deities???
  • esteenaesteena Member, Neverwinter Beta Users, Neverwinter Guardian Users Posts: 1
    edited February 2014
    Consider kneeling to Evil deities as a spying mission. Your good deities has trusted you with a heroic task to spy on the evil deities to know their plans, resources and evil schemes inorder to defeat them swiftly. In order to gain the evil deities trust, you have to kneel before them and act as if you are one of their loyal servants.
  • ianthewizard2012ianthewizard2012 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 2,142 Arc User
    edited February 2014
    esteena wrote: »
    Consider kneeling to Evil deities as a spying mission. Your good deities has trusted you with a heroic task to spy on the evil deities to know their plans, resources and evil schemes inorder to defeat them swiftly. In order to gain the evil deities trust, you have to kneel before them and act as if you are one of their loyal servants.
    That's deception.
  • kaiuscormerekaiuscormere Member, Neverwinter Beta Users Posts: 1
    edited February 2014
    If anything this game (and D&D in general) would benefit from more ambiguity and less reliance on black and white alignments.
  • charononuscharononus Member Posts: 5,715 Arc User
    edited February 2014
    kaiuscormere wrote: »
    If anything this game (and D&D in general) would benefit from more ambiguity and less reliance on black and white alignments.
    Agreed very much to this. Looking back thru history I think very few of the truly evil people in the world would have thought themselves evil as well. They would have thought they were working for the greater good.
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