1) Who are you?
My name is Bialar Crais and I am an Atriaholic.
2) How long have you followed the development of Atriarch?
Quite a while now. I really didn't get active in the community right away, I did passively follow the development of Atriarch for quite some time. The first mention of it I saw was in February, 2000 or around there. I didn't really get active until June / July of this year.
3) What game(s) did you play before finding out about Atriarch?
In the MMORPG market: I played UO quite a bit. I think I just got bored with it after they kept adding on lame additions like when they would use some monster's model and just change the hue. That really annoyed me. Eventually I made my way over to EverQuest. That wasn't such a great Idea; That year my grades took a plunge, but my avatars were doing great :-P. I never bothered to try Asheron's Call, because it just looked like another MMORPG to me. In just general gaming, I play a lot of everything, except for sports games.
Gaming Aspects
1) What gaming design aspect are you glad is included in the game?
There are a couple. It's very hard to decide. I think that the fact that your characters don't disappear off of the world when you aren't around is cool. Also that they are building in a scripting engine and support offline macros is pretty appealing to. But there are many other reasons, like being able to design your own buildings, having no "Zones", and finally not having to play a human avatar. There is more, but those are the things that really stood out at me when I first saw Atriarch.
2) What would you like included in/removed from the game?
A new "Floating name" system would be nice. It was heavily discussed on almost all the community forums. Soralis and a couple of other community members had a great system going; it is in the Anonymity Question of the Week on the CoA boards. I would recommend a read over it. Interesting discussion.
3) How much/what innovation do you think Atriarch brings to the industry?
Atriarch has got some great new Ideas. I think that what it is bringing to the MMORPG industry has been needed for a long time. The way the game was produced encourages role playing, it doesn't really try to force it on you. That is an entirely different argument though. But, to answer the question, World Fusion has done A Lot of innovation.
Atriarch Community
1) What factors build/destroy the Atriarch community?
I think that the Atriarch community has a strong following. Much would need to be done to destroy it, short of stopping production of the game. One big plus for the community is that it has the Developers involved with it. If people disagree with a certain in-game system, they post up an argument about why they hate the system. The developers can in turn look at the argument and say that is a good/bad point, and act upon their newfound knowledge of what the community has to say. I think that contributes greatly to the strength of the community. It is also one of the reasons I joined up.
2) How can the schism between longtime and new followers of the game be breached?
Well... Uhm... hmm. That is a good question. I was lucky enough to jump on before that separation really started happening. I think that the only reason people are dubbed newbies is because they haven't really done much research on the game itself. Being my dweeby self, I looked over all of the Atriarch stuff I could get my hands on before jumping into the pool. There are still questions that haven't been answered, and when newer followers ask them, people around them get tired of saying "We don't know yet." I think that is a large source of the communities bitterness to the new guys. I too have contributed to the division in the past, but I try to catch myself before I do it anymore.
3) Should visibility in the community curry special favour in the (pre-)game?
I think that people who are generally more active in the community get noticed more. Whether it should or not, I am not quite sure. I think that all the time and devotion spent discussing and coming up with Ideas gets paid off when you are able to play the game. As for rewards IN game, I don't think that is quite fair to the new people. But hey, who am I to discuss fair, it is one of those perception things.
Discussions
1) Where can people find your threads (site/url)?
You can find my strange ramblings posted all over the place. Atriarch Stratics, Crossroads of Atriana, Atriarch Vault, The late ATN, etc. You can go to almost any Atriarch website and find something I posted there.
2) What thread was your favourite to start or see thrive (site/url)?
I always enjoyed watching the Floating Names conversations, those were always my favorites. You can find those on just about any Community site. My favorite ones to start were my infamous Solar Forecasts I posted on the Atriarch Stratics Open Conversation Forum. Those would get some interesting responses, most of them saying "What are you talking about?"
3) What do you think should be discussed more amongst the communities?
Everything. This is one of those things where I have no answer. I think everything people want to discuss should be discussed. It gives people a chance to voice their opinions and Ideas.
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