What does "Persistent World" mean?

fetito666

What does "Persistent World" mean? Is that like a sandbox, but inside of one of the campaigns?

Musaab

Think of it like a mini-mmo. It's a server that stays online (most of the time) and the changes that happen to it are "persistent" meaning permanent. You will be able to play with others who will advance their characters just like you do. There can be Dungeon Master(s) who host events/run dungeons. Because there are way fewer people than an actual mmo, there is more room for RP and relationships have more meaning.

fetito666

Okay, but does the loot respawn in the dungeons?

Jimbobslimbob

fetito666 said:

Okay, but does the loot respawn in the dungeons?

Depends on the player world you are playing on. The creators have control over the experience - they write the lore, story, design and create the worlds and people, make the rules etc.

The potential for NWN persistent worlds is staggering and some of them can drastically change the game. I remember at one point there was a Firefly (the sci-fi show) server in the works, along with a Star Wars themed one similar to KOTOR.

This is one of the many reasons why NWN is so good, it's so customisable.

melonrancher

I preferred PWs that were more action oriented than RP. Log in, find a group of similar level, then go find a cave or a castle or a swamp and kill monsters, gain XP, find loot. In these types of worlds, loot definitely respawned -- it was a main motivator for players to group and go adventuring. Occasionally DMs would lead unique quests or spawn special mobs, or stage a monster invasion of the city causing everyone logged in to rush back and defend.

To echo the post above, what's so cool about NWN is that there is (was) a huge spectrum of types of PW to play on. It seems like mostly the RP PWs have survived at this point, which is not my preferred style. I hope NWN:EE brings back many of the old PWs and spawns many new ones too.

Kaltrip

There are also some servers still running out there that are more action orientated. Places like the Higher Ground and the Three Towns servers come to mind. On these loot respawns as you describe. I've kept a little server that would fit into this category running for the last eight years but there aren't many people still playing on it. Hopefully with the reintroduction of a central listing of available servers, and the renewed interest in NWN with the EE, numbers should pick up again. It's also worth pointing out that some of the RP servers will happily accommodate other play styles as long as you don't cause problems for other players. Places like the Island of Thain might be worth a look. Who knows, if you try a bit or "RP lite" you might even get to enjoy it ;-)

superfly2000

fetito666 said:

Okay, but does the loot respawn in the dungeons?

Its funny how you despite not being versed in multiplayer actually put your finger on one of the main problems in the so called "persistent worlds"...and that is...that most of them are really far from 100% persistent.

On most servers its kind of accepted that much of the fixed loot (in containers) only respawns at server restart. However...most servers also tend to have somewhat regular restarts for this reason. There are a few servers who have fully scripted persistent systems for this but usally it still doesnt offer full functionality (like ability to have traps and locks on chests for example).

Anyway...if you are really interested about multiplayer I think I wrote somewhere in the forum already that I am willing to teach beginners in this. The reason being that I am also looking for players to cooperate with. Voice coms like Discord is required though.

I am the admin on Genesis Nordock (link to the homepage is in my signature).