FinalHavenLarp.com

Wow, I am beat, but wanted to get in first and say It was a Great Ride... I will put more thoughts into it, and write a much better Feedback when I have mental ability to do so, but just wanted to give a VERY big shout-out to The GM's and NPC's for making this a truly memorable event for me!


Ok now that I have had a good nights sleep behind me heres my feedback

GOOD:
WOW Thank you for making me feel special, and going out with a helluva bang! Special thanks to all the PC's who went along for the battle, and those that helped out by npc'n, made me feel very loved. Even better was watching no less than 5 people standing there at the final battle with Torval to just watch was something ill never forget. I am also not going to lie, being able to have my own personal portal mechanism was pretty awesome as well!

I liked the idea behind the book, with things happening that suddenly made sense when I had heard about the final results from the book, and I can honestly say, that is the first time I have ever let myself get beaten to a pulp on a hunch... (c:

Camp wise, I thought it was a GREAT camp, layout was good, great facilities, and a beautiful grounds. The price can't be beat either, and As I was talking to Mike about, it is only 15 mins farther than Rota Kiwan, so distance is not a big issue....if anything its more Central for EVERYONE.

BAD:
Well this is one that has taken me some time to put words together, but I feel that the Red Tear plot has gotten VERY stale. I think it has even become some what of a joke in the aspect of, we whoop the snot out of them, EVERY time and it seems to be nothing but more of the same... I know I haven't been on the inside of the ritual part of the plot, and what that means, but the fighting part against the same foes, using the same tactics are feeling meh. I think that the Red Tear to me have become almost like Wandering Monsters in the fact that I am not afraid to go out and wipe them out to a man, knowing that next event they will be right back there doing the same old stuff.

BAD Cont'd and UGLY:
I also think it needs to be stated that, we should have had a MUCH harder time in that fight. We as pc's should have had a couple people at the very least drop and need a chip draw, but from what I witnessed barely anyone of our healers was taxed, and we only had 4.... I think we really need to police ourselves as players and make sure we are counting hits, cause I know I took a helluva a beating and dropped back twice and dropped below 0 once. Just something we need to think about.

UGLY while also Bad:

The lack of npc's is really starting to become a real detriment to the game. I know you guys can't control the amount of help you get, but it has definitely taken a toll on the game. I know with Saturday specifically, that Chris getting hurt threw a wrench into alot of what was planned, but the amount of sitting around was very noticeable, and wasn't the greatest feeling knowing that this was one of my last times playing for the foreseeable future. I think something needs to be done to either get you guys more help, or make the reward better for helping, cause something needs to happen, only having 3 npc's for a time is really hurting the game. I wish it wasn't the fact that I go to FH to play since I am a GM at WH, so its my only chance to play, or I would absoutlely help out NPC'n but it is a definite concern that needs to be solved.

HOPE CHRIS IS OKAY.
Long weekend.

I liked this camp better than the one. It hasd the best shower. (better even than rotakwon or Merriewood)
I love the kitchenttes and bathrooms in every single building.
spacing was good. (we need to move cars but tree lines block NPC camp and PC camp just enough to make it sweet.
Lots of outlets.

Food.
Meal plan was good, would have been nice to have snacks and veggie trays. (or at least the upgrade option for such things.) The pulled pork was AMAZING.

Game:
As usual I enjoyed the red tear plots on Saturday night but everything else was lacking. I think the 1000 deaths plot should have been a Saturday morning plot to give us something more to do.
The delay on Friday was really, really long. (like 10:30 game on. We could have at least gotten a game on RP shortlist.)

Friday night seemed pretty slow and the lead up that day had no plots I found myself interested in. (No red X plot, which I wouldn't have gone on anyway.)
Given the emergency on SAT, delays were fine.

All in all I had a good time, and Saturday was fun.

I enjoyed this event a lot. Thank you to those who kept me included and especially to Jared for rp.

Food was good, though I would have liked a snack Saturday early afternoon. Not a problem, just an idea.

I would like to thank everyone for making my (possibly last for a while) event awesome.

I went to bed much earlier than I usually do, so I know I missed some stuff, but I'll talk about as much as I can...

Friday was a bit of a slow start, but part of that was the group showing up when everyone was almost done checking in.

Saturday was awesome. Red Tear fight was fun, as kicking Red Tear butt usually is. Fire snake/me-getting-interrogated plot was my highlight, since it was "my" plot. (By that I mean that I was a main character)

I feel bad for Chris, since he always seems to get the short end somehow. I hope he feels better soon! (And doesn't have to drive to Iowa without one eye working correctly)

Food was good. I wasn't hungry, so that works for me. The camp wasn't bad, except the mosquitoes, which isn't really under our control. I'm still not sure if I like having a "PC cabin" but that may just be LARP paranoia.

Definitely a great event.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. Keep it coming, as it's the only way to improve the game.

Game-On *was* pretty late, but it's been reasonable in the past, so this was the exception to the rule, as it should be. The rest of Friday night was pretty good with plots going on until late into the night. The initial puzzle plot was ingenious.

Saturday, unfortunately, was ridiculously dull. If you were told you could hear the music, you were pretty involved for at least half the day. If not, well, the most productive thing you could do was sleep through it. Some of us tracked those who could hear the music, but after spending an hour watching them sing along to music we couldn't hear, I headed back to town hoping not to miss anything I could actually participate in - unfortunately there was nothing to miss.

Saturday night was active and awesome. It was fun to team up with a single, uber-powerful foe in the red serpent battle. The 'angry lady' plot had a cool twist. The Red Tear plot had the requisite hoards of undead and powerful baddie mages. The castle assault plot pitted us against ordinary foes who were actually vulnerable to all our abilities (it's a shame this is the exception to the rule, but as such, it sure was nice to encounter).

Also, the food was delicious. I recommend, during these hotter months, that the drink coolers be placed on the bar for easier access by the players.

I had a great time this event, but I'll also echo the comments about the pacing on Saturday. Once we got going Saturday evening we had plenty to do, but most of the day was slow. I'm sure that Chris getting injured played some part in that, but compared to the breakneck pace of some recent events it felt like Saturday afternoon was moving at a snail's pace.

The food was good and I have no complaints. Thanks to Chris for providing the food, to Amanda for helping Chris, and to Dani for stepping in when Chris had to step out.

On a larger note, perpetually hitting stone walls in our attempt to understand the nature of the Red Tear ritual / way to save Haven is becoming frustrating. We have access to the best scholars and resources left on Phanterra and have no clue if what we're doing is even vaguely related to the goals we're trying to accomplish. We've now gone through two of the four locations we're scheduled to visit and we have no idea if we're on track to save our home, being led down the garden path by a Red Tear manipulator, or so completely off track that there's no chance of actually saving Haven. No attempt - be it through personal research, NPC conversation, Sage hints in-game or regional advisors is providing us with any answers, and I find that only Taki's faith in the GM staff is preventing Korrigan from dropping the current quest completely and looking for another way to save Haven. (Seriously - we're working on the unconfirmed word of a Red Tear "turncoat"... why the hell are we doing this again? It's not like we've never been duped into hurting ourselves by a bad guy before.)

This problem manifested itself most clearly when we got to the Red Tear ritual and had no idea what the hell we were doing. We thought that we had to use the Cube along with the focusing dish in some configuration, but when we did so we received no confirmation whatsoever that anything we were doing was having any effect at all. The information we did receive suggested that nothing we did was working as expected and hinted that there might be other consequences beyond our perception. Other than killing a bunch of Red Tear I have no idea what we accomplished and no way to check on it. This kind of bafflement is to be expected at the beginning of an arc, but since we've been trying to figure this out since last fall and have only two events between us and the destruction of everything we've worked for, something seems amiss.

I was told during the event that it was clear that "something or someone" was trying to prevent us from understanding what was going on, which is fine... but how? Did they erase all trace of the truth from every avenue available to us? Limit the knowledge and abilities of all of our sages? Prevent our magical sensing abilities from being able to sense what's really going on? If so, how did they do those things? How do we un-do them? All we've got to work with are the mechanical abilities that our characters possess and our ability to ask questions. Our abilities apparently cannot counter the manipulations of our enemies and it was suggested to me that we're not asking the right sort of questions. While some of that is certainly on us as players, be sure to take a look at how your mystery looks from our end - especially in-game and with fragmented information.

I really appreciate all the feedback and think it is spot on and reflects our own feelings about the event. We were admittedly less prepared this event due to me moving and of course we are seriously understaffed, which we will have to address at some point. As to the "mystery," part of that issue was again my absence for that part of the plot and my inability therefore to help facilitate. There is also a design problem which we recognize and will fix, though we always intended to let the third event be far more revealing than the first two, so by fix I mean trudge forward st this point. Also, part of the issue is not using the right skills at the right time: there has been more information to find.

As for following a red tear member: he was tortured so things were verified in that fashion. To my knowledge, though, no one has attempted to research him nor the person he formerly worked for.

All of that said, even though there is more information that could be discovered, I blame our plot construction for the issues. Even though we've been doing this for a long time, we still trip up every now and then, and we learn and fix in future plots.

Keep the feedback coming. It really is valuable.

@ Taki:

also this may be working against us:

Spy—Privileged, Common
Level 1: Investigation – Between events
The spy can discover the amount of money another character makes, and how that character is spending their money within the political system. They
The Warrior Spy has a heck of a cover, a physical presence on the outside, a sneak on the inside.
can learn worker assignments within a territory, military strength, etc.
Level 4: Sabotage – Between events
The Spy chooses a Character to affect. The target receives less information from Research, Investigation and Regional Advisers. In addition the target also has their Wealth level at their next event reduced by 1 level (to a minimum of Starving).

They can be used by NPCs and the tear COULD have MANY spies. Just a theory, since those two skills together could be used very effectively to do exactly what your describing.

NOW for the event:

CAMP:
On a 1 to 5 scale a 3, add in the price the GMs seem to like, makes it a 4.
I was not a fan of the look and feel of the buildings like I am the Winter Haven camp. I do like the central locations for all the players, the kitchen is great for the food cooking people, relative building locations is good.
Sleeping quarters feel jammed together, and I would like to see(at a perfect camp which may not exist until one of us hits the lotto and builds it) sleeping areas for diff in game groups like at the last camp and last years camp.
The mosquitoes were insane, I have NEVER had to use nearly an entire can of Deep Woods Off and STILL come home looking like I had the pox. I thought for sure they were gonna carry my fat hiney off. Ranger/director says its never really that bad, and due to uncut grass. Lets hope if we go back.
I did like that NPC camp and the "cave" pavilion wasn't a long walk considering the heat, but on cooler events would be nice if the cave wasn't so obvious form the "tavern"". Did I hear correct there is another elsewhere?
Also not thrilled with the unsafe ground obstacle level of the area used for most of the large fights. Not hating it, just the safety marshal part of my wasn't happy.

PLOT/GAME: I thought overall it was strong. Closer to the full weekend jammed in one day of the one day and far better than last event which I felt was slow. I tend to be slow to get into and back outta game due to costuming/armoring time as well as being old, outta shape and slow in general. Even with that and a few hour nap after game break I still felt busy, maybe I slept through the bits others felt poorly paced,
Red tear fight was cool, had to even chuckle at the pin cushion version of Korrigan due to the three archers.
The fight in Brents "Im Home!" plot was INSANE...in a good way. I had my CBR and armor beat to crap AND had to use almost every skill AND still took 2 30+ channels that nearly killed me...and would have if not for my new specialties AND the hard work of Fionna, Markus, Nell, and one other PC whose name I cant recall due to my old calcified brain(Abbadons minion... i mean apprentice ).
I like the flags better than the orange cones for the herbs, cones are too easy to see and not very immersive.

Nick, GREAT RP job as always on conversive RP and taking damage as an NPC RP. I still hate you, you ninja sprinting spidey blocking bastage. Plan on having your drinks drugged next event to slow ya down!
Jared(sp?) Check in and out seems to be getting smoother, nice job.
Brad, kudos for your NPC stamina. Say you completely worn out a few times and ya still trudged on. Thanks! Oh...i still oh ya...just sayin.
Chris, you do know there are rules about striking other players weapons with the face...for shame! (Hope your ok, the work you did pre eye shot did make it easy for the meal plan to still run smooth when others stepped in. GREAT JOB!
Mike...what can I say, aside from...because FUCK YOU.... and that damn snake. And I say it with love...creepy man love...but beggars cant be choosers.

Overall event 4 outta 5

Signed,
Kaylan Lencher
Master of robustly unpleasant magnetism

I can't believe this is only the second full event of the year. It already feels like the third to me.

Love the campsite~! People have been complaining about the PC building, but they've forgotten that there was an option of bunking in the non-amenities barracks up on the hill down the 'fire-bowl' path. And for those really adventurous people, I found a small area around a campfire ring further back in the woods that had three one-open-side shelters made of wood they could really camp at. And if we ever get the ranger's trust enough to use the Tower, I think it would be a very good camp to use. Mosquitoes were bad, along with the rain, but as people mentioned both of those aren't typical for that site. And with a couple small towns in either direction for food during game break, it's pretty ideal~! (And of course I'm loving the fact that its half-a-tank less for me round trip. Not going to lie about that.)

Sleep deprivation made me pretty loopy near the end, so apologies for getting on people's nerves. While I agree with Korrigan that I'm frustrated with the slowness of the year-long plot, I understand that it's THE YEAR-LONG PLOT and that it's highly unlikely that we'll find the things out that we need to know until near the very end. (Not to say Nellie ISN'T looking into other possibilities...)

I have a feeling the Red Tear fight was gearing up to be worse than it currently was if I hadn't used the GIANT ARSED LASER FROM HELL on them. But I think a lot of people have conveniently forgotten that part of the narration along with the fact that Serrith dropped some Chaos creatures on them that cut the battle time in at least half and left the players feeling like there should have been more to it. That's because yes, there was supposed to be more. Tactics in conjunction with me managing to be very efficient with a mistake changed that.

Out of everything though, three instances top my mind for the weekend as the best parts: Telling one of the victims of the rage filled lady "How could we not?" in response to their amazement that we came to help them, both logically and emotionally manipulating the non-charmed PC group that were originally against helping the charmed group continue helping Alto's somewhat shady Master, and running away from a bunch of dune worms with only Ceres as backup because the rest of the group turned around to head back to the inn.

The fact that we managed to find another cube like Ceres' has given me thinky thoughts, and the feeling that yes, we did miss something major back in Gateway. (Or somebody found something and isn't sharing.)

Feedback wise, all I can say is that I loved every single moment of this event (minus the starfish call - those incidents I'll never love), and I'm glad I didn't sleep and miss any of it. Multiple times I found myself in situations were I had to rely on the connections and best guesses that my mind had made, and finding out that those were right made me feel better about playing a sage. Getting out of the tavern and being involved in the plots to their completion made my weekend, and I'd probably go stir crazy if I didn't do these things with you all. To all you people that decided it was too far to drive, you missed an amazing event and a wonderful experience.

The RP was there and intense from both PC and NPC sides, the fighting was available at the drop of a hat, the GM and NPC staff were courteous and available to answer questions even if you did have to wait your turn. I'm sorry I ran you all ragged Friday and Saturday night - I'm just a tenacious little terrier when I've got plans and agendas.

For me the event was kinda meh, not good, not bad, just meh.

I believe that this was mostly due to the limited staff. For example, a small group of I think four of us went out to just find a little trouble, this was unfortuantely around the time that three other groups started to converge on to NPC camp, and we all stumble onto the wyvern fight. I'm not sure if anyone else felt cheated in this experience, but the small crew I was with did. Again, i understand the why becasue you guys are short staffed. That's mostly the reason I decided to just NPC the rest of the night past a certain point.

I gotta say, Serith's plot was probably my favorite battle. Period.

During the Red Tear plot, I think there was some rules misunderstanding going on. Like charging skills on the run and not restarting a charge when struck. Just sayin, it was mostly newbies doing this, but there were a few seasoned players too.

My only gripe with the camp, besides the swarms of mutant mosquitoes, was NPC camp placement. I don't want to say it was too accessable, but it was right there. At the previous camp there was concern that NPC camp was too close, and this camp it felt right on the back porch.

Just want to give a shoutout to CJ and Dani, your RP was awesome during the rage monster attack.

Edit: Just a reminder to newbie rouges: keep in mind that dodge is a LP AND 10 second reload. Taking a couple or three of "2 vorpal" in succession would drop most.

Another Good Solid Haven Event with some good solid archery

Chris I hope you an expedite recover, and much enjoyment in Vicodin land.

The Good
Seeing everyone again

Chaos Frogs, Multicolor swirly realm of chaos.

Korrigan throwing the strange floating dagger into the Chaos Realm so we could deal with something else. The F*** this dagger amused me greatly.

The Pit Trap for Hero’s was enjoyable, and so was the RP with the Trapped Heroes

Being the only PC that remembered that the Winged Serpents gave the maps to a Hero trapped in the Pit Trap which seemed to be a big plot mover for (I believe) Serith.

The Vulture Avyana was well RPed and gave a really good reason to be an Eater of the Dead in a “non-evil” way. Even if it was still gross.

NPCing the Two head fire Drake and breathing fire onto the PCs

I saved a lot of people from dying this weekend, some people more than once. I am really enjoying being a Combat Medic Archer, because of the general awareness of all of the happenings on the field, which allows me to react rather quickly to any downed companions.

Experiencing being an Archer, firing on a line of attackers weakening a charge, and being the Archer behind a charge weakening the battle line that my allies are about to charge into.

I had one of the best shots of my Archery Carrier late Saturday night where I hit Nick who was archer NPCing from across the battlefield.

The Bad
I had a really good time, anything that is considered bad I cannot remember because of all of the good.

Some, Hopefully, Constructive Criticism/Idea pertaining to lack of NPCs
I will start by saying the Haven games are very very good at getting every mile out of every NPC both in combat and in RP, and I enjoy Big 75 foot worm battles, or similar low amounts of monsters with High hit point creature battles, or even multiple pops of medium strength monsters, and these are good for your average encounter, dungeon encounters, puzzle encounters, or Huge monster Boss fights. But, I felt there was a lack of NPC presence and ability this game. And I would suggest to the GMs/NPC staff to do, is to add a couple bi-plot encounter every once and a while. And what I mean by Bi-plot encounters is to run two plots at the same time and then uses the PCs from the Separate plots as NPC for the other plots. This suggestion has been done before by Finalhaven GMs and it has made for memorable stories (encounter) that are still told today, almost a year later.

A good example of a point during this game when this could have been implemented was when a large portion of the PC was sitting outside of the NPC shake after the break looking for something to do. Instead of spawning 3 fire drakes with lots of hit point that were easily disposed off, the 2 GMs could have split the group into 2 groups and made them fight each other, and then the PC would have had a rather interesting encounter and 2 combats.

I will also caution game staff that encounters with high numbers of NPC are generally more difficult (I would say much more difficult) then lower NPC encounter with respawns to represent the rest of the group, which is one of the things that makes these encounter types so fun.

Also, if this is implemented, consideration should also be taken into account about loot drops, and if there should be more loot dropped for one of these encounters because the Players are fighting two encounters using personal energies that could be directed to find more loot on other plots, even though their character is only fighting one encounter.