I'm going to admit that Valikorlia can't thrive on RPing alone, they need something else to pull in the players. The reason it used to achieve over 100 players online was because it had an RPG system and was ahead of its time. Also, PLEASE bring back the giant gmap, I miss it so much.

There are also a ton of bugs. I can't even remember how many times I was trying to get around and had to unstick me because of link problems. Either a link put me in a dead area(water with no way onto land, or on a wall), or there was just no link giving me a way back(left a room and the link back didn't work).

Same lol

Lack of player support is a huge issue on Valikorlia. They want a new system, but they either don't want to change, or they can't agree on what kind of change they want. But, mostly, I think the lack of player support comes from the fact that players simply don't trust any type of management. I mean, we had years and years of Clash. In case you didn't know, Clash did not care about Valikorlia. He released not-even-half finished "systems", because he was working on "New Val". He wouldn't even give NC to anybody who wanted to help on the scripting side. So, over the years of his management (and the 3 short managements between Clash being fired by globals and Omake being voted-in) a lot of players have lost faith that management can actually do anything.

Staff being unenthusiastic about working is almost a domino effect of the players' mood. For months, on a daily basis, I personally was told that I was ruining the server, either by working on the update and not paying attention to the current server, or vice-versa. The thing with Valikorlia is that there aren't any automated systems to keep things going while an update is being made. Levels need to be made almost constantly for new events, for example. A problem facing the LAT team while I was LAT Chief, was that I had to juggle between fixing the broken level and making new levels for the current server, and making new levels for the update. Pretty soon, LATs started quitting left and right, and I was essentially all by myself. In order for a full update, Valikorlia would really need two sets of staff: one for the current server, and one for the dev server. That wouldn't be problem, if developers weren't such a rare commodity.

We debated this a lot, actually. What Omake (the manager) decided was a segmented GMAP (three different GMAPs, to represent three different continents). When the LAT team started shrinking, I convinced him to just stay with the worldmap (which really is a unique part of Valikorlia -- as far as I know, we're still the only Classic playerworld with a worldmap). But, my decision was based on more than just manpower. The server itself has a very wide range of climates. We have tropical, desert, tundra, arctic, temperate, and wetland. Try fitting that all on one GMAP, along with weather effects. It just wasn't feasible, in my eyes.
Most, if not all, of the level errors are from players themselves. At Valikorlia, we allow players to make and upload their own levels. I don't want to bash anybody here, but it's really a result of horrible standards on the part of the LAT Chief (not me -- I was demoted just after the 'update' was released). When I was LAT Chief, I was prepared to deny any level containing tile, link, graphic, or scripting errors (I really only wanted GS2 to be used) from being uploaded. I also wanted them to pass my quality test, which included my personal level aesthetics. But, all of that received backlash from the playerbase, because essentially they were too lazy to learn GS2, or too lazy to fix all their errors. Eventually, I was forced to allow GS1, and told that I wasn't allowed to deny people's levels from being upload, just because they didn't pass my 'quality standards'.

It's horrible to say, but I really do think that it's the players, not the staff, for the most part, that prevent Valikorlia from having any substantial updates.

How did this turn in to a discussion about Valikorlia, anyways? Valikorlia's not exactly Graal's benchmark server.

It sounds like you guys give in to players way too easily(and by you guys, I mean whoever keeps letting the playerbase decide how the server ends up).

All in an effort to not be called "Clash", I guess. It's odd, really, because we constantly tell the players, "Valikorlia isn't a democracy".

NEVER blame the players for the server's faults -- that's what Jenn did when Era's playercount sunk to 10 average. But suddenly when managers changed, Era revived to a hefty 70-80 players. So there must be something wrong with the server.

From my point of view, it depends on the updates. Whilst a staff is active you'll get more players.

Yeah, Graal Classic update 2004, anyone recalling? lol

I know, I know, it was a forced update and they had to do it. But what the staff chose to do afterwards made the playercount sink into the rest of the playerworlds.

Era is not Valikorlia. ;)

Either way, players can't be held responsible.

If you keep making excuses like that then your server will definitely be stuck in a rut.

You guys don't know Valikorlia.

The fact is there's nothing stopping the administration from changing Val for the better. The fact is, if the current player base doesn't like it, the current player base can lump it. The fact is Val could be so much more. The fact is, players complaining is no excuse.

Quit making shallow assumptions you're starting to get annoying now.
By the way, at least back it up when you say something like that. It's not smart if you don't.

"For the better" is a broad term. Be more specific, then I will tackle the rest of your posts at once as they pretty much come back to this.

Are my shallow assumptions correct or not? Your posts show that you know nothing about Valikorlia. The fact that you only mention playercount just shows you really have no clue what you're talking about.

Once Codein answers my question I will tell you why you're both missing the point.

Here you go big boy.

Regarding the players holding back the leveling system, which is pretty relevant.

Regarding the players in general.

As a part of my "shallow assumptions", I don't expect you to know what "pre-flood" means.

I don't know what's for the better when it comes to Valikorlia, because I don't know it, as you've previously stated. I was just arguing that the players are not responsible for the lack of change. All I'm trying to get across is that the administration has a choice and that choice shouldn't be swayed by the players so much.

They are responsible. Valikorlia's staff does not wanna **** over the few loyal players that are left. Players on Valikorlia prefer too much quality over quantity (in terms of RPers). They don't want to simply attract a ton of people from UN, Zodiac, and Era only to see them all running around ruining RP's.

My experience on Val doesn't lead me to believe that this 'loyal' playerbase takes RP as seriously as they'd like everyone to believe. Walking around silently it seems just as bad as UN at times.

I think that for a month or two, limit the amount of servers there can be at once to about 75. That way it's still getting some money and there'll be more development?
More/better development = More Hosted/Classic Servers = $$$$ by upgrading.
More servers = $$$$ by server hosting. If there are more people that play Graal and have a reason to upgrade, I don't see why this won't work both for CJ and the players.

Just depends on what time it is.

Yes it is, I just realized i had it installed on my computer O_O. Proceeded to login and realized that most of these server have lost their playerbase. Then proceeded in looking at the servers and it seems that Era is the only one with the slightest glimpse of quality out of all the servers.

I was never into Era to much anyways after the first time the server was restarted.

This is true. There are certain people that create roleplaying on Valikorlia, and those people get on at certain times. Generally, if there's a player count below 20-25, there's little to moderate roleplaying. When it's at 50+, then there's a good chance that there's an event (or multiple events) going on, thus a lot of roleplaying. It also depends on what day of the week it is.

Also, as a response to people saying that the administration should just do what they think is good for the server: it's really not that simple. Valikorlia is by far the most unique server on Graal. Nobody really knows what's "best", and agreeing on what's "acceptable" is a feat in itself. We have daily debates on what should and shouldn't be going on with the server, from small things like what races should be available, to large things like how the battle system would work. We can't just stop these cold-turkey, and expect the players to follow suit. They'll retaliate, just like they've done with every administration that's done that.

Like I said, Valikorlia is unique. And, like Crono said, you don't know Valikorlia. Players have earned their part of the blame. It is, after all, a player-run, player-generated server. :cool:

No need to flex your internet muscles, just because my presence on this forum is rare does't obligate you to make shallow assumptions. Just be because I have only talked about the playercount doesn't show that I know nothing about Valikorlia in any way. Are you not aware of the lack of logic behind assumptions?

Also what the kind of back-up is that? Those "back-ups" are just you rambling that Valikorlia needs an RPG system. Yes it does need one, if Val strictly relies on roleplaying what else is there to do if there is no roleplaying going on? The player gets bored and logs off.

And then you challenge me on some Valikorlia knowledge huh? I'd be glad to retort.

The Valikorlia "flood" is when Clash was ****ing around as usual and then decided "HEY! I want to make a ****ty sand nation that isn't Lerhyn! But how do I make one appear out of thin air? Oh I know! Let's FLOOD THE WHOLE WORLD inexplicably."

And so people got on their pretty little boats and fend off the danger that came by. Of course, that sand nation never came to happen.

To be honest Crono, you were one of the players of Valikorlia I have barely seen online.

This has nothing to do with the forums. It has to do with Valikorlia.

Third paragraph mate.

Then you should know why playercount alone is not what Valikorlia needs. The flood was also more than that, Clash wanted to somehow "prove" that Valikorlia needed him. Don't ask me how, as I don't know what he was on about, but it's the explanation he gave me years ago.

That's because I stopped RPing after 2002 and server-hopped a lot. To this day I still server-hop a lot but I always get on Valikorlia to check it's "progress". I actively played/worked on Val from 2002-2004 but once Clash had taken over I became less and less active. I was still there, though.

graal is dead

Graal isn't dying. "Dying" is present tense.

It has died.

Yeah. It's not as it was a couple of years ago, sadly. :/

A couple of years ago was not much better unless you played Era (Era from spring 2006 was quite nice in my opinion).

As in a couple of years I meant pre-2004

*points* ZOOOMBIE!!!!!! wasn't you part of the graal new world team?

Boo!

Go figure. :P

I refuse.

Subject Change:

What is happening to Graal3D are the globals working on that or is it dead.

It's dead, I worked on it alone for a while trying to spice up the visuals but it was hard without a programmer to help me so eventually I got bored of trying and gave up.

You mean unpaid programmers isn't working out?

*Shock*

oh I thought they payed stefan, owell.

You mean Stefan can't do it alone completely?

*Shock*

Bump Sefan to death eeh...

*strangles darkreaper* why you little!?!!!