Feedback Weekly community fair ideas

[Deleted member 32699]

When I started playing a fortnight ago and heard about the weekly community fair for the first time, I was excited.
Images of traders selling their wares at (imaginary - or maybe even real) market stalls via roleplay (i.e. /s and /emote) popped into my head.
"The best outfitter in town. Come one, come all! Hello, lady, would you like a new pair of gloves?"

The reality was a little different: Instead of market stalls and roleplaying, there was the usual mundane spam in /trade - but at least there were a few duels and fireworks.

I think more could be made of the weekly fair:

1) Give the traders temporary stalls that they can occupy.
This could work in a similar way to mobile crafting stations - and to prevent abuse, it should only be possible to set them up in the area and at the time of the weekly fair.
Alternatively, a certain number of stalls could be set up during market hours - perhaps with designated market areas for weaponsmiths, woodworkers, provisioners, etc.

2) Promotion of roleplay
This could already be encouraged by an in-character announcement, but also by one or two people acting as "role models" by roleplaying during the fair - others could then pick up on this.

3) Cabaret and dance stage
Similar to the stalls, a temporary (or why not permanent?) cabaret and dance stage could be set up during the fair where people sing, perform and dance.
Alternatively, some NPCs could perform there at certain times.

4) Soundscape
To further amplify the atmosphere, a (discreet!) sound backdrop with market noise and / or corresponding background (fiddle?) music could also be played in the area and during the time of the weekly fair.

These are just a couple of ideas off the top of my head - maybe others have more (and better) ideas.

But perhaps the team is already working on a virtual marketplace (i.e. auction house) - in which case my suggestions would of course be obsolete.

At least I've already heard rumours about setting up a postal service...

 

[Elloa]

Heyhey! Thank you for your feedback.

The TRADE FAIR is a humble, social event that I have started to organise to ease the trade between players. Players had shared lots of feedback related to the difficulty sometimes to trade with other players, and as the dev team was not going to develop an auction house (or similar ideas) anytime soon, I toke uppon me to organise this every sundays.
So it's nothing fancy. A player could have set that up themselves. But it is atleast a moment of gathering for the community where they can trade, craft, socialise, do light roleplay, share some fun together. After a while organising this, the tradition hold. Now, even the sundays I'm not present, the players are gathering!

I actually have included Roleplay in the event, just as you are suggesting, and this from the start. There is an announce in game on the SYSTEM channel which is roleplay. I also used to maintain my presence Roleplaying, encouraging players to roleplay. That being said, we do not really have an active roleplaying community. So I put the roleplay asside to focus on a more fun-social aspect.
I organise mini game every Trade Fair. Sometimes it's Hide and Seek. Sometimes it's a duel tournament, a drunken race... silly little things. And players can earn some gold.

All the ideas you have shared are excellent, but it's probably not going to happen for now, as we have a tiny dev team, and we are already busy on more important projects.


That being said, the Trade Fair event is going to stay, (even with the mail system incoming end of April) and if some players wanted to spice things up with more roleplay, dances and the likes, they are more than welcome to do so.

 

[Deleted member 32699]

Hello @Elloa,

I hope my post didn't come across as too critical - I'm grateful that the weekly trade fair exists in its current form.

Thank you for initiating it and enriching it with activities.

I guess I just had slightly different (and exaggerated) expectations that the fair would be less about simply offering goods (often drops) and more about the artisanal aspect - more craft, less commerce, so to speak.

But - as you already wrote - the community interested in roleplay is miniscule.
I've also noticed in myself that the willingness to roleplay without the right environment is clearly waning.

On top of that I'm still new to Embers Adrift and feel like I lack proper knowledge of its world and lore.

However, the limited number of emotes also contributes to this (and yes, I'm aware that they don't grow on trees, so please don't get this the wrong way).

But even custom emotes are made difficult:

In WoW, all I had to do is to type
/e hands Elloa a cup of freshly brewed Goldthorn tea.

In Embers Adrift, I have to type
/emote hands Elloa a cup of freshly brewed Deer Leaf tea.

That may only be a small thing, but in the end it contributes to discouraging roleplay.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to the next community fair and the introduction of the mail system.

Cheers

 

[Undone]

But even custom emotes are made difficult:

In WoW, all I had to do is to type
/e hands Elloa a cup of freshly brewed Goldthorn tea.

In Embers Adrift, I have to type
/emote hands Elloa a cup of freshly brewed Deer Leaf tea.

As an FYI you can type "/?" to get a list of all available commands. To drill down even further you can "/? emote" to see more details which shows that "/em" and "/me" are aliases for this command. Given that there are no other command that I can find starting with E I will add "/e" to the list of aliases.

 

[Deleted member 32699]

I stand corrected.

And thank you for adding /e as an additional command for custom emotes - much appreciated!

 

[Elloa]

I hope my post didn't come across as too critical - I'm grateful that the weekly trade fair exists in its current form.
Thank you for initiating it and enriching it with activities.
I guess I just had slightly different (and exaggerated) expectations that the fair would be less about simply offering goods (often drops) and more about the artisanal aspect - more craft, less commerce, so to speak.

Hey not at all. I absolutely understand the feeling. Especially as I'm insisting every week, for players to join the Trade Fair, and it may seems from my announce that it's greater than it actually is. It's not a "seasonal style" event, like you see some in other MMORPGs. Just me creating an occasion for players to meet and ease the Trade.
But I try to make it fun and I'm open for new ideas or even assistance!

 

[Deleted member 32699]

I wanted to add a very general comment on trading.

I have the overall impression - subjective of course (which could be deceptive) - that trading is a bit slow.

Why is that?

First of all, many people probably play multiple characters, between which they exchange equipment and recipes.
In addition, most of them are organised in guilds and are therefore more or less self-sufficient.

Neither of these apply to me, and yet I realise that I'm reluctant when it comes to trade offers - for the simple reason that I can't realistically estimate the value of an item.

As much as I like the idea of "direct trading" (i.e. trading without an auction house), as it encourages communication (and roleplaying), the advantage of an auction house is that the same item is often offered by multiple sellers, and you can be somewhat sure that you are paying a reasonable price.

But maybe that's just me (still being a drifter fledgling).

 

[Elloa]

We also have a Trade Channel on Discord where you can discuss prices with other players. Prices are set up by the community so it can be anything, really. But that channel serve all kind of discussion about Trading