The Kingdom of Aythirmok

“One stands before us in Durance. Speak thy name and testament.”

The question you hear the most is how we can stand the cold. It’s true, you can freeze to death if you aren’t careful. Only the foolhardy are out during the peak of winter during a storm, or brave the wilds without ample provision. But it’s almost an old friend, the cold. You get accustomed to the silences in the dead of winter, of places so still that even one doesn’t even need a Gift to hear spirits talking on the wind. Our lodges are built for it, our holds can stand the worst of it, and there are far worse things than waiting out a storm by a hearth. Better than the spring, for certain, as we’re reminded all too often. Because as bad as the cold can be, we’re always warmed by one simple fact:

The armies of the dead freeze in the cold.

“Salt and steel guard us well, ere the dead march from hell.”

Life in Aythirmok is in tension with those two facts, then. We can’t sow on frozen ground, and that same thaw means the dead may come. It’s a real pickle. Everyone always hopes it won’t be this spring- the scouts are always watching, we ask spirits for predictions of dubious use. But we always need to be prepared as if it will. The southern barriers to the Deadlands have been rebuilt on every incursion, and those without a Gift do their best, but you always know it’s counterproductive to even try melees to stall them, as much as the berserkers wish to be unleashed. Some bites and you just grow their numbers, and you can hardly count on them to stay dead even if you drop them, however much the dead are begging you to help end their torment. But what choice do we have, really? It isn’t as if only we would starve if we give up the thawed grazelands, they’d be eating each other in the cities of Salvation or Tenebrum without our shipments before too long.

That’s also the answer to ‘why would anyone live in a land that is attacked by armies of the dead every few years’, too. Hardly any choice. Best farmlands in all of the continent after a thaw, a number of the richest mines, and that’s more than enough for some. For most though, it’s home, and someone has got to do it, and some day we’ll end the Deadlands for good and all.

Some day.

“Winter is the kind season.”

We’ve held our own for the better part of a thousand years. Some Harvests are far worse than others, mind. We face down the greatest Affliction in all the world, and the spirits have long been in our allies in this. Maybe not as helpful or easy to understand as you might hope, but still, we’ll take what we can get. Now don’t get me wrong, it would be nice if we knew why we had to have a geas, or if they even made a little bit of sense. What does never refusing a drink if offered, or you can never eat with a stone fork, or any of these have to do with anything?

Spirits, as a rule, are very odd. But some help is better than none.

@ten said:

@apos

what’s the polytheistic sitch like?

Much broader. So Arx 1 had the Faith of the Pantheon as having clear allegorical nods towards religion in medieval Europe, and while I was happy with a lot of the stories based on that, I found there was some parts of world building that were counterintuitive and very restrictive, and that made me lean another way.

It’s a very wide polytheistic pantheon, with relatively few extremely strong institutional faiths (notable exception inside Luxen), and the gods and goddesses being worshipped individually. Much closer to hellenistic polytheism with a significant number of major gods, and then a much larger number of minor gods and deity gods. (ie Ares vs say, Hypnos. Sorry sleepy bro). Player characters can have a chosen faith as a declared outward worship on their sheets, and some institutions (like noble houses in Umbros), have chosen patron deities. The main difference is it would be more like Arx 1 discipleships of being focused on a single deity than a broader unified religion. I found most PCs generally wanted to RP that even when it wasn’t the case, and it’s easier conceptually for people to latch onto.

Did the great famine in the 7th age lead to the toppling of the monarchy or are we still lords and ladies-ing it up?

Depends on the region. Arx doesn’t have nobility any longer, and hasn’t for quite a long time. Luxen is a republic, and recently overthrew their nobility as a counter-revolution to a coup attempt. One very significant NPC polity is a mercantile oligarchy. Arx 1 was the entire PC population underneath a single crown, which was held by a PC. This is very much not the case here, as the different regions are very much divided and separate states, and no PCs are in control of them. But even for the feudal other states, they each have some quirks that probably aren’t quite how people would think of feudal, like in terms of succession.

Umbros: the imperial title is done by tannistry succession, a weighted election done by the magically powerful voting for the strongest noble. While the lower titles have their own succession, but usually strongest enatic-cognatic child.

Inferna: Enatic succession by strongest gifted among daughters.

Aythirmok: Strongest child, no formal gender preference.

Pre-revolutionary Luxen: Primogeniture.

Ariwn: Succession? What’s that?

@InkGolem said:

Maybe I’m slow right now, but are we starting at some point after the Arx bubble burst and people set up enclaves elsewhere? I’m a bit confused.

So yeah, these civilizations have been going on outside of Arx for a long, long time, meaning some PCs are coming from Arx and emerging into a world that’s not very post apocalyptic at all, and others are starting in societies that have been going for a long time. It is very unclear to all PCs, whether they came from Arx or another starting region, why Arx was under the Shroud if the world was going on seemingly just fine for many generations and why it’s dropped now, and what that means for everyone. Maybe a good time to mention that the popularity of the clues system in Arx 1 caught me by surprise, and I’ve made that more of a focus from the start this time.

so is the implication that these are possibly characters from Arx 1 that survived the finale? or is it pretty firmly not anybody who was ever on screen?

The latter and I hadn’t really thought too much about someone wanting to do the former, but with how separate the stories are, and how every Sleeper has no memories, I don’t think it would be that disruptive, frankly.

@junipersky Have two I’m pretty happy with, point in fact. Both human older guys, one from Arx and one from Inferna.

@Dreampipe said:

@Apos Might’ve been answered before but I’m a bit slow - are there still going to be roster characters or is this all OCs?

There will be rosters, though how they work is a little different. I didn’t really like how there was so much ambiguity over who was overseeing a character’s story and what they need to do to advance, and just a lot of blockers in general, so rosters’ stories are directly connected to GMs, and so it’s designed to try to filter people picking up rosters that have active stories they can be involved with and that have active GMs overseeing it.

@ten said:

aw hell to the fuck yeah.

a contrary question though: are humans still a thing?

So not really spoilers to give a demographic breakdown, along with a bit of mechanics. Each starting area has multiple Beginnings, which also break down along different playable species.

Arx: Human caretakers, as far and away the dominant majority, with a small minority among Sleepers (individuals have been in a magical slumber for the past thousand years and awaken with no memory), as well as Misbegotten (magical births with no obvious parents), that can be other species, including elves and Daeva (think aasimar).

Umbros: Overwhelmingly human, including near all of the nobility. Very tiny minority populations of khati and infernals (tiefling equivalents).

Luxen: Humans are the majority, while khati are an extremely significant minority, particularly concentrated in the capital city of Salvation. The Khati beginning is profoundly different than a human witch hunter beginning.

Inferna: Infernals (in two subspecies, Sireni and Cinderi) are the majority, with a large human minority, and a very tiny khati population.

Aythirmok: Nearly all human, tiny amounts of other species.

Ariwn: Large human commoner population, but the rulers and warrior caste are decidedly not.

Only playable elves will be from Arx with no starting knowledge of their culture, or any connection to any that survived outside the Shroud. Might notice I have not mentioned any half-species, and that gets into a much deeper lore topic deserving of its own pace.

The Grand Principality of Inferna

“One stands before us in Durance. Speak thy name and testament.”

Any description of Inferna is rife with misconceptions, lies, and inaccuracies. You’ll hear Inferna described as an unbearably hot Island realm, its nobility comprised of Abyssal-blooded Infernal pirates who prey upon all those who dare to cross the Strait of Consequences. Tall tales of slaughtering all of their crews, seizing all of their riches, and malevolent agents of chaos slipping into other realms to sow dissent and corrupt the innocent. This is, of course, ridiculous.

The Isles of Inferna really aren’t that warm. Pretty mild, actually, depending on the season. Nice sea-breeze.

As for the rest, we would certainly take issue with the word ‘slaughter’. Most ships can pass unhindered, even! Not so much Luxen, who refuse to surrender lands that are rightfully ours, and will continue until the day Cinderus once again flies its rightful banners. But even then it isn’t as if we kill everyone, and many in our houses are talented individuals who cheerfully joined our ranks rather than staying with the stupid and dull. And while a few houses are noteworthy exceptions, we really as a rule don’t engage in wanton bloodletting. The least interesting crew members just are politely ushered off the side of the ship, and well, if you lack the water-breathing of the Sireni or the wings to fly like the Cinderi, you can scarcely blame us for what your gods refused to grant you. That’s a skill issue on their part, and feel free to take it up with them.

“Please, Envala, let this happen because it would be so fucking funny.”

Anyone traveling from Inferna gets quickly accustomed to being treated with distrust, and for native Infernals it is far worse. Not that most would ever call us anything but ‘imps’. And admittedly, a lot of our houses don’t exactly help matters. The dagger length claws of the Cinderi and certain houses insisting on handshakes has made for memorable incidents but much less than one might assume, with hardly ever any ambassadors losing a hand or two. And it isn’t as if we lack for treaties and agreements with most realms. We even had a perfectly good one with Luxen of all places, lasting right up until their revolution.

But if anyone else starts a conflict, we are most certainly going to end it, after we discover the most hilarious and delightful way to do so.

“Don’t marry the mark.”

Look, it’s nothing personal. There’s relatively few of us. We’ve already lost one kingdom, would rather not lose a second, and we have neighbors all too happy to expand. So we have to think of ourselves first, and every other realm isn’t making it easy to be overburdened with a generosity of spirit.

There comes a point when everyone treating you like a villain makes you decide to own it, after all.

Just treat us fairly, and we won’t have any problems. Trust us.

@MisterBoring said:

@Apos That’s cool. Are there going to be parts of the Arx 2 backstory that will cause devout Arx 1 players to squee?

Probably, though I hadn’t really thought about it too much, and I think if it happens it is more a consequence of my creative process versus other people. A lot of people like to really be focused on the current setting, and then work backwards from explanations, keeping things vague until it would be story significant and needs to be defined. And that’s valid and I think there’s a lot of arguments for doing it that way, and I think it’s really helpful to keep narrative room to maneuver.

My process tends to be the other way, where I tend to start at the furthest back point and then work forwards and think of all the different pivot points in a history and the different decisions on the way, and how this resulted in things being the way they are. It lets me get an easier grip around it, and in some ways that’s why the interest in Arx 1’s lore caught me off guard, because at its heart it was honestly more for me just so I could keep things consistent in my head than for anyone else. So Arx’s reboot is a lot of the same way, where because of how things happened, that leads to other things, which led to other things again, which in turn created these different states and all these dark secrets waiting to be uncovered, and some would point back to different decision points that PCs made or brushed up against.

It let me learn a bit from what I saw as my mistakes in the first iteration of Arx, in how I could keep things clearer- like for example, breaking up the different time periods into ages, so it’s much easier to see what was contemporary of what. Not really a spoiler to say that Arx 1 happened during the 6th age of the world, and the game starts at the beginning of the 10th.

@MisterBoring Yes, but not very directly.

@real_mirage It’s canonically the same game world, if warped by the passage of ages and catastrophic events, though I am trying to write it so it should not require any knowledge of Arx 1.

@hellfrog said:

I thought the premise was that it was a small (ish) population in a sealed city that was just opened up to the post-apoc world. In-city empires? Nations?

Thank you, let me explain a bit. So what I’m doing now is posting lore introductions for different starting areas, from the angle of an unreliable narrator for different areas.

Mechanically, a new player making an OC character would select a region, and from there they can select a different Beginning from the different cultural groups available, and some of these could have very dramatically different starting stories (like playing a member of an oppressed group within a culture).

Arx as a city has been cut off for a thousand years (from their perspective), and now the world is open for them to explore.

The other starting areas are different realms that have risen up since the most recent apocalypse. There is Luxen, Umbros detailed above, and then we have three others: Inferna, Ariwn, and Aythirmok. Past that, there’s several neighboring powers that won’t have CG available initially, but will open up later- Blighton, Jadairal, and the Southern Compact.

One significant mechanical difference from Arx will be a replacement for clues in our Codex system, which largely has all the IC knowledge that a character has. So if someone has specific cultural knowledge to their starting area, they would start with that in their Codex, and something shareable to other characters, and something they could research further as they delve into histories.

The Umbral Empire

“One stands before us in Durance. Speak thy name and testament.”

There are several folktales taught to children that are unique to the Umbral Empire. The first is a type of tale where an individual is offered countless dangerous opportunities, and thinking themselves prudent and wise, decline to run reckless risks. These tales always end with the utter destruction of the individual and all they hold dear, chastising them for their foolish failure to be bold and gain what was necessary to prevent disaster. Similarly, other children’s tales emphasize the importance of never mocking another’s failure if what they tried was daring enough, or how shameful it can be to gain great success without ever running risks.

It comes as little surprise to outsiders that there is no greater cultural insult than to call a peer of Umbros a coward. It does, however, come as a significant surprise that the insult is almost unheard of, because gloryhound risk taking is so deeply ingrained, that if a peer is failing to act on something opportune but dangerous, it is just assumed that they are restraining their natural inclinations to try regardless of consequence and forcing themselves to wait for slightly better odds.

There is a constant tension in Umbros that is never truly reconciled. Deep responsibility to Houses whose continued survival very much depends upon their protectors continuing to draw breath, versus the constant need to run greater and greater risks to gain glory and strength to guarantee the success of those same Houses. To any that would bemoan that, there is a common saying in the Empire that if one finds the crown heavy, another would happily bear it.

“Dare Greatly.”

Modesty, as a notion, is not overly prized as a virtue inside the Empire. If one has a strength in any arena and in any form, it should be flaunted. This combined with an intensely daredevil culture can result in extremely predictable conflicts, and some cultural traditions have arose to slow the constant churn and bloodletting between the best and brightest of Umbros’ rising talent. Duels are more restricted than most would expect. While all take place in magical rituals to restrict the degree of collateral damage, it is an immense loss of face for a challenge to take place except between peers. And ‘peers’ have a more restrictive meaning in the Umbral Empire than in the peerages of the other realms: it is not noble blood alone. One is considered a peer of the Empire if, and only if, they are a blooded member of a noble family and have magical talent. The latter is considered far more important, and is a strict requirement in voting for the Tannistry. It is customary for the Gifted visiting Umbros to be given courtesy noble titles in address.

The need to cultivate the relationships between Peers and their houses finds an emphasis on social events that those outside of Umbros often find excessive and frankly exhausting. Masquerades serve a particular role in Umbros, where it is understood that many can recognize precisely whom they are interacting with, that those under exile are tolerated with a polite fiction of anonymity, but one can spend a pleasant evening with those whose situations would be materially improved by marrying them, murdering them, or frequently both.

Those perplexing social events serve an important function in that it is given to the Peers to cultivate as many allies as reasonably possible among other Gifted, as it is commonly accepted that one trying to go about their Durance alone is nothing more than a particularly self-indulgent way of committing suicide.

“Return puissant.”

More peers of Umbros are invited to Shroudwatch Academy than any other group, a source of not inconsiderable pride in the Empire, but the reason is not necessarily indicative of overwhelming natural ability. It is understood, of course, that it is far more likely to be Gifted if one’s maternal bloodline has magical talent. But the likelihood of one manifesting magical talent is tied inseparably to moments of great personal risk, intense danger, and all too often trauma.

It is expressly forbidden to have children in arms, strenuously enforced by all the realms of Catenys after some infamous and rarely-spoken incidents. But Umbral noble houses tend to not be overly concerned with the safety of their scions, and increasingly hope that life-threatening situations awakens ability in them. Betrothals between noble houses are generally of a shorter duration, as one would neither guarantee that a noble still be among them in the following years, nor would they imply that they would ever do the self-defeating notion of attempting to keep them out of harm’s way. Longer betrothals, in the rare cases they happen, are taken as a sign of immense confidence in the capabilities of those involved to not die despite whatever reckless behavior they chase.

Safety, it is said, is a price they are unwilling to pay.

Next on starting areas, though I consider this a rough draft.

The Holy Revolutionary Republic of Luxen

“One stands before us in Durance. Speak thy name and testament.”

Every day the threat grows greater. The Afflictions ravage the land with a cost that continues to mount in the villages consumed, the people infected and slaughtered by slaver demons. And we hold the other realms of Catenys accountable not simply for a failure to act to stop this madness, but all too often a complicity in their dabbling with the Abyss, of being so foolish and arrogant as to think they could use the tools of demons against them and somehow escape unscathed.

The People of Luxen know better. We saw it first hand in our good King Alairre, Shepherd keep him. Blinded by his pride and notions of tolerance, he was betrayed by those closest to him, and if not for the Church rising up to cast down the usurpers, all of Luxen would have been lost. It became clear that the sin of pride would lead us all into destruction, and the Abyss and all its works must be confronted with force and burned out root and branch.

And so it was insufficient for us to stop here. We cannot rest until every tyrant that consorts with the Abyss has been overthrown, and their lands liberated. This starts with the Umbral Emperor, and if one ever needed proof of our war’s necessity, they only need look at the great Affliction that rose and stopped our righteous advance upon Umbral lands. Once that is consigned to flame, we shall do what is necessary.

“Extremism in defense of the Revolution is no vice.”

From the highest Blessed to the lowest Sinner, all in Luxen know our cause and how the survival of our Republic, our continent, even all of Nitera rests upon it. Still, knowing the dangers of the sin of pride, self-honesty might force us to confess there has been excesses. To keep the white cities safe, it is true that the Inquisition can be overzealous. Some of the most soft-heartened might wonder, quietly and in secret, if the Sinners are treated too harshly.

Those sorts have seldom wandered into the cumberwards of Salvation, nor have they seen the risks of loosening the leash that has bitten us time and again, from the very start of the founding of Luxen until now. When we liberated these lands from the Chimera Empire we did so to avenge the loss of the Daeva and drive the imps into the sea, but also to guarantee that we could never again fall under the chains of a great tyrant or his minions. King Alairre lost sight of that, and it killed him.

But the Church of the Shepherd has never forgotten.

“No crowns or tyrants here.”

Luxen stands alone, surrounded by enemies. The Blood Kingdoms of Ariwn to the East have never been our friends, nor can we tolerate the murderous predation of vampires or lycans here. The Umbral Empire has vowed to crush the Revolution and would seek to install the betrayer queen upon King Alairre’s throne, and force us all to kneel. The imps in the sea would murder every last one of us, and drag their old lands back into the Abyss.

Within, there are those who would destroy the Revolution. The savages of the Revanche who leave carnage and destruction in their wake, and are forever hunted by the Inquisition. The traitors who once had rank and title and humbly accepted the Church’s grace, but treacherously seek to regain what was lost. The proud and weak of soul who hear the whispers of the Abyss and consort with the darkest forces, and the malcontents proud enough to say their lot is insufficient, and would do anything to change it.

We are unafraid. We shall meet these challenges and overcome them.

Or else all the world is lost.

@MisterBoring Biggest is kind of subjective. Like if we are talking about mechanical clues, out of 4904 researchable clues, 125 were never discovered. At a glance, the majority of those were written in response to some player investigation and they never completed it, so didn’t see what the GMs came up with, like someone looking into the Stonewood, or about their character’s secret, and so on. Some were clues seeded in response to major events, like there were clues around Esera’s disappearance that were never found in season 1, for example.

But for biggest, in terms of ‘how would this change how people perceived the world’, I think it would have been a lot of the backstories of major historical figures and how things developed the way they did. Like I don’t think people found out why Onyx was kind to mortals, or what was behind some of the disputes or wars or things like that. Like I’m not sure how many people would guess what in Arx 1 would lead to the cataclysm hinted at in the above lore, though some probably would.

But turning back to Arx 2, what I think I’m going to do is post a bit about mechanics/design and then follow up with a very unreliable narrator lore post, and probably keep at it for the different major starting areas every so often. So for the game design post of today:

When making systems for Arx’s reboot, I separated systems largely along three different axes.

One is Player to Player, and for that all the systems around relationships, making social scenes feel very meaningful to character progression, the ties that strengthen characters and yield benefits and drive story, that’s one axis.

Second is Player to GM, and this is going to be primarily GM tables, where GMs (whether player or staff), have tables of groups of players to run stories from, manage the stories of the PCs at them, help guide them on adventures, keep track of what they need to do and what can happen. I didn’t like how often people stalled out in Arx 1, and specifically I think the ambiguity of whether a next step existed at all caused way more harm than good. I think we can make enough mystery without not knowing whether a story is over, or if it’s waiting on it to be written or if a PC needs to do things first in order to advance.

Third, and which was basically completely absent from Arx, is player to environment. I am just a huge believer in a living grid. This is what I missed the most in Arx 1. A PC, or group of PCs, being able to go just do things on grid, whether that is breaking into a place and do an automated crime heist, checking out a shard haven in the wilds, doing a spy mission, tinkering with alchemy and seeing if you are eaten by a demon, managing a domain, anything. The goal here is to have strong enough automated tools where people feel they can make meaningful impact upon the game world without needing to go through staff, and it to feel fair both to them and the stories of everyone around them. This has been a not inconsiderable percentage of my time working on the new Arx. Special shout out to the first PC to opt into doing something extremely high risk and dying. Risk, for obvious reasons, will be extremely clear and opt in.

Okay, as I have time I’ll do some lore posts that will give a hint about the theme of the world and what changed, though it is still medieval stasis adventure-fantasy. So starting areas, beginning with Arx itself.

The Necropolis

“One stands before us in Durance. Speak thy name and testament.”

Arx is a city of history and memory. If one wished and spent time in the Great Archive, they could learn of each different age of the world. Of how the Great Necropolis of Arx was built, of how the Compact of Arvum rose with the now city of Arx as its capital, and how the Compact spread through all the world. In these walls, you could learn of the Sixth Age and how this place came to be the greatest city in all the world. We have no shortage of memorials with the names of deeds of the great heroes from those past ages, and there are reminders all around us of how many spent most of their all-too-brief lives here. Near all rest here, in our Necropolis. We built a golden age, an empire with Arx as its crown jewel.

That was before the Penitent’s arrival and the Shroud over Arx.

To this day, we don’t know who the Penitent is. Or was. There were always guesses, and the most popular was that he was the god of Justice descended in mortal form, the Sentinel made manifest and come to Arx to shield the city from what was to come. The Sixth Age ended with the Penitent crafting the Shroud over Arx, a great gray haze of a barrier that prevented all entry. The Penitent was near never seen, but we felt his eyes upon us always, and those inside that threatened the city were struck down by the Penitent’s magic without a word. Not quite without warning, his statues would turn to give notice, but near enough for most. We wouldn’t quite call it a prison, not when the Shroud only blocked entry to Arx, but any could pass through if they chose, never to return. It was, we were told, a safety measure against the end of the world, for the greatest city that ever was, a city of three million people, to ride out the apocalypse. Most at the time thought it would pass quickly.

It has been a thousand years.

“As Arx endures, we remember.”

Years winnowed us. There were the Great Callings, when the greatest among us would be gathered by the Penitent and ride out through the Shroud, never to return. Over the years, more and more stifled under the Shroud’s gray sky and the unceasing watch of a being we know nothing about, and traveled to see what world remained beyond. Age after age passed, underneath the Shroud, and we kept and honored this city despite a malaise that tested us all. Few who were born here did not at least consider leaving, even knowing that we could not be certain anything at all existed beyond the barrier. Of the three million when the Greatest City was sealed, there are under fifty thousand living within Arx today. But at least we were safe.

And then came the Vanishing.

Five years ago, during the Eclipse of Mirrors masquerade under the Blood Moon, a great mist entered the city and with it came the demons. Those with magic to fight, our Gifted, were not great in number in our current age, as how many could stand to remain and languish here when possible adventure called beyond the Shroud? But few as their number were, every last one of our puissant was killed or taken from us on one night, shocking us to our core and breaking that lifetimes long lethargy from us. We could see cracks in the Shroud now, fractures in the gray sky, and not a word from the Penitent as our city was gutted in a surprise attack.

We still know not what directed the attack, who the demonic foes were, or where those captured were taken. Some believe the city could have been massacred, and know not why it wasn’t. Some left the Shroud to seek answers, never to return. And we started to see beasts, corrupted abyssal things prowling the lands around the city. Minor foes we could handle, but more proof they could penetrate the weakened Shroud.

“Still Here.”

And now the Shroud has broken completely. The sound of breaking glass, like a million mirrors all shattering at once during the night. The lands are open to us, and as we are to them. Those with strength to do so gather to go forth. Others panic and pray, hoping that the Penitent will answer, despite that he has never done so during the past thousand years. We were born and raised in a city of ghosts and echoes, a Necropolis that has been the resting place for the greatest men and women of every age. But if one cares enough to read their stories, some believe they know what the gods will ask of us.

Because most of the heroes were born here too.

@Juniper So the first Arx was designed more for a pretty small group in that it was very much a mush with a very few immersive grid based elements. People coming from muds frequently said some version of 'I do not know how to play this game ’ as mush design was still a very top down ‘go out and find RP and get involved in story’. There is a lot about mushes and this kind of play I enjoy, but there’s some fundamental differences in Arx’s reboot, I’ll talk mechanically a bit about that and then start doing lore teasers in follow up posts.

So I am very big on interactive grids and the coming game might feel a good bit more like a mush merged with a RPI or old style moo in how much someone can do without needing staff to make it real. I view automation as kind of in tension with high quality personalized story telling, so I’ve been very pointedly trying to make sure I, and anyone else storytelling on the game, can try to focus on that and have as few barriers to doing that as possible. Structurally it is mostly born of me thinking about the different pain points people have playing a mush and trying to smooth them out, to the point where role players I know on other formats might be able to enjoy it, as I remove a lot of the blockers that we in the hobby grudgingly tolerate.

Mostly this means me designing a game that I hope would be better with my storytelling there, but it isn’t as reliant on me or any one person. I am believer that if things on the game engage people, if there’s mini games on grid they find fun and want to do, it is more likely they will be around and available for RP and creates a reinforcing environment. I expect my testing to take a good bit as it’s just too important I hit the right notes there.

@Kestrel For me it is less about intentional exclusion and more just being fine knowing that a lot of people won’t play a game of X, Y, or Z. A lot of these are just mutually contradictory. For example, I think a collaborative game and an unrestricted pvp game aren’t completely exclusive but the degree of work you would need is just something I’m not willing to do, vs just doubling down on the former. A lot won’t play that and that’s fine.

If I make collaborative story telling the only way characters advance, people not interested in that leave, and that is for the best.

When designing any MU system, it’s absolutely critical that you ask yourself what implementation is far and away the most punishing to anyone with ADHD and makes them feel unwelcome, in order for for you to address a problem that doesn’t really exist and to police someone that you made up in your head.

It’s the MU standard.

I think as a medium we tend to err by not reinforcing enough the expectations around roleplay. It is natural to not want to tell people how they should play their characters, but if the expectation is that people should be fun to RP with and not miserable, and you can kind of tell what RP sucks and what doesn’t, I think we do more harm than good by not explicitly saying so.

I think the most challenging thing you can do in a the MU format is run a game that allows open pvp between players that dislike one another, are encouraged to do so because of theme, and not have it turn into an environment where players despise one another. This is compounded by staffers who do not see a point in trying, and players who enjoy the game exactly because of the environment it produces rather than in spite of it.

Without saying too much, if anyone has stuff on Arx 1 that they would like to keep, like past writing, scenes, images, whatever, please grab them soon. While I don’t intend to lose it, I’m getting closer to having something I want to show and it is entirely possible that all this old stuff could poof in the transition. If anyone needs login info to grab old stuff just let me know.