Is willard's universe to soft?

[Donavin Jones]

I've noticed that willard universe compared to other hl2rp servers is a bit soft/bright.
Not really dystopian.

 

[Imperator RAD-X]

I'm 50/50 on your question, but this debate has been brought up before and while we agree it can be at times rather soft, it's because of numerous reasons:

1. No narrative currently, going to shift that and push it in a more "dystopic" setting.
2. Playerbase concerns (the biggest one). While we definitely have the potential to charge right into a full draconian atmosphere - sometimes it's just wise to stay the current course, before it's cramped up to 11. Rising Sun worked out well for it in Short Stories, but main server is an entirely different breed.
3. City RP concerns and the past. We used to be full dystopic back in V1... it didn't end well, even when we reinforced it. So since then, we had a change of pace and atmosphere while keeping it as much as we could. In the end, we just decided to let the citizens live and left live... until the moment the Combine wakes up and then proceeds to skull-cave everyone into the ground.

So there's a process, and it's not often pushed so far to bring it out.

 

[RogueSynapse]

too*

It's funny that this is brought up because I was just thinking about this earlier and to answer it you need to ask yourself the question of:
"Compared to what?"

Compared to the retail game, yeah, for sure.

But that's just because they aren't supposed to be the same timeline.

Honestly if we base it off of what we presume to be the most realistic take on what something of this caliber would look and feel like, I honestly think that even the retail game is very soft on the feel oppression. In the first few minutes of Half Life 2, the citizens seem to be more annoyed than in peril. They utter disgruntled comments about how much life sucks and they get wacked with batons in raids but there is so much more to it than that.

 

[Lyniv]

The retail game had full liberty to take as many liberties as it wants to make the world and oppressive for the sake of it's storytelling and producing a compelling narrative in a creative and unique world that the writers felt would be compelling enough for the player to look deeper into while also playing a Source game with janky prop physics, odd gunplay, but still find equally enjoyable.

HL2RP is a RP narrative, instead of getting to take 'liberties', it is taking the prewritten basis of the setting and essentially taking the chasis of this game car and then setting a server up based around the roles we see in the game. It has to make concessions constantly. If CPs on Willard just beat the ever living fuck and abuse most the citizens like the later parts of the game when socio-status got damaged, then it'd be boring for citizens and there wouldn't really be any sort of loyalists if they kept getting beat up.

Its all part of serving a specific narrative. Our narrative here seems to be calmer compared to most, especially in regards to the treatment of non-adults, considering how most servers just say 'they are all gassed'. But thats because its our telling of the narrative. Nobody in lore sat us down and point out 'there gordon thats where they gassed the kids like 1945' either. Its all part of the creative processes.

If Willard's story telling is gonna be a bit lighter on the dystopia and more of a futurist-totalitarianism (yes I know these mean the same thing) then so be it. It can be just a compelling story as the others.

 

[MrMindBlow]

I want to feel like I am living in 1984.

Willard is like living in 2018.

 

[Xushi]

I think their universe is made out of atoms actually

 

[Pandafish]

I think the tone of the server is in a good place. There's lots of variety; no more "UU-branded" foodstuffs and bluesuit reskins for clothing options.
Only problem to me is that it's literally 1984. Get rid of the Ingsoc anthem and hyper nationalist garbage for something more true to HL2 (technocracy!! science!!) and you've got a more authentic feeling server.

 

[RogueSynapse]

I want to feel like I am living in 1984.

Willard is like living in 2018.

There's nothing wrong with wanting that and you're not alone in feeling that. There are servers that offer an experience closer to 1984/retail Half Life, but this ain't it, chief.

 

[Deagantio]

Not enough sweeps, inspections, priority-identification checks, forced workshifts, etc.
Vorts are allowed to roam relatively free, which has lead to nearly all vort chars having fake shackles.

Don't get me wrong, its good for RP and all. But the Combine don't feel like badguys enough.

 

[Donavin Jones]

Not enough sweeps, inspections, priority-identification checks, forced workshifts, etc.
Vorts are allowed to roam relatively free, which has lead to nearly all vort chars having fake shackles.

Don't get me wrong, its good for RP and all. But the Combine don't feel like badguys enough.

I agree, and the fact some CP's have normal conversations. Which doesn't seem realistic.

 

[0xNiklas]

Not enough sweeps, inspections, priority-identification checks, forced workshifts, etc.
Vorts are allowed to roam relatively free, which has lead to nearly all vort chars having fake shackles.

Don't get me wrong, its good for RP and all. But the Combine don't feel like badguys enough.

They are more degenerated than bad guys. It annoys me the retardness more actually.

 

[Furious]

Maybe the Combine are the good guys after all.

 

[Hiros]

Say no more. Don't make OTA complain threat plz

 

[0xNiklas]

Say no more. Don't make OTA complain threat plz

haha no

 

[The Milkman]

Vorts are allowed to roam relatively free, which has lead to nearly all vort chars having fake shackles.

every free vort has fake shackles because being in the sewers is boring as fuck. You'd have more RP opportunities AFKing in the nexus on OTA

 

[ZeroPants]

In my opinion, compared to the canon HL2 lore Willards lore is much grimmer, most of the planet is covered in gigantic tumors the combine are barely able to contain, even if humans somehow beat the combine the world is still going to end after 10 or so years.

but in terms of city RP I would say that Willard city life a bit soft compared to canon half life city life, Canon HL2 citizens are more oppressed and Willard citizens are much freer, but I feel that giving players more freedom is good for RP.

Canon HL2 Citizen:

-Constantly relocated so you never make friends or join groups
-Forced to wear bluesuit, no nice clothes allowed
-Constantly oppressed by civil protection even if they did nothing wrong
-Instead of getting shot and thrown in a pit, citizens that commit crimes are stalkerized, which is arguably worse than death
-You either live as a citizen or join the civil protection, there is no in-between, no loyalists (at least none visible in HL2)
-No citizen-owned stores, all of the stores seen in HL2 are closed


Willard Citizen:

-Rarely relocated cause there is only one map
-Everyone gets to pick their own clothes
-Only oppressed when laws are broken (or when rebels do something *really* bad, like a big terrorist attack sometimes everyone will get a re-ed)
-When a citizen commits a crime, they are shot and thrown into a pit, only the worst criminals (and best RPers) are stalkerized.
-Loyalism exists, allowing people to live relatively peaceful lives in exchange for collaboration
-Citizens can own stores

 

[ZeroPants]

Don't get me wrong, its good for RP and all. But the Combine don't feel like badguys enough.

I like the combine not feeling like bad guys, it makes everything feel less black and white allowing for more morally grey characters

 

[Deagantio]

I like the combine not feeling like bad guys, it makes everything feel less black and white allowing for more morally grey characters

I guess it can be both ways in that regard. The "combine" can be bad but the guys making up the Combine don't have to be monsters. They can just be people.

As an organization, they should be doing absolutely horrendous things to the people. But individually? Keep the chillness and wacky/fun CP-RP. That makes it far more morally challenging to brand them because they're just folks doing their job - and their job happens to be opposed to your very human existence.

I'm talking about something like initiating an inspection quota where CPs take random civies off the streets to search them in private. Priority identification checks whenever there's a POI in the district. Frequent housing/store inspections where even all of the customers are lined up and searched. Etc.

 

[ZeroPants]

I guess it can be both ways in that regard. The "combine" can be bad but the guys making up the Combine don't have to be monsters. They can just be people.

As an organization, they should be doing absolutely horrendous things to the people. But individually? Keep the chillness and wacky/fun CP-RP. That makes it far more morally challenging to brand them because they're just folks doing their job - and their job happens to be opposed to your very human existence.

I'm talking about something like initiating an inspection quota where CPs take random civies off the streets to search them in private. Priority identification checks whenever there's a POI in the district. Frequent housing/store inspections where even all of the customers are lined up and searched. Etc.

It goes the other way too, the resistance does some pretty bad things to achieve their goals, tons of innocent people get caught in the crossfire

For example:

I was walking through the slums the other day when a shootout broke out between cops and a rebel, I was shot at by the rebel despite just being a tireless unarmed citizen, the rebel eventually got cornered and took a citizen hostage, cops ended up killing the rebel in the end (I think it was an event char)

 

[Votton]

Regarding the CityRP especially, it's well a difficult one I would say in a sense because you have both types of people, the people who like it as it is and then the people who want it to be 1984 like. This is just a personal opinion as I've heard things about V1 and my own preferences towards a more dystopian environment, also a fan of dystopian fiction generally. It's a difficult one because when you lean to more dystopia or a harsh environment, gameplay-wise it can be less pleasant as well, especially in a server like this where your own character will get the consequences if something negative happens and now your personal story is gone. From what I know V1 used to be a lot harsher on some aspects such as the CPs being a lot harsher and known smaller HL2RP servers with their own private communities that have managed to pull a nice dystopian atmosphere off but once again it's a smaller group of people which is easier to work with as well. Overall what I would say is that it can be harder to pull off nicely but there are more passive elements that can be implemented for the atmosphere or changing specific procedures that Merlinsclaw used to mention where CPs would maybe do more public executions type of thing or other environmental changes that happen more passively than making every CP a robocop.

I think the narrative should help a lot more as well when that gets going by RAD but the full-on dystopian elements tend to work better in other forms of game types or fiction in my opinion, so it ends up being the implementation that Willard has right now and why things like the RPG system exists as works out better for the larger player base too than everything being put to staff hands to manage, which has its own negatives of personal bias happening if had to supervise all the roleplay and all that.

Still always open though to how different dystopian elements could be implemented where it wouldn't just feel like crushing your character you've put so much time into but instead still produce the fearful feeling to yourself because of the environment around you, it's overall an interesting thread to see the different opinions about Half-Life itself and what people think of the way Willard handles these things too.