Creating Memorable Public Community Adventures
By: Benjamin “Foghladha” Foley
F
or more than a decade,
I have hosted public
community adventures for
hundreds of players at a time. They
may seem easy to put together,
however anyone that has helped me
run them knows just how difficult
they may be. Creating a memorable
event is even tougher.
When we’re looking to create a
public community event there
are several things we need to look
at. The first thing to realize is
that every player has a different
motivation for playing. For some
they play for loot and rewards, for
others achievements and accolades,
and for others they play for
community. There is one thing that
every human being craves from the
time they’re born to the time they
die. Acceptance. People want to feel
important, they want to feel useful,
and they want to feel needed. If you
can bring these things into your
event it will be a huge success.
Now before we go into details, I
want to be honest with you for a
moment. Just because you create
an event, doesn’t mean players will
flock to it. It also doesn’t mean that
players won’t long for something
else. Not every event you think up
8
will be a great event that people
remember. It takes practice and it
takes understanding your audience.
For example the second season
of the Telara Saga in RIFT. By the
time we kicked it off players grew
tired of closing rifts and doing
zone invasions. They longed for
something else. The interest of the
community changed and by the end
of season 2 the population was next
to nothing.
Not a single person could tell you
anything memorable about Season
2. However if you ask someone
about Season 1 where we sieged
the Defiant (rival faction) capital
city of Meridian, you would hear
wild stories about how hundreds
slammed into that city and caused
an entire block of servers to go
offline. The event series literally
drew over 800 players to the field
for one epic battle at the gates of the
rival faction’s city.
So what changed between the
two seasons? The biggest piece
that changed was the lack of an
unsurpassable foe. In season 2
there was nothing standing in the
way of success, no major villain,
no unbeatable, unthinkable task
to overcome. The best, most
memorable, public community
events I’ve hosted we’re not the
ones where the fight was easy, but
was the one where we took players
to a place they would never think to
go or ever have the opportunity to
see.
The most memorable experiences
in a mmo don’t come with the
fights you should have won, they
come from the fights you should
have lost yet prevailed. They come
from doing that which is not easily
obtained.
Putting an idea to work
When conceiving a plan for a public
community event it is important to
consider a few key points.
Give a reason to attend
You need to offer some type of
experience they normally wouldn’t
receive. Whether it’s killing a
creature so difficult it requires large
scale coordination, or making use
of a system only available to a select
few, or a prize that is highly sought
after.
Reward players for consistency
Offering rewards to players for
participating is a great way to keep
the population attending. Whether