First, just to point out the obvious, saying that "the inevitable is coming" is a truism. It's sort of like proclaiming, "The immovable object is staying put."
'> The question isn't whether the inevitable will come, but whether or not something is really inevitable in the timescales of interest.
Second, I agree with Lightfoot8 and others that all the doom-and-gloom talk doesn't serve any constructive purpose and probably hurts the game by discouraging new players from testing the waters at a PW. Even if declining numbers at action servers were the case, what's the benefit in focusing on it? It mostly comes across as negativity and not as a productive way to address the perceived issue.
I am not quite a newb anymore, but still one of the people who just started paying attention to the online community at the old forums not long before we moved here. I haven't really given PWs a try yet because there are so many modules to enjoy on the vault and I've only gone through a handful of them. (And, because I am a terrible typist!) Now my girlfriend plays, too, and we are thinking of PWs when we finish a couple HOF modules we have lined up. We figured it might be wise to see how we do in situations where there is no pause before plunging in to situations where there is no pause
and there is no reload.
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But newer forum visitors might not yet even know there is an NWN PW experience to be had. I have been here on the forums long enough to know that, whether or not there are as many PWs as there once were, people are still enjoying them. But, with a little experience as an admin on another game forum site, I can almost guarantee that most new people end up at these forums because they have some question about playing the SP game and about setting up MP with friends. It would be a shame if they got their "how do I beat the swords of never?" or "how do I get my CD keys from GOG?" question answered but then saw threads that look like they were written by the OC doomsayers in the City Core. They might not bother learning about all the add-ons, modules, PWs, and so on that make this such an awesome and enduring game.
In the interest of saying something possibly productive, if there is a shortage of players for action PWs, then finding them and getting the word out should be the focus. From my inexperienced perspective, there should be a wealth of action players waiting to be mined from among those who have gotten bored with various swords-and-sorcery MMORPGs and/or who are looking for something without subscription fees. It seems like those guys would be willing to give NWN PWs a try, especially when the direct cost to get up and running forever is lower than the one-month subscription for many MMORPGs. I don't play any MMORPGs, but if I were active on those games' forums, I would be mentioning NWN PWs as a great option for people looking to try something that's similar, awesome, and cheap.
