Greetings,
"It's UOF's Bar-BQ and it tastes good"
but...
I started this thread because UOF is still a young shard and is (as all shards young and old are) always in development.
Open for Any Development Questions or Observations (which may or may not be answered)
What happened to OSI shards in their development, "what went wrong? what went right?"
Development in any shard is a programing nightmare with the time and enormous energy needed to complete anything having to do with changing or placing something into, or out of the game. "OSI / EA" had a huge budget just after they realized how popular UO truly was. But just after that, they soon realized that artistic quest talent did usually go with having Tech talent. Shortly there after, the businessmen of $ took charge and began cutting the personnel budget and almost all of the Non-Tech quest artists were left without a job, with the remaining Non-Tech quest artists having a very short lived contract there after. The OSI / EA thoughts on this subject was that the Non-Tech Quest Artists took far too much time developing their quests and were seemingly doing allot of nothing but staring into space...
And for thus, the Technolians had won the paycheck wars...
Some Non-Tech Artist Examples:
NPC interactions and NPC mini quests (anyone remember getting married to a local NPC?), cow tipping and many of the older skills lost their reasons for being in-game. Anyone remember having a conversation speak wisp, orc or gargoyle while fighting or interacting with them? There were actual quests still in non-tech development when the first cuts came...
Remember the UO Congress?
I a desperate OSI / EA search to fill the intellectual art void, the UO Congress of players were formed. These were a collection of non-paid players who's thoughts and talents seemed to fill what the OSI / EA Chiefdom were looking for (easy way outs). The Congress worked much similar to that which we have here... a nice forum to discuss and report on what we think...
The main course of Ultima was first changed by this Congress, never to return to Ultima's original course. A course of wonder was lost in this and wonder is what questing is all about, "the discovery proses", as the Player Congress posted their thoughts, leaving "wonder" far behind.
It took a long time back in those days to build a mage Chr because Regs were hard to come by and the skill was very hard to build up. This caused most players to more admire the mages over the non-magic warrior Chrs and the people that predominately played them. Thus, the Congress was quickly lopsided with mages taking the lead in it's membership. As this may not seem important, this was the first development cause of the Nerfing of many other skills. Some Examples; Detecting Hidden, Lock Picking, Camping and over all designs of dungeons and resource availability. The Mage/Tamer Chrs were soon to follow in this esteem. As the OSI / EA mindset was as it is with any other entertainment, "give the crowd what they want". This was not right or wrong in reasoning, it's just the way "UO's Development Evolved", into the game we now play.
Remember the Troubadours?
When sales of Ultima Online began to fall, OSI / EA made another attempt to fill the quest and wonder intellectual void. These were players similar to in-game Counselors, yet had the sole mission of creating/writing and acting in player written quests, with the help and aid of the paid Technolian developers. I was one of them, but by no means the best. I just knew allot of Ultima (offline) History and wasn't bad in role play.
The Troubadours went into being non-supported by OSI / EA because they too, as the paid non-tech quest artists had been judged by the Technolians as being people that tended to stare into space with nothing forthcoming".
...(Personally, I think Technolians suffer from a lack of patients wanting everything instantly and at their fingertips or abandon it)...
Currently, UOF is a young shard that has the potential to become world wide what OSI / EA had wanted to become. With such a limited staff UOF has seized the original spirit of Ultima Online but they have had a daunting task in doing so. Trying to fill in and develop the game better than what OSI / EA did is no easy task. But as with the origins and intent within the word "Development", it means an evolving change...
OSI / EA forgot what wonder had brought to them.. this was a mistake they could never recover from because of the forces described above. And once developed (changed) they could never go back. They tried with the Siege Perilous Shard... and after that shard's initial success... they again cut the newly paid non-tech quest artists and allowed the prevailing Tech-Player influence to Nerf even that shard's initial success.
The un-changing Laws described in the I-Ching... "whatever is ridged will break and whatever soft will harden"...
Just an example of how important development discipline in ideal can be, just look at the way OSI / EA did it by killing "wonder" by going so technically known. some, if not all things are served best by player discovery and I think that has been represented well here by the staff of UOF, as they seem very tight lipped as to the exactness of % of this or HP of that... but at times I do wish they would be more forthcoming into what a skill dose or does not do before a player invests their time and energy raising a skill that is in some way useless or not the way they would expect it to be (the UO normal),
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
~Example of Why this is All Important~
There was one instance that I would like to share that brought me to this in-depth subject matter of discussion. it reminded me of what early mistakes OSI / EA had done that caused UO to change from it's original course;
On one hand, we have the UOF staff being somewhat tight lipped on some subjects.... but on the other hand I received a "world wide message" during an event (which I was not attending at the time).. the messages were things like "I told them that wouldn't work and would kill them".... followed by "Use Archery to shoot it's tentacles".... followed by "LoL"...
This gives rise in a player's thinking that there are some players in the "in crowd" and some that are not....
The discovery proses and wonder all dissolved forever as to how to kill such a monster...
And somehow, I wonder what a Game Master or Counselor may be holding back from me in the Tech of it all?
~Epitaph and the Moral of this Story~
"Wonder is a Thing Easily Lost Forever"
Feel free to comment ...
I love UO Forever!
Sil~Rel~Por
"It's UOF's Bar-BQ and it tastes good"
but...I started this thread because UOF is still a young shard and is (as all shards young and old are) always in development.
Open for Any Development Questions or Observations (which may or may not be answered)
What happened to OSI shards in their development, "what went wrong? what went right?"
Development in any shard is a programing nightmare with the time and enormous energy needed to complete anything having to do with changing or placing something into, or out of the game. "OSI / EA" had a huge budget just after they realized how popular UO truly was. But just after that, they soon realized that artistic quest talent did usually go with having Tech talent. Shortly there after, the businessmen of $ took charge and began cutting the personnel budget and almost all of the Non-Tech quest artists were left without a job, with the remaining Non-Tech quest artists having a very short lived contract there after. The OSI / EA thoughts on this subject was that the Non-Tech Quest Artists took far too much time developing their quests and were seemingly doing allot of nothing but staring into space...
And for thus, the Technolians had won the paycheck wars...
Some Non-Tech Artist Examples:
NPC interactions and NPC mini quests (anyone remember getting married to a local NPC?), cow tipping and many of the older skills lost their reasons for being in-game. Anyone remember having a conversation speak wisp, orc or gargoyle while fighting or interacting with them? There were actual quests still in non-tech development when the first cuts came...
Remember the UO Congress?
I a desperate OSI / EA search to fill the intellectual art void, the UO Congress of players were formed. These were a collection of non-paid players who's thoughts and talents seemed to fill what the OSI / EA Chiefdom were looking for (easy way outs). The Congress worked much similar to that which we have here... a nice forum to discuss and report on what we think...
The main course of Ultima was first changed by this Congress, never to return to Ultima's original course. A course of wonder was lost in this and wonder is what questing is all about, "the discovery proses", as the Player Congress posted their thoughts, leaving "wonder" far behind.
It took a long time back in those days to build a mage Chr because Regs were hard to come by and the skill was very hard to build up. This caused most players to more admire the mages over the non-magic warrior Chrs and the people that predominately played them. Thus, the Congress was quickly lopsided with mages taking the lead in it's membership. As this may not seem important, this was the first development cause of the Nerfing of many other skills. Some Examples; Detecting Hidden, Lock Picking, Camping and over all designs of dungeons and resource availability. The Mage/Tamer Chrs were soon to follow in this esteem. As the OSI / EA mindset was as it is with any other entertainment, "give the crowd what they want". This was not right or wrong in reasoning, it's just the way "UO's Development Evolved", into the game we now play.
Remember the Troubadours?
When sales of Ultima Online began to fall, OSI / EA made another attempt to fill the quest and wonder intellectual void. These were players similar to in-game Counselors, yet had the sole mission of creating/writing and acting in player written quests, with the help and aid of the paid Technolian developers. I was one of them, but by no means the best. I just knew allot of Ultima (offline) History and wasn't bad in role play.
The Troubadours went into being non-supported by OSI / EA because they too, as the paid non-tech quest artists had been judged by the Technolians as being people that tended to stare into space with nothing forthcoming".
...(Personally, I think Technolians suffer from a lack of patients wanting everything instantly and at their fingertips or abandon it)...
Currently, UOF is a young shard that has the potential to become world wide what OSI / EA had wanted to become. With such a limited staff UOF has seized the original spirit of Ultima Online but they have had a daunting task in doing so. Trying to fill in and develop the game better than what OSI / EA did is no easy task. But as with the origins and intent within the word "Development", it means an evolving change...
OSI / EA forgot what wonder had brought to them.. this was a mistake they could never recover from because of the forces described above. And once developed (changed) they could never go back. They tried with the Siege Perilous Shard... and after that shard's initial success... they again cut the newly paid non-tech quest artists and allowed the prevailing Tech-Player influence to Nerf even that shard's initial success.
The un-changing Laws described in the I-Ching... "whatever is ridged will break and whatever soft will harden"...
Just an example of how important development discipline in ideal can be, just look at the way OSI / EA did it by killing "wonder" by going so technically known. some, if not all things are served best by player discovery and I think that has been represented well here by the staff of UOF, as they seem very tight lipped as to the exactness of % of this or HP of that... but at times I do wish they would be more forthcoming into what a skill dose or does not do before a player invests their time and energy raising a skill that is in some way useless or not the way they would expect it to be (the UO normal),
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
~Example of Why this is All Important~
There was one instance that I would like to share that brought me to this in-depth subject matter of discussion. it reminded me of what early mistakes OSI / EA had done that caused UO to change from it's original course;
On one hand, we have the UOF staff being somewhat tight lipped on some subjects.... but on the other hand I received a "world wide message" during an event (which I was not attending at the time).. the messages were things like "I told them that wouldn't work and would kill them".... followed by "Use Archery to shoot it's tentacles".... followed by "LoL"...
This gives rise in a player's thinking that there are some players in the "in crowd" and some that are not....
The discovery proses and wonder all dissolved forever as to how to kill such a monster...
And somehow, I wonder what a Game Master or Counselor may be holding back from me in the Tech of it all?
~Epitaph and the Moral of this Story~
"Wonder is a Thing Easily Lost Forever"
Feel free to comment ...
I love UO Forever!
Sil~Rel~Por