Returning Players

[Smithers]

I am 100% behind being as forgiving of long absences as possible. We have a small game, and anything we can do to encourage veterans to return is worthwhile. We NEED more players to enjoy the game's full potential, and there are already a lot of other, arguably more meaningful obstacles to overcome when you're an established character coming back from time away.

Based on the number of homes on the real estate board, and the number of assets on the marketplace that have been there for a really long time, I don't think the game is really suffering from any properties or resources that are "held up" by inactive characters. But we already have provisions in place to wrap up characters who are legitimately stalling progress, so why not employ the same rules?

Suggestion 1:
Cull assets/resources off the marketplace that have been actively sold by PCs or end up there after liquidations, first. This frees up more of the preferred asset types and/or resources.

Suggestion 2:
Firstly, I don't think most players realize the full extent of what is potentially available in assets, since in chargen you only see the list of what's available at that time. Other than perusing the marketplace on grid, is there any other way for people to see what they might want? I don't think there is, but let's say that changes.
In the same way you can request to have a character wrapped up, or request to take over a roster job if the current holder is long-inactive, let players request to have an asset type or resource opened up for purchase. Worst case scenario, Staff determines they're all actively held and there aren't any marketplace ones to clear out. But if there happens to be a really inactive character, reclaim the asset/resource in high demand, inform the account holder and let the game roll on. It's a much smaller penalty than death and it only affects them insofar as their inactivity is hindering the game. I don't have a strong opinion on what to do about refunding the 'lost' boon, but I think letting them pick something of the same value or less is fine.

Suggestion 3:
Don't repossess houses. Instead of doing that, if they get to that point of inactivity, just let them keep accruing rent. They already were aware of that regular cost.

If people think that's too big of an obstacle to come back to, maybe cap it at X number of months or something. They've already been risking the total theft of anything left in their home.

[Sparkles]

I am 100% behind being as forgiving of long absences as possible. We have a small game, and anything we can do to encourage veterans to return is worthwhile. We NEED more players to enjoy the game's full potential, and there are already a lot of other, arguably more meaningful obstacles to overcome when you're an established character coming back from time away.

My question which might be beyond the scope of this particular thread but I'd argue we should 100% be encouraging returning players but also recognizing that a particular character returning after a long absence (and repeated long absences) could be potentially problematic to those who remained active while they were gone. Particularly if the absence was foreshadowed by a lot of IC "stuff" that never had a fair resolution to other involved parties.

Because sometimes, people seem to hold on to some of those established characters not because they actually seem to enjoy RPing them or have the intention of playing them actively but for the stuff/skills/bank account they have. And I'm not sure honestly that's a healthy thing to be encouraging.

[Kuzco]

Take the asset from them but offer an automated money refund.

[galaxgal]

A full refund on the 'present value' of an asset or phome that's lost sounds reasonable. These are effectively partial refunds, because anything in a phome (furniture, et al) is going to be lost, and characters with assets can and probably will lose money to shifting market conditions.

[Kinaed]

We have decided, and implemented, that assets will not depreciate or be stripped until the character reaches purge. The asset market never caught on, and whereas we are concerned about inactive players holding highly desirable assets, we don't think we have a pbase size where it's a serious issue as of yet. We also have decided not to count assets that are locked down to inactives in the game balance.

We do not see the same problems with assets being present in phomes and the like, so have made no changes there.