Atriarch Community Profiles:Spenser

Introduction

1) Who are you?
I'm a software engineer living in Colorado with my wonderful wife and two kids. The younger of the two is only ten weeks old (which explains my recent inactivity on the boards). I'm one of the old farts in the Atriarch community, having been born (slightly) before the assassination of JFK. When I was a kid I owned a polyester leisure suit!

2) How long have you followed the development of Atriarch?
I discovered AT in March 2000.

3) What game(s) did you play before finding out about Atriarch?
I've been a pencil-n-paper roleplayer for almost 20 years, beginning with silly AD&D games and maturing (?) into GURPS and campaigns centered on story and roleplaying. My computer gaming has mostly been with strategy titles (Civ and its descendants, Master of ) and turn-based tactical combat games (X-COM, Jagged Alliance). I don't generally enjoy FPS games but I've recently discovered Tribes and am eagerly awaiting Tribes 2. Other than briefly fooling around with a couple of MUDs, the only online RPG I've tried is Asheron's Call - great fun for a while, but I became bored in a hurry.

Gaming Aspects

1) What gaming design aspect are you glad is included in the game?
Sorry, but I can't limit myself to a single answer. My favorites:

(1) The combination of an RPG with a higher-level strategic game. This may be the best answer to the MMORPG conundrum, "How do we give the players interesting things to do?" Real people pursuing real goals produce real storylines.

(2) The rich set of skills and "things to do" available to players. Lots of players are turned off by the near-total focus on combat in existing games. Hopefully AT will be compelling to all those folks, and even those who prefer combat should benefit from more diverse and complex communities.

(3) A realistic and immersive skill system, especially with regards to combat. No visible numbers, no ubercharacters that can slay hundreds of newbies.

(4) Persistence. I want my characters to improve and accomplish tasks while I'm offline, especially since I won't be playing 50 hours a week. I'm also looking forward to the challenges of offline scripting, but that's just an occupational hazard of my career...

2) What would you like included in/removed from the game?
My biggest problem with AT is the alien environment. *begins ducking the rotten fruit hurled from all sides* I think it's cool that WF is making a world that's so different from the standard Tolkienesque millieu - but I think it will be difficult for most players to roleplay an asexual being without essentially pretending that it's a human. I would have preferred a world that's a bit more familiar; AT would still have been new and amazing due to all the other fantastic game design elements. So WF, would you mind scrapping all your artwork and game content and starting over? Hmm, I didn't think so. It doesn't matter - I still think AT is the best design for an MMORPG I've ever seen, and I'm interested to see how these alien cultures develop.

My other suggestions have been on the forums. I don't like unrestricted global telepathy or instant correct identification of other characters. I do like separate racial languages, awesome support for player-made maps, and unique items whose benefits are more complex than simple combat modifiers. I'd still prefer a single character slot but I've reconciled myself to doing interesting and useful things with those other slots :-)

3) How much/what innovation do you think Atriarch brings to the industry?
See (1) above. AT is the most interesting game idea I've seen in a very long time. If anything, it might be too innovative - aliens + asexuality + karma birds + no numbers + persistence + etc. - but I think there are enough creative players out there to make it work. Many years ago, some friends and I spent many brain cycles working out some ideas for great computer games. It's amazing how many of those are present in AT.

Atriarch Community

1) What factors build/destroy the Atriarch community?
The building factors are simple: engagement by WF, the presence of creative motivated players, and forums such as CoA and Stratics. I think the biggest destructive force right now is time. The AT community has lost some of its brighter folks because of the lack of a game. I'm not blaming WF; AT is a huge enterprise and great games take time. But some external testing - even crappy alpha testing - would re-ignite the interests of many folks.

2) How can the schism between longtime and new followers of the game be breached?
Longtime folks need to exercise some patience when dealing with the newbies. We also need to continue to provide good resources (FAQs and the like) to get them up to speed. By the same token, newcomers should spend some time looking over previous discussions and other information before flooding the forums with questions like "Will AT have perma-death?"

3) Should visibility in the community curry special favour in the (pre-)game?
I think that useful participation in the community should be a big ingredient in acceptance criteria for alpha and beta testing. However, once the game goes live, the playing field should be leveled as much as possible. Presumably early participation in the game should bring its own advantages once AT starts up for real.

Note that it's contribution, not visibility, that should matter. WF needs to decide which players will contribute most to their early testing. Early participation in the community is one important way to gauge this.

Discussions

1) Where can people find your threads (site/url)?
I've posted almost exclusively on the Stratics dev board, with a few miscellaneous posts at CoA and the AT Vault.

2) What thread was your favourite to start or see thrive (site/url)?
The thread entitled "Maps and exploration". This discussion was not nearly as lofty as some of the others (morality of murder, anyone?) but it contains many good ideas.

3) What do you think should be discussed more amongst the communities?
It's probably time to quit discussing game mechanics, since WF is hopefully done with them (absent tweaking for game balance). Discussions now should be about roleplaying and game content (characters, history, cultures) and in-game plans (factions, city building, player-run justice systems).

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