Feedback Post!

[monomods]

As with last round, we've decided to have a feedback post for round 2! Thank you all once again for participating, and for those of you who didn't get a chance to participate thank you for coming along on this wild and wonderful ride with us anyway. While we're especially looking for feedback from players to see what we can do to improve and upgrade the workings of the game itself, anyone can comment with anything in particular that you noticed. As with last time, the only thing that we require is that you put a name to your critique - to that end, anon commenting is disabled.

There are a few things that we as a mod team are aware of, and things we've been working to change! Those issues and changes are the following:

First of all, you have our sincere apologies for the way a few trials and situations played out this round - there were a few things that were accidentally set up in such a way that was completely unwinnable, and while it was unintentional on our part that doesn't excuse the fact that it was frustrating and unfair to our playerbase. We're sorry, as a lot of that was on us from an organizational standpoint, and we should have implemented changes to our system a lot more firmly than we did, more quickly than we did.

On that note, a few details regarding the way we set up trials have been changed. From here on, there will be no more asking Monobear to conceal crucial evidence, nor will the mods be issuing "saves" from the bear for any reason outside of "We completely screwed up in giving you guys sufficient evidence."

Don't worry, however! We have also changed evidence protocols to streamline the entire process. This is something we received crit on in the last round, and while we had rough patches in this round as well, we've worked out an organizational system that will allow us to see immediately whether a trial is solvable, both with regards to the culprit and figuring out what happened.

From here on, we'll do our best to ensure that there are no more trials that are accidentally unwinnable. Again, you have our apologies, as well as our gratitude for your patience and understanding.

The other things we've been working on improving with this round include:

Increased efficiency and clarity in handing out evidence during investigations: This is something that really came to our attention this round, and we've been trying to improve the way the mods communicate with the players during the investigation in order to prevent confusion or overly-startling "The room is covered in blood" moments.

Improved pacing: The last few weeks of the last round were said to drag quite a bit, and this time we really tried to focus on keeping the energy of the game up. (We would like to add the caveat that while there was a lot of slowdown during the few days before the trial, that was more or less inevitable, because that week is an incredibly busy one on our end while we prepare to roll endgame out.)

Increased player autonomy: We wanted to avoid an overly-scripted game in which the plot was handed to you. As such, we worked toward allowing for more player-induced sidequests, more "rewards" for taking initiative where appropriate, and actually letting the players themselves decide exactly what sort of ending they wanted to the game. (There's another caveat here: the Golden Ending was an option, not a guarantee, and choosing to gun for that ending and not giving up until they got from it everything that they wanted was entirely a player-made decision. They earned the hell out of that Golden Ending, and it was entirely their choice as players to do so.)

If there's anything else you can think of that didn't work, or anything that did work that you particularly liked, we would like to hear from you! All feedback will be read and taken into consideration, though we may not respond to every one or implement all suggested changes. Of course you're free to discuss amongst yourselves, as well, as long as you keep it civil.

Once again, thank you so much for participating in this round of Dangan Roleplay - it's been a pleasure to work with you as a mod team, and we hope that it was as enjoyable to play in as it was to run. You all did so well, guys - thank you all, and hopefully we'll see you again for Round Three!

Comments

[thejusticewagon]

OKAY SO I think you guys did a hell of a job and this was an amazing experience. I feel like I should say that you did a very good job of responding to and addressing little issues as they came up within the game (like repetitive evidence and whatnot) and I could definitely see that coming through on my end.

Overall, I think you did a really good job of hammering out the issues people brought up with R1...! I think the only crit-ish suggestion I'd make would be making murder timelines mandatory rather than suggested, because I think that might preemptively help avoid problems that come from you guys and the players being busy. I think the final "standard" investigation/trial turned out pretty well regardless despite the fact that we got hit with a combination of "everyone is busy" and "terrible luck with plurk," but I think having a timeline written up before the universe decided to hate us would have made dealing with some of the last minute stuff less... hectic.

Aside from that, I only have suggestions for some experimental things you might want to mess around with in future rounds! I had a lot of fun being a "witness"/complicating factor in a case, and while I'm not sure how to implement those in future rounds it'd be pretty darn fun to do so. It could be a little helpful with "unwinnable" trials, since I think those could've been mitigated a bit by witness testimony.

I also reeeally liked the sidequest-y stuff like Floor 7 and how many ways we could have things go at the end. I guess my only suggestion on that end would be to have it a little more spread throughout rather than having a lot of it at the end, maybe? I do understand that's a lot of work for you guys, but at the same time I think having little investigations/areas where the cast can make progress on the setting through the weeks could also be a little more manageable for you guys, even?

As more general gushing about stuff I liked, I really liked how you guys utilized the fact that DRRP doesn't operate on standard jamjar logic and stuff that goes on actually affects characters' home worlds and whatnot. It was fun to think of the implications throughout and the fact that it was an actual plot point was fucking awesome imo. The twists were pretty fucking great and I really love how it built off round 1 and kudos to you all for pulling it off.

...and uhh... HMMMM that's all I can think of for now, I might make another comment/edit this if I think of anything else

[torya]

Pretty much everything I wanted to give feedback on is addressed in the post, so I guess it's time to be a HUGE LOSER INSTEAD and just gush about how much I loved this game.

I've been RPing for nearly ten years now and I can honestly say that DRRP is the most fun I've had in RP ever. It took up all my free time and exhausted me and it was worth every single second of it. I got so attached to this cast and this setting that I'm really honestly heartbroken to see it end. You all did a fantastic job in building a compelling mystery and for leaving us enough clues that, in hindsight, all came together to tell us exactly what we needed to know when we needed to know it and not too soon or too late.

I also want to say that I'm so glad the mods were as approachable as you were -- I never felt uncomfortable coming to either of you for clarification on something or if I had a problem and in a game like DRRP, that's so important. Having you as players alongside us, as well as mods, was great as well!

The plot of this round as a whole was totally amazing and HOLY SHIT THOSE TWISTS. Mastermind Lysandre on a fucking gyarathrone. MASS EXECUTION. I'm pretty sure you scared about ten years off my life.

The Mono Mono Machine was also a fantastic idea! Even just getting random junk from it was fun, and seeing characters win each other's regains was so interesting and it was a mechanic I don't think I've seen used in another game.

Also, the ending. Literally everything about that ending felt so amazing, especially after being put through the goddamn emotional wringer for weeks and earning that ending was so satisfying on so many levels -- as was the fact that the characters had a choice with what to do after they left the school.

Also, I think it's a testament to how well this game was written that you not only made me sympathetic towards Monobear, but you made me fall flat on my face in love with him TINY CUTE BEAR A.I. <3

ARRGHH basically, this round was fucking fantastic and I'm so pleased with everything and I love everyone in this bar AND I WANT TO SMOOCH YOUR FOREHEADS FOR GIVING US SUCH A GOOD ROUND

[loveisanopendoor]

Alright boys and girls, I hope you're ready because this is probably gonna get really sappy and I'm already a huge ball of emotion today for various reasons, and I'm sure this is only going to make things worse, but I really can't thank all of you enough, and I do mean quite literally all of you, for making this as amazing of an experience as it was. I knew from the moment I joined up here, especially after that phenomenal mock trial, that I was going to have a fantastic time with all of you, and I most certainly wasn't disappointed in the slightest. Someone said it before, but the roleplay is only as good as the players who are in it, and I genuinely loved tagging around with each and every one of you. I can't wait to get around to all of you in the epi-log, and I'm always down for musebox stuff or whatever you need; you all know how to contact me! Thank you for being such amazing castmates over these past three months; the game definitely would not have been the same without any of you, and through this game, I've made incredible friends and had experiences I don't think I'm going to forget. It's people like you guys that made me remember how much I used to love roleplaying before I took my hiatus many moons ago; I'm so glad that I decided to take a chance and join Dreamwidth to join up with you guys (you can thank Atom for that one)!! Seriously, for an impulse pick-up for the mock trial, I was stunned at how positive the response to Anna in the game was, and I'm really thrilled that she got to have such great CR with all of your characters. I hope that she'll continue to have that great CR in future games, but you're all such sweethearts, really.

Throughout the game, it was incredibly clear that everyone, whether they ended up a survivor, a murderer, or a victim, especially our lovely mod staff who I know for a fact worked themselves to the bone to make the best experience possible for us, gave as much effort as they could and tried their hardest to give the best investigations, trials, sidequests, you name it, and were incredibly friendly and accommodating while they did!! I think a lot of the murders turned out to be really interesting, right from the outset, and steps were taken throughout the game to ensure that they were kept fresh and fun to play out. I do agree with Ran's suggestion that a character in a "witness" role was both an interesting concept to see in action in addition to a crutch to help complicate things/help provide vital information, especially in regard to the concern that some trials might be unwinnable! Trials certainly felt a lot more fluid than they seemed to be in Round 1; if the aim was to give more control to the players, it seemed like that goal was certainly reached, and then some! The trial system as a whole was coherent and, for the most part, player-driven; however, while situations where Monobear is being interrogated can be inevitable, I do feel like those can get in the way of the overall pace of the trial system, and having him unable to conceal crucial evidence does make the trial seem more fair! Of course, to have the bear not meddle with the crime scene in his own way every now and again seems almost uncharacteristic of him; the organizational system for the evidence seems like it'll make it easier to see where Monobear can or can't involve himself with the crime every now and again! Case 4 of the first game, where he replaced the suicide note comes to mind; while the suicide note is indeed crucial evidence, the case was fairly solvable without it, and replacing it with a fake one certainly had an effect on Asahina.

The twists and turns of the story were excellent, and I always found myself at the edge of my seat just waiting to see what kind of new curveballs were thrown at us. It was most certainly far from predictable, even though there was quite a bit of foreshadowing that made sense given certain information! Like Claire mentioned before, I couldn't help but kick myself when I realized the tower was in the shape of a Poke Ball...in regards to how this stacked up to Round 1, that whole twist was certainly a major, yet very welcome surprise! You all certainly outdid yourselves in that regard, and you have a lot to be proud of even in regard to the more subtle details like Floor 7. I can't thank you all, Lynny, Ri and Dal for putting on such a good show, because it was truly magnificent.

Also, gosh-darn, seeing the murders and supplementary materials played out in museboxes and whatnot were real treats, and I loved seeing them whenever they popped up; I most certainly not be opposed to seeing more of those in future rounds because reading them just added that much more to the trial experience!

I can't wait to see what you all have in mind for the future. I'm sure that no matter what all of you end up doing, you'll be destined for games full of success and a hell of a lot of fun, whether you're running them or just playing along. I'm incredibly honored to have been a part of this, and I'm thrilled to see what's next for everyone. Thank you all, from the bottom of my heart, for everything you've done both to make this game incredible, and for me as friends and castmates.

Also special thanks to VG for putting up with how absolutely livid I was over that last case because I was out on a date and the second I saw the Monokuma file I flew into a blind fury

[mopocalypse]

Longtime spectator here. I adored this round and thought it was a huge improvement from the last one, which was already pretty awesome. Points as follows:

* I was really surprised by another Everybody Lives ending, but you still lived up to your promise -- I saw people pulling all-nighters and working themselves to the bone just to meet the requirements, so I know it was an A++ effort ending, not just a guarantee. Just reading it had huge emotional pull and I loved it.
* Switching the Hope Shard system out for the Monomono Machine was a great idea. I've been a mod in the past and I know screwing around with HTML is a pain in the neck, and for a plot-heavy, extreme-high-activity game, I don't know how you survived it in the first round. The Monomono Machine also feels more authentically Dangan Ronpa and had a clear, present, and easily understood OOC and IC effect in the game.
* Rumour has it that themed rounds will be short spinoffs rather than have the official Round 3 be OC-only/single-fandom/villains-only/what-have-you. If so, that's a great idea! It lets everyone app who they want for the round and still work within the confines of a challenge round for a while.
* I liked how you built the plot and had it respond to the characters, who they were, and how they grew throughout the story. One of the big themes of this round seemed to be "learn to understand each other because every life matters", and it really seemed like they did matter, from the survivor pool to the early dead. Round 1 seemed like it had major characters and minor characters, but Round 2 was more of an ensemble story like DR itself was supposedly written to be.
* Sidequests? Awesome. I loved seeing them and they looked like a lot of fun along with advancing the plot.

You guys are amazing just by looking and this kind of game has to take a lot of time and effort on your parts. Congratulations!

[dereban]

I'm going to agree that this was definitely a really wonderful first time experience for me -- I've never been in a game where murder happens, and I honestly believe that you handled everything little well, especially any of the problems that persisted, especially on my behalf. You were great at dealing with both players problems timezone-wise, which is what I was really pleased with for the final investigation, and simply just general problems as well. You guys are top notch, and I thank you for that so much.

And I'm going to agree with Ran that a timeline written up should be a mandatory thing, not an optional thing. When I was reading up the investigation for the case that I was personally involved in, it was a little difficult - not impossible - to see the entire timeline, but that might have been because neither of the victims were in contact with each other during the entire planning of the case, so that's something to note for the near future. It was a nice surprise on my part, figuring out who the other person was that ended up dying, but if you're going to plan a multiple person murder, I personally think it would be better if all parties involved could contact each other for future rounds.

I also really enjoyed the side quests on the seven floor; I know not everything was gotten to due to either a time crunch of having things missed in general, but I'm not blaming you guys for that at all. I honestly think that the idea of having side quests is great, and I'm hoping that you guys implement this in round three as well so that more characters can jump on that bandwagon.

As for things I enjoyed this round, let's be real. The twists in the game were amazing -- I was honestly surprised that Lysandre was the mastermind and that Adachi was the mole, mostly because of their roles in canon, and I personally did not expect people who had respective canonically "evil" slash "villain" roles would end up being the ones in such important roles, and I'm quite pleased with how that went. Lynsey and Dal, you two did wonderfully in this round in your respective roles, just allow me to applaud you two for that. You guys put on a show, and it was a rather pleasant one indeed.

I didn't even expect our characters to be in Kalos, and I was completely thinking - especially during the time the Information Room was revealed - that Junko, or someone from SHSL Despair could have been involved in the masterminding of this round, and I'm honestly glad that wasn't the case. And the fact that all the characters - sans Sycamore - were Future Foundation members prior to the game and actually knew each other before the game even began was a surprise even I wasn't expecting, and I'm clear positive that not many of us saw that coming.

I also enjoyed the canon integration, and I'm agreeing with almost everyone else who's said it - the fact that Dangan Roleplay doesn't operate on the same rules that most standard jamjar games do - that time still goes on as the game happens, and that there are actually consequences that do have to occur in the end, regardless of what happens.

Another thing to note is that the memory loss aspect was really great and I enjoyed how it was implemented. The Monomono Machine was also an amazing idea to use, and I laughed so many times when Schuldig kept pulling out people's underwear. Henri was also a blessing, and although I did find the name suspicious, I personally had no clue as to what it meant until the reveal happened, so here's to crossing my fingers for future rounds, regardless if I end up participating in them or not.

I was also really happy that this game could have ended in multiple ways. While I'm glad that our survivors did so well that they got us the Golden ending, we might not have gotten it, and just thinking about those endings makes me really excited for the next rounds - because hey, maybe next time we won't to as well from an IC standpoint, but who knows!

As for my suggestions as of right now, the only major one I can think of right now is that as mods, you guys should probably have write-ups of the general areas of the locations for investigations because there are going to be characters who will do a wide sweep of the room, so basically, anything you can see at first glance would be nice.

And, while I'm not doing it myself, I'm kind of curious. Would participants of Round 2 be able to participate in Round 3? If the memory-related things are going to continue being in play and characters are not allowed to talk about certain aspects of Round 2, etc.

If I think of anything else, I'll either edit this comment or post a new comment, thank you so much mods for making this wonderful! And thank you everyone who participated in this round, I had a blast.