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Question about the 10 year story

So, I'm trying to find more info on the world story or whatever it is called. Is it an actual sort of overarching narrative that the devs are pushing by providing quests and events to support it, or is it largely player driven and the devs just go with whatever the players are pushing for?

I know that there are story points, which you get rewarded for participating in the story. Does that mean you have to be located near the seats of power in each country to be more involved in major affairs, or can people located in remote locations still be just as involved?

I'm just trying to get a better understanding of the whole concept, if anyone has links to existing explanations I would appreciate one.


1/31/2017 3:39:30 PM #1

I think the best explanation of the 10 year story came from one of the early Q&A sessions:

We break this story up, as we choose the title “Chronicles of Elyria” as opposed to “World of Elyria” or “Elyria Online” or any other name, because the concept of “Chronicles” to us speak to us of texts, of books, of epic novels and that is what we wanted to recreate with this game, this idea of you living out this epic story.

So we have divided up this 10-year story into books, and each book is going to last about a year, there is about 10-books in this story, these books are further divided up into chapters and the chapter for us could be months. What happens is that at the transition point, at the inflection from one chapter to another, we don’t know what the players are going to do, how they’re going to come out of that chapter. At any one time, the engine is always looking at how close you are to one of the possible outcomes and it is trying to drive you to one of those outcomes. It is introducing quests, creating conflict and introducing NPCs that have certain personalities so they grow up and have conflict.

The choices that the players make might steer them towards one of the others, as soon as they do, it adds weight and credibility to it and drive them to that other step. This whole story is built around this concept of triggers and things that players can do, and it might be that they can start heading in a direction that we didn’t anticipate at all and it has something to do that is cataclysmic or awesome or whatever. But we don’t have the whole story upfront, we have a plan for an overall and we do have writers on staff and as things progress we have the opportunity to respond to things as necessary. This isn’t something players need to look for it is something they will be involved in whether they wanted to be or not.

Source

The thing to remember is that this story is for the world, some parts might be local, some parts impacting everywhere all at once. There is no 'right' place to be in order to take part.

It is really important to note that the 10 year story is just one of the layers of the story of Elyria. You have the 10 year story, you have the dance of dynasties, you have personal stories based on your birth date, stories based on the ecosystems around you. Some of those are almost completely player driven, such as the dance of dynasties, some are driven by the Soulborn Engine, such as your personal destiny. There is a bit more about the layers of story in this article which is not direct quotes but a summary of information shared by the developers at the time.

As for story points they are not directly for participating in the 10-year story. The idea of story points is any play that goes towards you gaining skills or you completely achievements earns you points, this is covered in the Developer Journal on Bolstering and Earn to Play. It is simply being active in the world, and all activity helps drive forward the world story on one of the many layers.


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2/1/2017 3:19:46 PM #2

Ok, thanks for the info, I'm sure that I and everyone else in the game would love to be involved in the story the devs have planned, but I'm sure they're not going to stick a big yellow exclamation mark over some NPC that says "talk to this guy to continue the story" so people are going to have to find it themselves for the most part.

My main worry was that It would just kind of suck if the main push of the story was happening in a completely different nation from wherever you are located so you have almost no chance of being involved unless you decide to become a hobo and do a bit of traveling.


2/1/2017 3:58:11 PM #3

Posted By Jasta85 at 09:19 AM - Wed Feb 01 2017

Ok, thanks for the info, I'm sure that I and everyone else in the game would love to be involved in the story the devs have planned, but I'm sure they're not going to stick a big yellow exclamation mark over some NPC that says "talk to this guy to continue the story" so people are going to have to find it themselves for the most part.

My main worry was that It would just kind of suck if the main push of the story was happening in a completely different nation from wherever you are located so you have almost no chance of being involved unless you decide to become a hobo and do a bit of traveling.

Just because the "big story" isn't happening near you doesnt meant that it won't in the future. Imagine an invasion of some mythical creature in Kingdom A. Kingdom B (which you live in) decides not to help. Kingdom A could either slay the creature then turn their sights on your kingdom for not assisting or the creature moves through their lands slaughtering everything in it's path. A path that is leading directly towards your settlement.

Kindom A could be fighting that mythical creature and because kingdom B didn't help. Carebear guild A in Kingdom B thinks they should have. They in turn, start pushing for Casus Belli's on nobility. Now you have a story that is local to you.

Just because they get to experience one story doesn't mean you won't have a part to play in one or more. Not every server will have the same story either. Technology will play a part in stories. EU-1 may never research ocean traveling where NA-E does..

I think the fun of the game will not only come from the player and dev driven story, it will also be cool to read about what is going on with other servers. Let's just hope the people plan on documenting these things don't flood the forums with small tales of John the blacksmith doing every day things.. If people do write about stuff like that, let's hope the forums are categorized for big stories and smaller ones. So people don't have to filter through tons of mundane stuff to get to awesome tales.


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2/1/2017 5:31:31 PM #4

And you must keep the scale and simultaneity of stories in mind, this will not be a game where you character is "the chosen hero" like all other players. While the mythical creatures atack the kingdom A, kindgom C mays be facing a misterious plage in some of its towns and kingdom D is cursed with a neverending night.


2/1/2017 5:45:52 PM #5

I think it was pretty much covered... the 10 yr story line is basically the direction the Devs will try to move the world over time. That doesn't mean that technology and population can change the direction some, but it is a general plan for the world.

Each character will have their own story line as well. Closely following your personal story line will be what earns you the Story Points. These points can be used to purchase a Spark of Life to help curve the cost of the game.


"Count Eldric Blackmoore of The Haven, offering direct support for the Hunters, Explorers and Gathers of Elyria" the