GAME HMD #1

[acatamods]

I ▫ main IV ▫ premise       XI ▫ applications XIV ▫ activity II ▫ logs V ▫ rules VII ▫ bestiary   IX ▫ canon updates XII ▫ taken XV ▫ drop/hiatus III ▫ ooc VI ▫ faq VIII ▫ setting   X ▫ mods XIII ▫ reserves XVI ▫ players game hmd. Hi, everyone! After receiving feedback and constructive suggestions from our playerbase, we have decided to institute a regular Game HMD. This is intended to give the modteam feedback about the game. We also plan on posting a Game HMD at the end of every world jump, to gain specific feedback about the world itself. That doesn’t mean your criticism has to be focused on the world jump! If you see something about Acatalepsy that needs improvement that doesn’t necessarily have to do with our world jump, you can leave it here. Please note, this is not the space to leave private player complaints -- comments here are going to be screened temporarily and will be made public to the entirety of the game. If you have a complaint that you want to remain private with the modteam, please visit our mod contact. Those comments remain screened permanently and will remain private. Here are a few points the modteam would really love feedback on! This is not an exhaustive list, so if we don't mention it here and you want to talk to us about it, please do! (1) Game Mechanics: We know the group mechanic in the very beginning of Akvos was not a popular mechanic. Our intention was to prevent the regularity of "oh no, we arrived in a new world again!" and to encourage new CR among different people. This had the opposite effect for a lot of people, and had a jarring start to Acatalepsy with our new players. However, we would really love suggestions on the mechanics themselves -- such as the world interactions, the plotting posts, the structure of the logs, etc. Additionally, if you have any suggestions for "fun mechanics" on the world jump logs, we would really love to hear that too! Do you like logs for the worlds, or would you like network posts instead? We like to try new things, and while this new thing wasn't necessarily a success, we want to keep experimenting and making Acatalepsy a great game for some time to come. (2) Player Interactions/Engagement: In a similar line with Game Mechanics, we would love to hear suggestions on how to better serve the playerbase in terms of interaction and engagement. What would make threading in Acatalepsy more engaging? What about the current game structure is exciting, or frustrating, to you? Do you find yourself being able to interact with the world jumps, or do you struggle with how to get involved? (3) The World: What about Akvos did you like, or not like? What would you suggest we had done differently? Additionally, if you were present during El Minha (World #1) and Struxta (World #2), what did you like or not like about those worlds? What do you like or dislike about them in comparison to Akvos? (4) Pacing: Our worlds last roughly six to eight weeks incorporating two bigger "events" in that time. Akvos ran a bit longer than that! How many events/logs per event is enough? Do you want more, or less? (5) The Game Writ-Large: We have a lot of plans going into 2019 with the new mod-team, including a world directory and ensuring all the lists/setting pages are up to date! They are already really hard at work. What else would you like to see Acatalepsy incorporate? What are we missing? What would you like to see? Again, this isn’t an exhaustive list! This is simply what Dai and Chelsea got together, thought about, and really wanted feedback on. If you know of anything else, please drop a line and let us know! We really want to hear from you. :) Thanks again, and here's to the next World Jump! - Acatamods.

Comments

[fuck1ngusernam3]

I know you just took on a bunch of new helper mods but I feel like it could be helpful to take on a couple more specifically to play major NPCs on plot posts.

[foundafamily]

Game Mechanics/Engagement: As always, I loved the list of ways to get involved in the different areas that was posted with the first ooc post and log. I always find those so helpful for getting a feel for the "culture" and general vibe of the setting and figuring out what kind of stuff my character would be up to. I think specifically one of the things I like seeing in the mechanics is how there's been a good cross-section of "impact levels." Like your character can start investigating something that may be plot relevant, or they can sit around and gamble with mermaids. So no new suggestions here, but that's a thing I'd like to see kept up, especially with the range of options. I enjoy the current log format too.

Engagement: I also really liked how phase 2 gave a lot of people a chance to go wild and get creative with their Astoria powers. It seemed like you guys were really flexible and encouraging with what people could do, and I really appreciate it! Especially since my character hadn't often found a reason to explore theirs too much, having that extra kick to apply the powers in different ways was really fun. I'd love to see more opportunities for characters to use their powers in unexpected ways. I apologize that I don't currently have any real specific ideas for this.

The World: Plot-wise, it was neat to see callbacks and connections to previous worlds, and I love that something as seemingly small as the coin came back into play. I'm really looking forward to seeing how more of this gets woven together in overall plot in the future.

I liked the end to Akvos; it definitely feels like the stakes have been upped. It hadn't occurred to my character ICly to focus on the rift itself, so the sort of "sucker punch" (that, looking back now, does seem like it was foreshadowed, and I just missed it) effect of the end was neat.

Pacing: Personally, I felt like Akvos was verging on too long/slow and maybe could've benefited from something like a "mini" event/update, maybe a short ooc post a couple of weeks after the big log goes up. Something to give players and characters a sense of how things are going so far. For Akvos, we had about a month between events, so towards mid/late month it sort of felt like the game was in "limbo" as we waited to see what the next phase would be. Maybe players could also optionally provide information/plot with each other on this post to keep others up to date on what kind of endeavors they have brewing.

As always, thanks for your hard work and for being so receptive to feedback!

[taketori]

A few points I'd like to make, just kind of based on personal preferences more than anything. I'll say that I do definitely appreciate everything you guys put into a world and I never get the impression that you guys aren't giving your all when it comes to coming up with stuff to do. That being said, one thing I'd like to see is kind of a bullet points/summary of what's happening in a world at the bottom in the OOC post.

I feel like having that kind of summary would make it easier to digest everything that's happening in the world and what might need to happen/what our characters should be doing. That'd also make it a tad easier to plot things out, and get a good idea of what a muse could be doing.

I'd also say that personally, I think two posts an event should be good! Akvos going the better part of two months made things kinda drag a bit, though admittedly part of that could be due to the holiday season.

Thanks for your consideration!

[shootstyles]

I'm a fairly new player and Akvos was my first world jump and definitely take this with a grain of salt because the real issue could be I'm actually completely dense and just missed something important along the way.

For the setting of Akvos, I think the biggest thing I really just struggled with was, outside of the more standard rp prompts in the first log which I actually really enjoyed, I just felt... very confused about what my character should be doing to actually have any impact. Which I think is definitely a bummer because I know one of the promises of Acata is that your character can affect the setting!

I struggled to find a direction in what my character could be doing that would matter or have an impact, both ICly and OOCly. There definitely was a lot of thought put into the world with all the political intrigue and negotiations and it was really cool to read about. However, I never felt really sure how my character would access that information and then act on it in a nature that had the possibility of making an impact in the world. This was also true for me as a player in general; I felt as though there was an intention in the information given to me in the OOC post that I should pick up on as to how I should have my character respond. But I just could not suss out what it was supposed to be. Or maybe there wasn't at all! It just felt like "I have this information and I'm supposed to something with it but... I just have no idea how to translate this into IC action". So my character ended up doing sort of rescue/crowd control two logs in a row which FINE HE'S A WANNABE HERO but it did make it feel like there was little to actually do but that I couldn't catch it.

Another thing is that I think perhaps some of the set up and subsequent pay of acting on certain prompts in logs could be better explained. For example, I had my character go into the rift because hey dwrp loves a good memshare plot and I'm a stereotype but I don't think as a player I really understood the clear consequences of how that would play out for my character. I know it was said on the OOC plot that it had consequences but it didn't seem as though my character was ICly aware of the consequences of making that choice. And I also think its hard when one plot is clearly... more interactive and the others less so? Regardless of consequences, I feel like I'm always going to go for what makes me more CR and that gets a little troublesome when there are different consequences to that action.

Finally, with the information I did have and could act on, I wasn't sure how to take the next step and try to make it something impactful. For example, on the second Akvos log, my character was exploring and messing around the depths but then the thread hit an impasse because we didn't know what to further do with it. It seemed like it was set up but it wasn't clear how to access the pay off. I do think this could maybe be an easy fix just by having a clear place in the OOC post to do "insert character doing xyx receive mod information/intervention" and making the OOC post sort of a living document and not just information dumped at the start of an event. Which I don't think it's intended to be that way but I just felt unsure of where to reach out to the mods to ask about what is happening when my character does xyz.

Tp respond to the other questions, I think having network posts for events would be cool? It seemed like in this world there was either not available or not really anything much to discuss. But I'd love for events to kick debates/shitposting/etc on the network because I think networks can be great CR vehicles with the opportunity it has for characters to showcase their personality in unique ways and hijack conversations.

Gosh, it is late and this might be a little rambling but I hope that it was in someway helpful. I know I seem quite critical right now but I really appreciate you guys reaching out to us players and trying to improve future events because despite my confusion (and like I said I may just be totally dense) I've really had a super good time in Acata! Thank you for all your hard work and I look forward to seeing the future of the game.

[intoningly]

hi mods, first and foremost i wanna say thank you so much for all the hard work that you do! the reason i joined this game was because i'd heard nothing but good things about the mod involvement and i've gotten to witness myself how much you all care about this game and how much work you put into it.

this was my first world jump and i had a lot of fun and got some great cr development out of it, but i will be honest and say i definitely had some issues getting involved and feeling engaged on an ic level.

i want to say re: the separation plot element, that it wasn't the fact that we were separated itself but rather when the separation happened. i know for me and some of my cr, we were very disappointed to be separated because we'd already been separated during the cave plot and had mostly had only slice of life plot elements to work with for threads for two months prior to akvos. we were really looking forward to getting to do more action-y things with one another and the separation element put a wedge in that after weeks of hoping for more action packed threads with each other. i know a lot of newbies were also disappointed that they couldn't carry out a lot of the things they'd reached out to people for from the cr meme.

as far as game mechanics go, i wasn't exactly sure how to get involved. the stuff rune team did was really fun to watch play out, but as a new player who'd never gotten to see a world jump happen in game i wasn't quite sure what questions to ask or what was available to me based on how the world jump itself and the segment for player interaction was set up. that being said i absolutely don't want this to come off like i'd want to be spoon fed plot because naturally that ruins the fun and surprise of the discovery element, i apologize for not having more concrete thoughts because i'm fully aware that its a difficult to strike a balance between a bit of mystery and making sure players are aware of what they can and can't do.

plot wise it didn't feel like icly we had much of an incentive to even really take a side? naturally it makes sense most of the characters sided the way they did based on their experiences in akvos (in that the queen was hospitable to the circle and the king's side seemed like a legion of the Big Bad) but even that was sort of a lukewarm loyalty, and honestly that in and of itself isn't even a huge issue since sometimes that really is the case in conflicts like this! but going forward for future world jumps it would be nice if icly there would actually be more reasons for circle members to pick sides and be more loyal to them (if there are sides to pick). the main problem i had with this situation in particular it just felt like there was a huge difference between part 1 and 2 tone-wise in a jarring way and i think that created some issues in terms of being able to get involved setting wise. to some extent it felt like both parts belonged to two entirely different plots. by the time part 2 rolled around it just felt like icly the circle didn't really have much of a reason to get invested in this whole conflict aside from the fact that a war broke out around them.

again thank you all for your hard work! i know all of this is kind of rambly so if you need me to be more specific or clarify please let me know.

[abandonware]

Hi mods! I hope you are doing well this weekend. This is Robyn and I just had a couple of things I wanted to talk about re: pacing of this past event in comparison to the only other world hop I was in, Struxta. I hope I don't come off as unfair or too harsh but if I do at all I will gladly amend my statements! I don't want it to sound like I'm beating you all up at any point because I really honestly do love the game and all the cr I have. I largely think it's very well-organized and you all have been nothing but totally open and transparent re: feedback and utilization, which I appreciate having been in games where that's been an issue. That being said, here's my thoughts!

1) Character suitability: This is kind of a character specific issue so idk if it's something that is helpful necessarily, but as someone who plays a character that is unique in the sense of being pretty difficult to utilize in an underwater setting, the pacing was particularly hard for me to adjust to. I feel as if the underwater tunnel exploration prior to the world hop was great! And I would've loved to do it...but A2 was landlocked for the duration of that event. And then landlocked in Akvos for the most part. This wouldn't be a problem if we hadn't just had a full month or so of slower, SOL related activity, followed by the month prior to the big fallout/battle in Akvos where we were all split up, which by nature, was also kind of slow-paced and more informational/exploratory. As a result, to me it felt like a good two to three months of SOL simply because of my character's physical limitations, which made it much harder to engage in the setting. I'm not the sort of person that expects every event to be tailored to my character or even to be tailored to every character, and I'm capable of making my own fun so to speak, but it was just really frustrating to be pushed out of a lot of the more interesting parts of Akvos and the exploration parts simply because if those limitations. If I had any suggestion at all, I guess it would be to make the part one of world hops more tightly focused? Compared to Struxta, the open-world, do what you want aspect of Akvos combined with the overall lack of very concrete goals and the odd sort of bare bones of the setting made it feel incomplete and frustrating. I admittedly personally work better with concrete objectives, as does my character, so I'm fine with admitting this might've just been a me problem lol.

2) The split up! I don't have an issue with being split up in theory, but the timing of it was really weird and didn't do the world of Akvos any favors. It was also kind of a head scratcher that the CR meme went up right before it, so everyone made plans with new and existing CR only to have it kind of thrown out of whack by the randomized splitting up. My suggestion here is not to forgo randomized teams like this entirely, but to maybe plan them a little better. Part 2 would've been a good time to do it, or perhaps to have slotted the CR meme after the randomized split ups so people could've at least had clear plans with new cr. I know for a fact it threw off a lot of the newer players and may have contributed to the steady stream of newbie drops.

3) The pacing: I'm just gonna be blunt and say Akvos was way way too long imo, especially coupled with the flagging interest in it right from the get go. I greatly preferred the tighter, more streamlined pace of Struxta. I liked being able to sign up for teams with really clear and focused for the second half of Struxta as well. I also think that the world jump should've happened earlier, such as after the first round of new applicants, rather than the second.

I'm also a little thrown at the implementation of the King and Queen's whole beef. By the time we were asked to sign up for a side, the characters had spent a good two months with the Queen and her ilk, and so ICly there seemed like little reason to jump ship to the King. This is a little ambitious I realize, but it would've been great if the team split up implementation used at the beginning of Akvos, had instead perhaps been splitting us in groups between the Queen and the King. This would've helped a lot with giving real emotional investment in one or the other side and given the characters a bigger, more personal reason to choose one over the other. As it was I ended up feeling a little lost and emotionally disconnected from the plot as a whole. It didn't seem as if we were given enough information to care about either side. It also feels like there was honestly way too much going on with Akvos as a whole, with the King/Queen, the Princess, the two separate factions, the coins at the very beginning, the Rifts, etc...so it was difficult for me at least to focus on one or two things. I think this may have been in response to the SOL in the months prior? I'm not sure. Correct me if I'm wrong!

I hope this isn't a big angry ramble on my part because I don't intend it to be at all. The idea of an underwater world is really, really creative and I don't think I've ever seen anything like it in a game before. I loved the second part of the event and that Astoria's character-granted powers played a big part in them, as I play a character who again, is a dumb metal person and would not have learned of her powers on her own. I really loved the dream hopping aspects of the Rift as well. The above is just stuff I think might've improved it or future events.

Thank you for reading all this! I'm happy to clarify if anything I said was super confusing bc I feel like I rambled a lot lol.

[nifties]

Hey Mods! I first want to thank you guys for being so dedicated and also open to criticism. I think for a young game you are doing a lot of great things and I'm super happy to be a part of it.

You already received some concerns about the initial launch of Akvos so I'll keep it brief but splitting everyone up and not giving them access to comms was damaging in a big way. It made one of my characters unplayable but I was already on hiatus at the time so I just didn't play that phase, but if I had been in it would've been devastating to my CR and place in the game. I think if you employ a mechanic like that in the future, the characters should be told they're splitting up so no one thinks all their friends are dead or anything lol. And/or have full access to comms even if they can't physically be with each other.It's totally cool to RNG people together for extra/different CR but also maybe next time make it opt in/opt out?

As for the pace of the game, I think it moves along pretty well, but not fast enough to sustain all these big logs in one month. I would prefer one modlog at the beginning and one at the end or maybe even just one and the TDM personally. As it is, I don't have time to do much with the Part 3s ever because they come so close to the TDM and I want to play with new people too! I know this only applies every other month so maybe you could switch this off. Keeping in line with this topic, I think the AC requirements should be tweaked a little. 20 comments is on the higher end for games these days and because we're only allowed to use threads that started in the same month as AC check I feel like almost no one here does backtags, myself included. And because logs are posted so rapidly it's like we're all just jumping from one thread to the next and not much gets resolved. This is all just my personal experience in the game of course and others are free to chime in or disagree! I've just had trouble scraping AC together and i don't feel like I'm particularly slow or lazy in this game.

The Akvos ending also, I'm glad it wasn't all just hunky dory but it was like a complete wash for the characters, so I hope in the next phase of the plot it's receptive to them being more jaded and less willing to help. I know especially one of my guys is not going to want to bother next time around.

Again, I appreciate you guys letting us weigh in on this stuff and being a part of game decisions! This is such a cool game in premise and execution and I really want to see what happens going forward.

[lumberlady]

Hey, mods! Any other issue I've considered has already been brought up, so I just want to leave some feedback/ideas for arrival gimmicks and other things to spice stuff up!

Since a lot of players have mentioned that the extended group separation + dead networks was too much for them, here's some things I've been thinking off!

☺ Arrival in different physical points is fine, but I think it shouldn't be an entire log, since those usually last an IC week or more. I think people will be much cooler with it if it only lasts part of the log, so that we can put in prompts for just the groups as well as OTA ones.

☺ Misfires on the network is a bit more fun than a fully dead network! Then it makes room for both comedy and serious threads, as well as new CR when someone gets a random message not intended for them.

☺ Translation support going down for a little while is another fun mechanic, I think! It's a good CR opportunity when people have to suddenly group with those who speak the same language, search for bilingual people to convey things for them, or work on their charades game! (But like with separation, "not too long" would be key.)

☺ Body swap! What if when world hopping people's minds got stuck in the wrong bodies? It would be fun to partner up with someone for a little bit of wrong-body hijinks. (And I will laugh while whoever was stuck in Konoha's body struggles to horse!walk.)

☺ Body modifications! If they go to a world more hostile to outsiders, it would be interesting if they had to shapeshift or something to fit in. Centaur people for a centaur world, green-skin alien versions for green skin world, elf bodies for elf world... idk, could be just a little or could be Weird.

Anyway! Thanks again, and I'm looking forward to what comes next!

POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS.

[acatamods]

Hi, everyone! After taking in your feedback, we have the following list of ideas to implement over the next few months. If you would like to offer additional suggestions or give feedback to these ideas, please don’t hesitate to do so with a comment below!

(1) NPC Mods: We are going to be keeping the mod team to the current staff. However, we have been talking amongst ourselves about scheduling “shifts” amongst the current modteam to accomodate the need/want for NPCs. In addition, we have also been toying with the idea of taking on NPC volunteers during NPC-heavy world months. Not all of our worlds will have interactive NPCs, but we definitely understand that players want to interact with them in a timely manner when we do. It is our intention to make clear the amount of interaction to expect and within what timeframe.

(2) Providing an OOC mini-update during events to give players an idea on how the plot is proceeding. This will be provided mid-event to give players an idea of what “path” the Circle is currently on, and give players adequate time to correct course if that isn’t the course they want to pursue. That being said, a huge portion of Acatalepsy is consequences for actions -- sometimes, it may not be repairable!! Still, this update will hopefully help relieve some confusion during events, and make all potential options clearer. The paths are decided by the players and how they interact with each world, and can and will change depending on how characters decide to interact. We’re hoping this update will open more opportunities for players to directed when it comes to each world and decision.

(3) Providing bullet points at the end of each plot post. Who doesn’t love bullet points? This will hopefully help minimize feeling overwhelmed during lengthy plot posts! We of course always suggest reading through (there’s a lot of info we want to share each event!) but we’re hoping the bullet points will help summarize.

(4) Re-organizing our question sections. In addition to providing bullet points at the end of posts, we are going to attempt to re-organize OOC planning and mod questions into something more palatable, and to signal boost player plots that will garner interest. A couple of ideas we are considering:

1. Linking top levels in the post itself for easy navigability.


2. Providing a specific location for people to ask questions mid-plot, rather than one giant OOC interaction thread.


3. Providing a thread for players to link player plots and/or boost them ourselves.

We also want to make sure players know that the OOC plot interaction top levels are active throughout the whole plot. Don’t be shy to ask us questions if you feel stuck, no matter when during the world jump they come up! We definitely want to make sure you feel comfortable threading and throwing yourself out there.

(5) Activity Check: From here on out, we have decided to allow TDM threads to count for AC for all players, not just new ones! We will be discussing limits on using TDM threads for AC in the future, but for this round, we will allow TDM threads to be used freely. Enjoy!

At this time, we are not going to lower our AC from 20 comments. We feel it is a fair in a small, capped game that everyone remain active each month with at least 20 comments per character. That being said, if players feel strongly about how we calculate AC, we are open to hearing comments on it. A poll could always be issued to the playerbase about how we calculate AC and have a more in-depth discussion at a later date.

(6) Game Mechanics:

• Thank you for everyone who offered feedback on the team mechanic. We have received a lot of fun ideas from players on how to “mess” with the Circle in better ways. We will also be considering timing more carefully for future mechanics.


• We want to make it clear that there is no “correct side” in Acatalepsy. There is no right or wrong answer to each World Jump, but there are consequences to actions. Sometimes, worlds are going to fail because they are far harder to “succeed” at than others. Think of it like having a higher DC on a saving throw in D&D -- sometimes, you need an 18 to win rather than a 10. Sometimes, you just need a five. It will differ.


• We are hoping that reorganizing our comment sections and providing more instances for players to ask questions/get involved will make it more obvious where players can interact with the plot.


• Our largest goal in Acatalepsy is to make sure all characters can interact with the plot, regardless of who or what they are! If your character is having difficulty, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us and we can definitely do our best to make it work for you and your character. The beauty of running a game where everything is magic is that everything is possible, and while we don’t want to “magic away” all difficulties in the game, we also don’t want you to feel like you can’t have fun because you’re playing Character X.

We want to thank everyone who has commented thus far, and we also want to be sure everyone knows that this by no way means that the HMD is closed. We are still taking suggestions, thoughts, etc and will continue to do so as long as there are players who have suggestions These are simply solutions that we as a mod team have discussed based on the already submitted concerns and comments.

We are so so thankful to have such an amazing and helpful playerbase, and we want to make sure that we take everyone's suggestions into account. If you have anything further you'd like to talk to us about, this post is still available, but also please feel free to come to our Mod Contact Page if you'd rather have a more direct and private conversation.

Acatalepsy is here to be a fun game for everyone, and we want to make sure we provide an environment where everyone feels like they can contribute. Thank y'all so much for all of the effort you put into this game, and we're excited about the changes and future of this game.