A Land Far Away

Good news everyone! This one has been brewing a long time, but with danielmn revitalising the process, ALFA has now introduced temporary retirement for player characters, as supported by all the current Administrators (Zelknolf, Hialmar, danielmn, Curmudgeon, Veilan). In a nutshell, characters that have become stale can be put "on ice" in favour of a new one, hoping to encourage people to find fun and game in our project, and removing one perceived obstalce to simply trying something new. There are four simple restrictions governing this:

- the character must at least possess an effective character level of 4
- the retiring character must be clear with the house (as determined by the applicable active server's DM team)
- no more than one character may be in temporary retirement at the same time
- no character may be temporarily retired more than once

Also, as no surprise, all PCs retired before this announcement are considered permanently retired.*

Of course, all usual ALFA rules, such as for instance concerning metagaming, apply.

Thanks to Hialmar's scripting wizardry, the system is somewhat automated: to find the option, simply head to the homepage: http://www.alandfaraway.org/

On the left, you will find a button named "retire character" - click it and everything should be pretty self-explanatory. For questions, the Administration is of course at your disposal.

Please be aware that this is a privilege, and not a right, and will be re-evaluated after six months. For a temporary retirement to be attempted, the approval of the DM team of your server is required - which is as much of a restriction as it is a chance: it lets your DM team know that you are not happy and it perhaps might help you, and them, find a solution to hang on to your active character. Of course, it is admittedly also a safeguard against abuse, such as trying to avoid legitimate IC repercussions or other consequences of that character's action.

Of course, permanent retirement works as it always has, and needs no approval. It is now also done via the website tool.

Allow me to also stress that this policy is not an assault on, or carving out of, pillar number 5 (one PC). It merely aims to faciliate the "letting go" of a character, as there is an opportunity to get the character back should things not work out. It does not allow "saving up" of a high level to try out a slew of new characters, and it does not allow going back and forth between characters. To the best of my knowledge, this policy does not violate pillar number 5 - it merely formalises a practice that we have seen precedence for in the past, and thus opens it to everyone.

Do not hesitate to voice your experiences and thoughts on this as we begin our field test!

Cheers,

*PCs retired before policy date can be considered for un-retirement by request to the administration and HDMs on a case by case basis.

Awesome news

*claps*

Cheers for all the Admins, and for Hialmar. It took sometime, but I think this is a step forward to keep this community going and to have happy players IG. I guess only time will tell how much use this will take.

For now once again, thanks to all.

Keryn

Nice work guys!

Finally, I was hoping against hope this wouldn't be tied down. I love you people for actually getting this done instead of debating it to death.

NwN2 is old and will likely not be getting much playerbase wise again, so some variety will always be good.

Big thanks, guys.

I have one question that is more of an Infra thing, most likely, but Ill ask here anyway:

If I click 'Retire Character Permanently', will it remove the name from the list? Also, will it remove the name from the list in the character selection ingame? Because thatd be hella awesome if it were to do so.

Heero wrote:If I click 'Retire Character Permanently', will it remove the name from the list? Also, will it remove the name from the list in the character selection ingame? Because thatd be hella awesome if it were to do so.

1) Shouldn't
2) Shouldn't
3) No, no that'd be awful if it did right now-- because you can totally get at other peoples' PCs, and the few jerkfaces (yes, I know that most people are good folk, but enough people are jerkfaces that we must account for them) would ragedelete other peoples' PCs (which is how you get them off of the list in game-- rage optional).

If we get an unambiguous list that connects Neverwinter community ID to ALFA community ID, then those things become more possible.

Ok, sounds reasonable.

And I think I was the first dumbass to attach to someone else's GSID. I attached the GSID 1 above mine, that of an old person no longer playing. Had to seek assistance from Hialmar. So let this be a lesson to everyone: dont attach to the wrong GSID else youll have to bug poor Hialmar.

Heero wrote:Ok, sounds reasonable.

And I think I was the first dumbass to attach to someone else's GSID. I attached the GSID 1 above mine, that of an old person no longer playing. Had to seek assistance from Hialmar. So let this be a lesson to everyone: dont attach to the wrong GSID else youll have to bug poor Hialmar.

noob

All this if for book keeping purposes.
It doesn't remove/hide any character from the vault.

If you perm retire a character by error, you won't be able to unretire it but any admin can do that.
You can still play a retired character but of course you might be contacted by the PA or an AR and risk a strike...
So it's better to tell an admin before you play a retired character if it was done by error.

Veilan wrote:- the character must at least possess an effective character level of 7

What? Why?

- the retiring character must be clear with the house (as determined by the applicable active server's DM team)

What "house"?

Can't say I didn't saw this coming...

Although I thought it would happen earlier.

For the record, I was for giving this option to lvl 1... but I was alone.

Edit: oh and the reason is always the same: lack of trust.
Maybe one day ALFA will trust members and ban the bad ducks when they deserve to be...

hollyfant wrote:

Veilan wrote:- the character must at least possess an effective character level of 7

What? Why?

- the retiring character must be clear with the house (as determined by the applicable active server's DM team)

What "house"?

The effective Character level requirement of 3-4 was determined to be a bit low. In order to appease a somewhat large base that had issues with other proposals, the level requirement was initially placed in order to curtail constant shuffling of PC's and constant work by the DM squad in order to keep up with said retirements. The PA boosted the level requirement to 7 to make the process a bit more of an earned right for players and to prevent the ADD of the playerbase from effectively overbloating the process. It should be something to take into heavy consideration and not something done on a whim, and it was deemed the level3-4 requirement was just not enough of a requirement to really be meaningful in that reguard. One can still easily permanently retire a character that is below the set level requirement. Upon examination of the system in the future by the future Admin, this requirement can and should be raised or lowered dependant upon findings and need.

And yes, be it noted that some of the Admin were for much lower level requirements than the PA. However, since this falls into the PA domain, the PA made a judgement call...weather that call was the correct call or not falls on the PA's shoulders and the PA alone. However, I will also note that if the requirement had been set to level 1, there would likely be just as many complaints for the level requirement not being higher, or that the level requirement should have been lower and set to 0.

The House refers to the DM corps of the server upon which a PC retires. The meaning and effort behind this requirement is to prevent the dodging of IC consequences because of IC actions. Example: Pc X Ganks PC Y. PC Y's friends somehow find out, and go hunting for PC X. PC X says "OH NOES, time to temp retire until crapstorm blows over!" DM/HDM wags finger with a grin and sez "Nu-uh..." Hence, Temp retired PC's need to be vetted by DM team to make sure the system is not being abused in such a fashion.

I actually did not want any temporary retirement at all, as I saw it as a weakening of the strong standards that built Alfa. However, I also acknowledge that an older game system (yes Alfa is not the game system, but it's own entity imo) has led to a lower player base and lower group of volunteers, so I understand the need for change if necessary.

However. The PA volunteered for the position. The PA was elected to the position by a majority vote. The PA worked and has worked to implement something that was requested by the player base at some point, and get things moving that had stalled in progress. Therefore, I support, and suggest everyone support a new implementation in any form that has been requested but stalled out in activation.

Why? Because, it's right. At the next election, you can run for the position. Or you can vote for a person that you feel would be better in the position.