I can definitely go back to doing various content-events. Player input would definitely be required, probably best NOT in this post as it will get lost with the sea of replies that are bound to occur (because honestly, this is just the "bring them back" thread in a new form) - get in touch with me through a forum PM or IRC PMs. If there is enough player interest, perhaps we can setup a formal system for generating ideas and taking meaningful criticism and feedback on how to make future events better.
Remember,
we're not talking about automated/re-occurring events, special "fighting areas" or anything like that. Everything has to exist within the World of Britannia+Lost Lands and everything has to be operational "as is" with the current systems in place. The Staff assistance is purely there for helping organize and adding a little flavor (decor, chance of trophies/silver, etc)
Here are some events I've run since coming to Staff in August 2013:
The Gem Encrusted
Whereas this is not a popular event, it does serve it's purpose. It provided a place for players to go. Gem encrusted monsters are harder than their regular form, but drop gems (2 to 8 gems), allowing new players to obtain gold a tad quicker (with an increased challenge to fight harder monsters and with the timesink of having to sell gems), and at the same time, provided a place for established players to fight all new boss monsters (powerful creatures - gem encrusted balrons, ancient liches, gem encrusted wyrms, etc). On top of PVM, it provided PKs a reliable dungeon to find players in. I monitored much of the activities during the Deceit encrusted attack and the activity was much higher than normal. PVM events bring natural PVP because of PKs and PVPers looking for PKs/anyone to fight.
This is currently going on in Covetous, there are even rare-monsters spawning if you slay enough of the same monster type.
Player-organized, Staff supported weekly dungeon crawls
All this involves is a player who is willing to gather players at Britain Bank on a weekly basis. At the determined time, a one-way gate will appear at Britain bank (staff created) to a random dungeon or region. The area is spawned to a "theme" - we had orcish hordes occupying Hythloth once with specialty orcs not found anywhere else. Another time Ratmen (ratmen, ratmen mages, ratmen archers, and other event-ratmen) invading Covetous. Another time we had the undead heavily spawning in the Yew Crypt. Last year we did Wednesdays at 8pm EST because that's when the player running it could make it. Single silver coins have been known to appear on random monsters within the effected region during these events but they were very rare and based on the total number of attendees.
Ice Dungeon Crawl:
viewtopic.php?f=11&t=57627
Ultima Lure-driven Monster Bashing
This includes stories involving The Guardian, a well known evil within the Ultima storyline. He's attacked 3 times so far - once at the Abandoned Fireworks Factory, once at the Fire Temple, and a third time at Trinsic's Barrier island (the defense is still maintained there, should he come back). I have a 4th piece to this story developed and a 5th underway but Summer left me with little time to sit inside at a computer. It is typical to receive trophies valuing 1 or 10pts from these events on random monster kills (despite what the general consensus that people claimed that only the "boss monsters" dropped them and that it was somehow unfair and bias with any justifications from players.) During the 3 major attacks, trophies were given out "The Guardian Attacks <date>" were the labels.
The Guardian Attacks, Isle of Avatar -
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Regular Monster Bash/Town Invasions
Most recently, "A Pirate's Life For Me" was a multi-day event over the span of a week or 2 where pirates reinforced Buc's Den, and then attacked Magancia until players were able to push the pirates back to the docks and eventually back to Buc's where our players continued to fight off the pirates for an additional few days. Trophies were able to be obtained during all of these.
The Orcish Attack at Vesper. Sometime this year, orcs invaded Vesper for a solid 6 hours before players were able to amass an army strong enough to keep the horde down and then the players themselves went to the Cove Orc Fort to continue the fight against the orcs until the Butcher spawned and was eventually slain.
Delucia Invasion:
viewtopic.php?f=25&t=57737
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In my opinion, the biggest thing we don't do on UOSA with our events is doing on-going promotion. When an event occurs, the town crier (and in IRC you can do !news) will talk about it. Typically a Facebook/Twitter update is made. We'll do this each day that the event is going on for in some cases, but it's up to players to keep their eyes open and actually play the game, instead of sitting in IRC waiting. We reward those who are actually out there playing, not people waiting on a sidebar watching a calendar and counting the minutes until the next event happens.
Maybe this part of the procedure can be changed. In the past it worked fine, because we had players who actually wanted to do this for us. If players put in half as much effort into being positive instead of leaving negative comments (note: criticism is great, but only if it's constructive) or being cynical, I think we'd see a much brighter future.
UOSA has always claimed to chase accuracy. It's been said for years, long before I was staff here. The reason I stayed as long as I did as a player was knowing the shard has an actual blueprint and you don't have to worry about logging in one day to find crazy hues, new mounts, new uses for items or skills, unthought/unbalanced additions, or being jailed for simply playing UO.
if you have constructive ideas get on it before the door closes 