The Alcifer Initiative

[Etherdrifter 2,518]

Do you remember being a new player on a road?  Running down that road to see what is at the end?  A monster tags onto you and you're already low on stamina.

 

You run as fast as you can, deeds are locked down and towers are few and far between, no spirit templars come to your aid.

 

You pray for salvation and suddenly its there, maybe an unlocked house or a rest spot put up by some kindly player.  Too bad you only found it on your way back to recover your corpse!

 

 

The Alcifer Initiative aims to help alleviate the pains of new and experienced players alike by lining the roads with safe havens, encouraging every deed to have such a haven clearly marked and creating campsites with water and enchanted grass for travellers of all levels.

 

Making a shrine to alcifer is as simple as planting 3 camellia hedges, making one roundpole fence, one gate lock (just to prevent griefing), one nymph statue (renaming it "Moon Goddess Alcifer" for bonus points) and some low QL blue dye.  The total materials required for initial construction of a small shrine are
 

Spoiler

15 camellia sprouts (more if your gardening is low)
4 shafts

1 small nails

77kg of stone shards (more if your stone cutting is low)

1 woad (+ 1kg of water)

1 gate lock (set passable to everyone)

Optional : Sign marked "Sanctuary" or "Safe Place"

 

The shrines are designed to be easy to maintain offdeed (40QL gate and statue require maints once every 1-2 months which takes <10 mins) and easy to spot (the blue statue stands out).  These 1x1 shrines take less than 10 mins to make and cost very little.

 

Some design ideas for larger shrines (using maple hedges) can be found on the deedplanner link below, these include such ameneties as an enchanted grass tile (for camping travellers), fountain (either on a water source or refilled by hand), mailbox (for the richest) and supply chests (for the generous):

 

http://pastebin.com/yhXjPCqQ

 

Each of these larger shrines has a similar level of basic maintenence as their smaller counterpart, to function all that needs repairs are the gate and the statue (even the statue is optional).  If you come up with your own designs for shrines please do share them!

 

• Need some help planting the hedges and live in the SW of Xanadu; then drop me a line ingame and I'll try and pop over to lend a hand. 
• Can't mix the dye; pm me here and I'll mail you some (admittedly crappy) blue dye at no cost!

 

So if you like this initiative and do set up a shrine of your own please do post up a screenshot and a map reference. who knows you might wake up one day and find some travellers sheltering there and feel good about it.


EDIT

 

We reccomend:

 

• Building shrines 2-3 tiles away from a highway (to prevent auto-runner tears from tarnishing the holy ground)

• Keeping any connecting road between a wayshrine and a highway as flat as possible (folks running to them are likely to be low on stamina and injured)
• Favouring the bottom of hills rather than the top for wayshrines (for the aforementioned reason)
• Planting a flower on the grass tile inside a shrine to increase its longivity

 

 

 

Edited June 20, 2016 by Etherdrifter

[Sirene 225]

This shrine has been build by some members of the Black Forest Alliance including Etherdrifter, Eltaran, Weatherwax and me (hope I forgot no one?). Sadly it is damaged because of someone that terraformed the area. But it still remains in pictures and has to be shown:

 

[Sirene 225]

This is how the small simple version looks like. 

[JakeRivers 2,921]

This is a truly annoying structure to have along roadsides for those that like to autorun, as its one more obstacle along the roadside to catch your horse/cart into.

[Sirene 225]

These shrines are on the side of roads, not on the roads. I cant see how they can "catch" you there. 

[Etherdrifter 2,518]

3 hours ago, JakeRivers said:

This is a truly annoying structure to have along roadsides for those that like to autorun, as its one more obstacle along the roadside to catch your horse/cart into.

 

If you can't aim straight on the roads there is no hope for you.  Don't drink and wurm!

[JakeRivers 2,921]

Build them in my area I am fine with that, always looking for more catapult grinding.

[Araninke 490]

I think it's a great idea. No need to be negative about helping out fellow Wurmians.

[JakeRivers 2,921]

Roads don't need obstacles along the sides

[Chakron 1,025]

If I was careless enough to somehow forget how to ride in a straight line, I'd appreciate an obstacle to halt my trajectory.

[bdew 2,462]

7 hours ago, JakeRivers said:

Build them in my area I am fine with that, always looking for more catapult grinding.

 

Don't forget to complain about dropping player counts after you do that... *facepalm*

[Revelation 288]

Another nail in the coffin of PvE. Can't we just make a server with invulnerability for these people already?

 

Along main roads you already can't swing a cat without hitting two guard towers.

If you  want to build these go ahead, I can't stop you, but if any pop up in my area they're going down quick.

[JakeRivers 2,921]

Well newbies have protection from hostile mobs, very good protection in the reduced agro range. After a few days hopefully they are learning the ropes and can figure out how to call guards on that troll chasing them.

 

When driving a cart/horse/wagon especially if you are running multiple accounts a lot of us use auto run, and wurm mechanics do not allow for a straight line and you pretty much always get creep to either side of the road. Sounds like you never drove a cart with autorun before, try it out sometime. So you know when you alt tab back to a account making a run somewhere it is always nice to see you are further down the road rather than buried in some hedge planted on the side.

 

If you insist on littering the landscape with your 1x1 eye sores, I sure hope you have the sense to keep them 3 or more tiles off the road side.

[NeeNee 855]

4 hours ago, Revelation said:

Another nail in the coffin of PvE. Can't we just make a server with invulnerability for these people already?

 

Along main roads you already can't swing a cat without hitting two guard towers.

If you  want to build these go ahead, I can't stop you, but if any pop up in my area they're going down quick.

 

Don't servers already have a bunch of newbie spaces around the starter towns? How is this ruining anything? It's just adding lore to the sort of newbie spaces we already have. 

 

And saying that these will stop you from driving blindly is just...odd. Where are you autodriving in a straight line for any long period of time?

[zigozag 918]

I liked these in the south, and one around g20 made by Dredbanger. I'll post a screenshot later. It has grass trimmed though, so i had to cut grass for a wild horse parked inside. I'll probably build one somewhere around my region. One thing worth mentioning however, build them few tiles away from roads when possible for reasons mentioned by these angry guys.

Edited June 20, 2016 by zigozag

[Chulirac 244]

17 minutes ago, zigozag said:

I liked these in the south, and one around g20 made by Dredbanger. I'll post a screenshot later. It has grass trimmed though, so i had to cut grass for a wild horse parked inside. I'll probably build one somewhere around my region. One thing worth mentioning however, build them few tiles away from roads when possible for reasons mentioned by these angry guys.

 

5 hours ago, Revelation said:

Another nail in the coffin of PvE. Can't we just make a server with invulnerability for these people already?

 

Along main roads you already can't swing a cat without hitting two guard towers.

If you  want to build these go ahead, I can't stop you, but if any pop up in my area they're going down quick.

 

Can't wait to see the fun in local

[Psalamon 201]

With all the info being dumped on a newbie when they start and without the resources or stats to stay alive i am building a safe haven on deed at my house right out fornt off the main road with a large neon sign to show a safe fallout shelter is there and let people com and go.. whether i put a nymph there and paint it and name it after  some un-deified god i dont know but yeah there should be lots of these on deed at edge of property as a safety net when the mobs get heavy and stuff .. as i amj only a 6month old newbie i remember what it was like to need these safe havens which i guess alot of people have forgotten and i know it is in the tutorial but i didnt find out or realize the words for guards to help till a week  or two in as i started in wurm unlimited....playing on a dead server..anyhow i think these would help greatly and if not on main roads then we should have a colour for the signs pointing them like say blue as you said and follow the blue signs for safety with the passive locks on them..

[Etherdrifter 2,518]

Updated the main post with some tips (including the 3-tile advice).

 

@PsalamonPlease do consider using the painted blue nymph, if we can get enough people to adopt it then it'll be easy to put signposts explaining them near starter deeds

[Dorian 865]

Neat idea, but one question...who is Alcifer? 

[Etherdrifter 2,518]

To be honest I have no idea where I came up with her.

 

She ended up as the patron deity of nublets where I used to live (the wayshrines then were just statues with chests full of wrapped healing covers in them).  It's stayed on as something unique to the areas I live, if you see a shrine to alcifer either I've lived there for a time or someone I know does.

[Mordraug 2,542]

On 6/20/2016 at 8:03 PM, JakeRivers said:

Build them in my area I am fine with that, always looking for more catapult grinding.

 

18 hours ago, Revelation said:

Another nail in the coffin of PvE. Can't we just make a server with invulnerability for these people already?

 

Along main roads you already can't swing a cat without hitting two guard towers.

If you  want to build these go ahead, I can't stop you, but if any pop up in my area they're going down quick.

 

Once again, it's not WU messing up player retention, it's the players themselves.

 

One can't drive in a straight line, the other one can't stand newbies surviving for too long, so bugger everyone else.  Yeeeeeh WU is definitely what's driving players away.

[Toecutter 331]

20 hours ago, Revelation said:

Another nail in the coffin of PvE. Can't we just make a server with invulnerability for these people already?

 

Along main roads you already can't swing a cat without hitting two guard towers.

I

 What cat you swinging?it must be a big Cat 50 tiles long   and anyways  you can drive through Guardtowers .

[Toecutter 331]

On 6/20/2016 at 11:03 AM, JakeRivers said:

Build them in my area I am fine with that, always looking for more catapult grinding.

 

What if they are deeded ?

[Raybarg 437]

Offtopic part first... (mostly acting as just a response to someones reference to why PvE servers coffins got so many nails)

I dont know if some of these replies are from "PvP" players.

I've come to wonder, is "PvP" some sort of mental disorder? During my time in Epic or Chaos, I met bunch of players. Also it is my assumption I have met a "PvP" player too, but probably not personally enough to have learned of their condition.

 

Ontopic part late...

Our alliance did similar thing in our past, it built many waystations all across the south Inde which were small stone houses including beds, well, basic meal stuff and equipment. What wasnt nailed down was looted very quickly, but atleast they offered occasional "breathing space" for noobies running from ...er.. lions. Also very often included a guard tower.

 

These days those waystations are mainly gone due to decay, but the guardtowers still remain.

 

It was cool and fun while it lasted. Invention of the idea was nice, execution was nice, all in kinda DO-STUFF-mentality.

 

I wish good times to anyone who builds Alcifer shrine.

[zigozag 918]

G20, center of the Great Fir Forest, highway from Weird Wonders to Whitefay:

Spoiler

 

 

Edited June 22, 2016 by zigozag