Make Sencliff Relevant

[Tomato]

Andunor is flooded with outcast huamns and elves, and that should not be. This is because evil has no good hub for villanious RP on the surface, Sencliff can be one, but it needs a face lift.

1: Not everyone wants to RP a "pirate" they just wanna be a bad guy. While Tattoos can easily be hidden from view with a sleeve or armor the tag makes that kind of RP meaningless.
An irremoveable tattoo on the right arm one might be forced to show through RP would be a far better mechanic, imo. Sencliff should be opened to more evil, with temples to evil gods to draw followers, and PCs should be able to become "citizens of sencliff" without turning into full blown pirates, to have an evil government option would be cool and fulfilling as an RP choice.

2: Sencliff has no levelling, UD has best levelling in the server. The two should be connected, with more unique docks surface ships from Sencliff can go to. It will give surface evil places to go that isn't the surface grinding grounds, that are full of paladins and do-gooders who would not join up with any openly-evil person. UD is flooded, and has a lot of unused dock systems! If evil humans and elves had somewhere to go that isn't Andunor, both places would benefit from it.

3: Sencliff has nothing to draw new players to it, the pirate ships destinations are literally the same as other surface ships. The Close Contact destinations should be added, as well as many more pirate only docks. Wharftown, dungeons, shortcuts, cordor outskirts docks, underdark gnome shipyard, Bendir, a port one could get to shadovar from, and so on, I know there are portals, but this could add more of the “freedom” aspect that works so well for pirates, and add a leveling place for pirates where they can both clash with UD monsters and not have to grind in the surface where they are outcasts from.

4: No government means no permanence, no storage, no access to materials and no relevnace to other governments!

5: little to no outside foot traffic unless already entrenched means old guard meets oldguard, the smuggler that buys everything is nice but is not a good enough reason to visit Sencliff.

6: BOATS. If I was a dwarf and lived in Brogdenstein, I'd also have two boats. There is so much RP that can be generated by crewmen of a pirate ship, and Sencliff's only "pirate" ship is the Sea Leopard, which isn't even Sencliff specific, it belongs to the Crow's Nest. The rent for a daily boat use in Sencliff should be lowered to a 100 to better accomodate new players, and two pirate ship quarters for rent need to be added.

7: Sencliff severely needs a redesign to allow for more foot traffic, more rp opportunity for all surface evil as a hub that isn't Andunor. I will suggest one and build it myself if I am allowed.

c/c to andunor: starter city, amazing levelling, amazing city design, 2 district setup encourages external and internal RP with SICK neutral ground conflict
Andunor is Snuggle a Bugbear ownage as a city and Sencliff is an island where you can't live unless you have public tats that get you kicked out from the entire server and you can't partake in the massive swath of server content that is the settlement system. Your compensation is shops no one shops at, an out of the way home, and a boat that you have to argue over the other 4 wannabe captains over who gets to raid that day.

Right now there's no real reason to "invest" in Sencliff. It's just a pirate nest. It's not Tortuga. As a pirate, I feel the setbacks are far greater than the rewards, though I do love my quarters in Sencliff, it’s just not enough to make a hub for evil people, and I would give up the tattoos I have on Aqarev to be able to join in politics.

[ForgottenBhaal]

These are all very good points and I belive that this would alleviate some of the strain that is put upon Andunor at the moment with the human presence.

I think the main issue with Sencliff is that its so isolated out there, and if we are gonna do a comparsion of some place, it would be Wharftown, where there could still be alot of foot-traffic.

[Purplemyst]

As a player the tattoos really put me off signing up as a pirate mechanically. All someone needs to do is force my character to lift their sleeve and they are instantly recognised as a pirate. I would also like a place for evil/outcast that isn’t the
Underdark.

[Tomato]

That place can be sencliff with some work!

[flower]

The biggest issue is with people wanting to get special stuff (being a pirate, for example) and then not being willing to carry consequences (brand).

If you play open villain you cannot ask for free access everywhere, and hugs from cities whose ships you raid and people you kill.

It is same as some people in past picked good aligned drow and then were upset as players They can never walk in daylight, complaining how it restricts them. All comes at price. We, as players, need to adapt and adjust ourselves to the limits imposed on us.

If people actually proved interest in piracy and made Sencliff alive, in time i am certain Devs would put more work there. But to leave this place being ghostly island and instead call for change on forum can hardly shift things to the goal you desire after, imho.

[Tomato]

There have been Sencliff events lately, I know becasue I made half of them and joined up for all of them.
Some pirates are about, lately, but I'm not talking just about pirates. I'm talking about followers of evil gods, necromancers, theives, corrupt politicians, assasins and so on. None of them have a place in Sencliff. Why?

[msterswrdsmn]

Actually, what did change? The last time I was on Sencliff frequently, it was like, a haven for war criminals. We did human experiments and built dangerous artifacts and and did all sorts of fun stuff. And we didn't have a single pirate with us.

[Nitro]

The biggest issue is with people wanting to get special stuff (being a pirate, for example) and then not being willing to carry consequences (brand).

If you play open villain you cannot ask for free access everywhere, and hugs from cities whose ships you raid and people you kill.

It is same as some people in past picked good aligned drow and then were upset as players They can never walk in daylight, complaining how it restricts them. All comes at price. We, as players, need to adapt and adjust ourselves to the limits imposed on us.

If people actually proved interest in piracy and made Sencliff alive, in time i am certain Devs would put more work there. But to leave this place being ghostly island and instead call for change on forum can hardly shift things to the goal you desire after, imho.

Why should pirates receive special downsides that murderers, necromancers, warlocks or any other evil character does not? If you actually want to be a pirate character at present it's far more attractive to cozy up to someone owning a ship and actually doing piracy instead of joining the sencliff pirates, because then you'll just be exposed to everyone you pass by as a horrible monster even if you haven't done anything to even remotely earn a reputation like that.

[Cerk Evermoore]

I am displeased with how the only way to make Sencliff relevant is to wander around and bring conflict to people. Place looks ripe for a next Necromancery Guild.

[Party in the forest at midnight]

I keep hearing how cool Wharftown used to be, I regret not having started playing the server earlier so I could have experienced it. It would be cool if there was somewhere that was more shady-friendly, but also worked like other settlements so there'd be a reason to invest in it. Sencliff would be cool for that, if it was opened to being more of a black markety roguish place than specifically pirate focused. There's also Sibayad, although having a town exist to be neutral ground that players can't control is good too. For the theme, Sencliff probably works a lot better.

[Poolbrain]

Having been actively playing in Sencliff for over a year now (I think?) starting right before the big pirate changes, this is my opinion.
It became a long post finally, so jump to whatever part you think might be interesting:

The Sencliff Theme:
I think Sencliff is an awesome environment for those of us who wants to get out of the whole “epic” fantasy mode. It’s a place for Scumbags, scoundrels and misfits who don’t fit within normal society.

I’ll express myself though a Star Wars simile. If a big part of the Underdark and Adunor is portraying Darth Vader evil. Sencliff is Jabba the Hutt’s Palace:
There’s gritty characters with a dirty past that just looks for a place to fit in. There’s dark characters filled with hate and a taste for revenge. There’s those who got bigger goals and are looking for the right opportunity.
The people of this place have no problem aligning themselves with “pure evil” if it serves their purposes, but neither is it a place of power that’s looking to make a mark on the world.
It’s filthy and it’s greedy but it’s a place that doesn’t want stick too much in any direction because it would get smacked down, even though its inhabitants might.
If the empire falls, I’m sure the Hutts would find a way to adapt while keeping to their ways. (Alright, let’s not nit-pick this I’m not a star wars pro!)
Now, that said!

IC Politics:
I think it’s nice that Sencliff has no politics. There’s a great place already for people to do this RP in Adunor. If Sencliff became a settlement and obtaining political status I think it should be completely separate from the criminal elements on the island. Morally flexible people who try to get more wealth into the island through any way they can, trying to balance its involvement with criminals and profitable lawful business.

Biggest Problems:
Since the introduction of the “Pirate System” Sencliff automatically gets identified as a Pirate Island, which is completely fine (First time I ventured to Sencliff the impression I got was that it is a small haven for various morally ambiguous groups).
This however makes people want to RP pirates and the idea of this in a usually stereotypical way: Start as a deck swabber, get stronger and recognized, becomes a Captain.
Some create their character already at the Captain stage.
Players quickly realize that there is only one ship around that is possible to Captain of, because nobody wants to be a “rental” captain. And the ship is already taken.
Instead of trying to figure out a new ways to make great schemes and become famous, or whatever the goal is, everyone lines up for the same crew. Perhaps hoping some day they will own it?
This keeps the Sencliff player community stuck in a loop where there’s only one big active crew at all-time which in the end makes it impossible to separate Sencliff from the Crew, is the crew Sencliff? This is also a result of us who play there frequently tries to catch stray, lonely pirates and pull them into our RP so they stick around longer.

Solutions?

Ships (I know this is difficult to implement!):
If Sencliff sticks heavily to the Pirate theme, it’s just like Tomato says. There needs to be more ships that player can own. These ships would come to represent various groups inside Sencliff, rivalling or uniting with each other. This would cause more chaos and discord on the island where interesting RP could grow internally. Super!

Encouraging other motives:
This is something that can be done IC-ly. Opening up goals for characters that has nothing to do about “Pirate hierarchy” and owning a ship.

Opening up the Island more:
Like what has been stated before. Allow characters who are not pirates to settle down on the island to start their shady business. With them more IC-motives would open up and bring plenty of business and interest around. There’s people who would probably love Sencliff’s gritty RP while skipping the whole pirate thing.

There's ofcourse a lot more to say, but I guess this is what I got on my mind to share at the moment.

Edit: Just to add something about the whole tattoo discussion: I have no problems with the whole tattoo thing anymore. But what has also been stated before: The tag should really be rephrased to something along the lines of "You recognize this character as an infamous "Insert pirate rank" from a wanted poster." This would instantly remove all this "how can you see my tattoo while I'm sporting this hip hoodie?" drama. (Would need some revisiting pirate ranks too though, which wouldn't hurt)

[Rockstar1984]

IC Politics:
I think it’s nice that Sencliff has no politics. There’s a great place already for people to do this RP in Adunor. If Sencliff became a settlement and obtaining political status I think it should be completely separate from the criminal elements on the island. Morally flexible people who try to get more wealth into the island through any way they can, trying to balance its involvement with criminals and profitable lawful business.

Actually I think that tying the politics to the piracy system would solve a lot of the problems. The thing is that Sencliff's organization IS a crew itself, but it's difficult to rp it like one when there is no central leadership whatsoever. You don't just get a tattoo that says you're a pirate, you also sign Sencliff's "Articles of Agreement". That stack of paper that sits in your inventory and keeps track of your writs? Those are binding documents that pirates and privateers signed to enlist in a crew. And in most works of fiction involving pirates there is a lot of politics to it especially when it comes to running a free port/pirate haven and usually some form of court.

My proposal is to have a settlement system tied to the piracy system stylized as the pirates of Sencliff having a court electing a pirate king/queen. Make it so that only Dread Pirates can run, and pirates of any rank can vote. This would give Sencliff a leader that was voted on and has authority and would give characters something to rally around. The Pirate King/Queen could also make an official pirate code for the isle to follow and enforce. Getting us settlement storage would also be great and an incentive for characters to come to Sencliff. We could really rp running and managing a port, Sencliff could basically become Arelith's version of rl Tortuga. "Free ports" also have trade and relations with other places, because someone does need to fence off all the pirates goods so that pirates can actually profit after all, and having connections with governments can help you protect yourself and other pirates. It would also cause the pirates to start banding together in different groups to elect a particular Pirate King/Queen or to undermine the current one. There'd be a lot more skulduggery and scheming within Sencliff itself.

Edit: Just to add something about the whole tattoo discussion: I have no problems with the whole tattoo thing anymore. But what has also been stated before: The tag should really be rephrased to something along the lines of "You recognize this character as an infamous "Insert pirate rank" from a wanted poster." This would instantly remove all this "how can you see my tattoo while I'm sporting this hip hoodie?" drama. (Would need some revisiting pirate ranks too though, which wouldn't hurt)

That sounds awesome actually. It could also be set so that Greenhorns don't get recognized by non-pirates at all, and each rank is easier to recognize than the previous. And the ranks themselves need to be changed as they don't make much sense. We could also cut out a few ranks entirely. I don't even know if Corsair or Buccaneer is the higher rank, they're just different words meaning pirate. We should have Greenhorn->Shipmate->Sea Dog->Dread Pirate. Simple, much clearer.

As for opening Sencliff up to everyone, I'm a bit conflicted about that. I think Sencliff needs to stay seperated from Andunor or else it risks just becoming an extension of Andunor and not it's own unique settlement. In the past, most players/characters basically just saw Sencliff as the "Andunor Fanclub". Opening up Sencliff's property to outsiders I think could help generate some life and opportunity, but citizens of settlements should not be allowed. Pirate characters can't become citizens or own property in other settlements, it would take away from the pirates if suddenly everyone could own property on Sencliff. Opening Sencliff's property up also means that people can establish a foothold just to spy, and right now we have no way to exile or release property so we wouldn't be able to really do anything about spies aside from kill them every time we see them.

TL:DR Opening Sencliff up to people who aren't citizens of anywhere else, establishing a settlement system with the pirates as citizens and the Dread Pirates being able to run for Pirate King/Queen, I believe would help with a lot of the problems we have.

[Rooshi49]

If there were to be multiple ships, I think it would be a cool idea to take a page out of RL history and make it an oligarchy of ship captains that rules over sencliff. Where the political power lies with the heads of the various crews, not some sort of democracy.

[Brandon Steel]

It’s been much more active recently but it still desperately needs some love. I think a lot of what’s been posted pretty much nails everything I have said about it already, and I’m always down for anything that’ll alleviate the huge human UD presence.

[WinkinBlinkin]

If you did have more ships, and the captains formed an oligarchy, could you make it so if they didn't sail the seas frequently enough, they could lose their ships to mutiny? As Rooshi says, that seems more thematic than some kind of democracy.

[Rockstar1984]

If there were to be multiple ships, I think it would be a cool idea to take a page out of RL history and make it an oligarchy of ship captains that rules over sencliff. Where the political power lies with the heads of the various crews, not some sort of democracy.

If we limit the political power to the captains of ships, then that means whoever owns the ships because of sheer luck is a political leader and people could hog the ships and prevent anyone who wants to actually rp an active leader could simply be blocked out. There's already a bunch of ooc drama surrounding quarters and shops, attaching that to a settlement system would be dangerous I feel. I think my idea of having it be only the Dread Pirates who can run for leadership would be the best way to do it.

Edit: And some pirate crews were pretty damn democratic and this is fantasy, we can romanticize it. I think it'd fit Sencliff just fine.

[Rooshi49]

I was just going for an idea that has historic value to it. Oligarchy based on ship captains is how Ancient Greek island governments ran. (pretty sure on that, I might be wrong *shrugs) But yea, while I think it might be a cool idea, it might not be the best mechanical idea unless there was some way to usurp the current rulers.

Having each ship be a democratic vote and have there be an oligarchy based on the elected ship captains of each crew would be an interesting middle ground of an idea. It would be kind of like a oligarchical democratic republic (big words )

[Tomato]

I actually really like the idea of the ships captains being political leaders, but they *will* need a mechanical way to get overthrown through democracy to prevent hogging and drama.

[Baseili]

What about using the settlement voting system and applying it to the pirate ships themselves?
Tie the act of standing for captain and actual voting to the rank system, have the cost of standing for captain equal to however long the term of ownership is worth in upkeep fees and a small cost to vote too (it sounds more pirate to vote with gold than just having the privilege "I weigh my 2,000 dabloons for Captain Blackheart!" etc.)
Depending on how many ships are available, the captains would be those with the most votes with a "weight" system that allows consecutively winning captains to retain their former vessel so that crews aren't shifted needlessly about ships. Then its just a matter of having a single room put aside for Captain's and you've got yourself a council.

[Durvayas]

Actually, what did change? The last time I was on Sencliff frequently, it was like, a haven for war criminals. We did human experiments and built dangerous artifacts and and did all sorts of fun stuff. And we didn't have a single pirate with us.

Well when the pirate update that made sencliff actually a pirate island went live, it kind of booted the faction from controlling the island, opening up their guildhouse to anyone who was a pirate, locking them out of the bhaalspire, etc. The change did not come without some serious negatives for the people that had already been inhabiting sencliff. Broken eggs for the omelet, as it were.

I'd love to see sencliff get an expansion beyond being a tiny pirate nest. Sibiyad was meant to become the evil alternative settlement on the server, but it has no real mechanical support for it, and last I heard it was being regularly patrolled by the radiant heart because having the portal at that guildhouse, and the portal at sibiyad, means that that is a 2 minute trip. So Sibiyad is not attractive to evil PCs because you're only ever a brief portal hop from getting ganked by team good in your own market. That isn't even getting into the fact that the PvE content is meant for lvl 16+ at Sib, so its basically hostile to newbies. I don't have a good suggestion for improving Sibiyad as an option for team evil aside from doing something to make it less effortlessly accessible to the most militant wing of team good. Unless that issue specifically is fixed, sibiyad will NEVER function as a haven for evil PCs.
For a den of drugs, prostitution, and slavery, the merchant league of sibiyad seems very uninterested in keeping paladins out for some reason, despite them being absolutely awful for business.

Due to sibiyad being a frankly piss-poor location to base an evil faction out of, a player's options are Sencliff, or Andunor.
Sencliff is out of the way, has no leveling, has virtually no foot traffic, has no portals, and everything in the place is tied to being a pirate. Sencliff will never be much more than a ghost town if it is not opened up. Its simply not an ideal place for evil PCs to settle, period. OP's reasoning is right on the money.

Which leaves.. *drumroll* Andunor, which is why you see threads cropping up regularly about the sheer number of evil human PCs that are literally funneled into the underdark by the module's very design.

Something needs to be changed so that 'Evil Human' ceases to simply be a synonym for 'Andunoran Outcast' again, because I can tell you there aren't nearly enough pirates for it. Not with Andunor having a ship that routinely does piracy, Humans seem to just come to the UD for that too, because they can be a pirate AND an outcast if they work with the dreadnaught.

We predicted this would be a problem the day wharftown was destroyed. Sencliff is not a suitable replacement for it as a hub for evil on the surface at the moment. It needs more.

[flower]

Sibayad was never meant to become evil alternative.

Sibayad league is interested in a trade, not in support of criminals these things are different. They will také your money and never ask who you are but if you disrupt their trade (even by your presence) you become unwelcome in Sibayad.

[msterswrdsmn]

Okay, gotcha. I'll pick apart the things I remember being issues from when I was around Sencliff. Apologies if its outdated.

1. Accessibility
Sencliff was stupidly inaccessable. If you didn't have a boat or someone who had been there who was also an epic level conjuration mage? You weren't getting there. So that locks out a huge chunk of the server right there. Want to leave? Better have a lense or just happen to know where the secret hidden key is. Getting in/out was always, ALWAYS huge pain. Making it more accessable, but not "easy and open to everyone" is tricky, though.

2. Size
It was small. And I got the impression it was originally intended to be a pirate haven ever since it was made? And not a "Magical War Criminal Camp" that it immediately turned into. Personally, I never got why. Basing ANYTHING (a build, a concept, etc) against a rare or exclusive mechanic has never been a good thing in my experience in any game. Since Pirate rp=boats, I don't think Siyabad would get much traffic simply because theres a finite number of players that can be reasonably mechanically supported.

Expanding Sencliff to other avenues of rp would be good. For example; okay, so the pirates plundered the ship. Now what? Is there anywhere good on the island to offload stuff? Pirate tattoos and general reputation is going to make it difficult for you to fence this stuff in an actual town after all. Add a shady merchant hub/black market section? A quatermaster/supply yard? Etc. What else would raiding pirates need besides you know. A ship and tattoo artist? Things that -don't- require you being a pirate to do.

[WinkinBlinkin]

Improving the smuggler network would help open up Sencliffe, I think.

[Aodh Lazuli]

I keep hearing how cool Wharftown used to be

It bounced around between cool, alright-but-bland, and absolutely atrocious.

"Zhents have taken over wharftown" may as well have been some sort of groundhog day experience.

[Cerk Evermoore]

I know accessibility of Sencliff is a problem, but that's kinda the best thing about the island is the fact you don't have 15 paladins showing up there every time you try to do something evil.

What folks need is a reason to go to Sencliff and they'll find a way to get there. I will admit team good has done a very good job respecting the NPC presence on the island. But the place could really benefit from some kind of society that is not pirate based.