(DISCUSSION/POLL) How oppressive should Willard's tone be?

[ConcernedCitizen]

Personally as a GM i've come to recognize a distinct drop in oppressive/realistic tones in some areas of Willard and a spike in others, this roleplay mirrors itself as I see almost exact dualities in personality types and goals in people who generally speaking; are on the exact same team. So I'd like to poll the community and get a better understanding of Willard Network's audience and what the server thinks about the current state of "Oppressive" themes in Willard.

Feel free to post your response below. (PIC RELATED)

 

[Vinyl]

A mandatory curfew every 2 orso hours sounds so hot

 

[Imperator RAD-X]

8/10 is my go-to take, and it's what I want the server to be at its fullest potentiality. We had it there before, infact we had people starving in the streets and dying to the point we reached a 9/10 during The Food Crisis in the oppression levels.

Then the playerbase tanked hard because they didn't like getting oppressed even though they asked to be oppressed to that extent. Be careful what you wish for.

So yes, 8/10 is the last safe zone before everyone starts to run away as much as possible into multiple directions because they don't want their character PK'd from starvation.

 

[ShadoWiz4rd]

Personally as a GM i've come to recognize a distinct drop in oppressive/realistic tones in some areas of Willard and a spike in others, this roleplay mirrors itself as I see almost exact dualities in personality types and goals in people who generally speaking; are on the exact same team. So I'd like to poll the community and get a better understanding of Willard Network's audience and what the server thinks about the current state of "Oppressive" themes in Willard.

Feel free to post your response below. (PIC RELATED)
View attachment 14736

I agree mostly with this but at the same time Civil Protection shouldn't be the sole thing that makes it "Oppressive" they should be a cog in the machine contributing to it but not the sole thing. IMO it should be.

-BOE The propaganda arm used to control and mentally condition the people.
-CCA The Controlling body/Legislative (the pencil pushers)
-CP The Authoritative/Militant Wing.
-OTA The Arm of the Party and the Will of the benefactors.


(Chart is rated on what level of importance each institution should/would have within the society.)
(Maybe consider having the power structure follow a pyramid as opposed to that of a complicated tree that we use now?)

Curfews, Daily scheduled sweeps, Enlisting to factions via Terminal.

Also maybe consider pre-propping all apartments the exact same? You go into one there's 4 bunk beds a common room with a sofa and a Breen cast tv and then a kitchen. Would Instill a feeling of uniformity/Unity and would eliminate the boring empty housing blocks

 

[Craw]

For me it definitely should be an 8/10 for a perfect balance. There most certainly needs to be enforced oppression where it should feel like your every move is being watched, your conversations monitored and that even a city plaza doesn't feel safe and that everything must be permitted.

I am confused with what the playerbase truly wants as people ask for this enforcement as to truly sell the idea of this dystopoan society. Yet when it is gained the playerbase finds it "Too Oppressive" which then resets this cycle of untightening restrictions.

 

[Kaffee]

lets introduce curfews every 4 hours oocly

 

[Blitz]

On paper I think 1984 and PRC levels sound fun (to some degree, even full on HL2), but in practice I doubt it.
For the love of the server, I hope it won't be adjusted to being more oppressive than as is - I don't think you're ready for the ramifications.

 

[Rat King]

you guys are gonna be kicking yourselves in the ass when theyre out handing out pks like candy corn because people on the forums complained it wasnt 1984 enough

 

[Deleted member 4096]

Be very careful about increasing the oppression umbrella. Though a lot of players enjoy roleplaying in a dystopian atmosphere roleplaying will always be a hobby; an act of writing that people do so primarily because they enjoy it. Including 'chores' or things that will further be roadblocks, funneling, or a variety of practices that discourage players due to inhibiting what they wish to do partake in. Especially if things aren't modified to alleviate in other ways. Willard is punitive enough as is, it feels like.

 

[Deleted member 4096]

you guys are gonna be kicking yourselves in the ass when theyre out handing out pks like candy corn because people on the forums complained it wasnt 1984 enough

Also hello Okamoto Saburo, I played with you as Tulugaq. You're a wonderful Rper. o/.

 

[TheDeNuke]

you guys are gonna be kicking yourselves in the ass when theyre out handing out pks like candy corn because people on the forums complained it wasnt 1984 enough

This might as well be written in gold.

Do you people not realize that the state of the server as it currently is was created to prevent what happened in Willard V1 and the Food Crisis where basically the entire fucking playerbase collapsed because too many people were getting their characters destroyed due to the slightest infractions?

I will never accept returning to that. This is effective appeasement of a specific element of this community which does not understand that if you kill off too many characters then you also result in the decline of the server as people will start getting annoyed OOCly and leave the community.

 

[Furious]

Personally, I'd love for the server to take a new direction. Let's go with 1/10.

 

[Merlinsclaw]

more oppressive but not in the 1984 way

more oppressive in an interesting dystopic way.

 

[TheDeNuke]

more oppressive but not in the 1984 way

more oppressive in an interesting dystopic way.

More oppression, but less boot leather and more...?

Trying to get a idea of what you mean here.

 

[Atle]

We have tried to experiment pushing oppressive cca policies, evil cops, food crisis, people dying on the streets, starvation, xen infestation, etc but what always seems to happen is it ends up feeling forced and players end up hating it. You can't "force" a oppressive feel when player agency wants a more balanced approach, it doesn't tick together and it conflicts

Aurawatch tried to go full oppressive mode and it's a interesting concept but in the end it churns out as Rad recently pinpointed to me "you get fed up and all you do is walk around to die"

We can try shape the story to fit but in the end I feel this must be a push by players otherwise the playercount just dips and withers due to how forced it is, as seen during food crisis

 

[NitroSky]

I'm mixed between how it is now, and something closer to a 1984/Half Life 2 proper oppression style.
On the one hand, I like that not all the CPs are robotic and some you can actually have a decent-ish conversation with. It's cool that City 24 has a distinct atmosphere (a newly relocated citizen may remark that "Wow, the cops here aren't as bad as City [X]", plus not having the RDT opened/closed at specific times every day.

But it'd be cool to see more of the oppression you'd expect. Random apartment block inspections, manned checkpoints with CID checking, mandatory CCA speeches/rallies, curfews (but at random times, so players in different timezones aren't constantly on lockdown cause they happen to be on at 1 am servertime), etc.

I feel like if balanced properly, oppression and authoritarianism can make for some great RP for ordinary citizens trying to survive day to day without going overboard to where you're arrested or harassed simply walking out of your apartment.

 

[Vulpes Callida]

If this server was a dedicated campaign where all players played like a 'party' and thus could have common enemies and the same goal, the ambientation could be incredibly more oppressive. Fact of the matter is, since we are greedy and we must roleplay everything down to the stalkers and even the stupid ass birds, such things become impossible because it means you'd have to offset the balance to accomplish so, mostly benefitting combine factions and screwing non-combine ones.

A lot of people very commonly forget players ought to have the freedom to not get bored to death and have a pleasant experience beyond walking in circles, but because most people who support this stuff hardly play vanilla factions and have a group they hide in in the nexus or sewers and roleplay with like it's singleplayer (or don't play at all) they never really think about just how souldraining it is to be in the plaza with nothing happening in it.

 

[ryebredd]

Let's start by oppressing the biotics more instead of somehow treating them with more respect and dignity than the actual citizens.
I'm tired of seeing people getting punished for being racist to vorts, or seeing CPs take a vortigaunt's side over a human's.

Or the other day when BOE wanted people to write articles for a workshift, two biotics were in line and allowed to come in. Aliens writing an English article for a newspaper. Nobody even thinks about discriminating against vorts. Just makes sense that if these alien serviles are supposedly kept alive because they are slaves, they should be treated like slaves. Right now they are somehow more respected than the average person.

 

[Craw]

Let's start by oppressing the biotics more instead of somehow treating them with more respect and dignity than the actual citizens.
I'm tired of seeing people getting punished for being racist to vorts, or seeing CPs take a vortigaunt's side over a human's.

Or the other day when BOE wanted people to write articles for a workshift, two biotics were in line and allowed to come in. Aliens writing an English article for a newspaper. Nobody even thinks about discriminating against vorts. Just makes sense that if these alien serviles are supposedly kept alive because they are slaves, they should be treated like slaves. Right now they are somehow more respected than the average person.

I agree with this. The Vortigaunt Faction is supposed to be treated as second class citizens thay ate disrespected and beaten daily, only being used for labour. Instead we have as you've said "Treated better than humans"

 

[Craw]

For some reason that post spawned three times lmao