Haven't shotguns have always been kind of royalty among HL2RP weapons, SPAS-12 especially? I honestly don't remember post-Clockwork if shotguns were even allowed to enter item economy through any means other than OTA getting got.
the spas-12 was considerably worse in helix clockwork but was locked away because OTA had them or smth. comically large pac3 model anyway, didn't have the same demure swag and aura. shotguns in general were a lot worse. they were status symbols on clockwork because they were the Best Guns™ (and the most expensive)
helix was, in hindsight, a downgrade from Clockwork in terms of economy
true we had a functional renegade capitalism in cw and reverted back to a barebones barter economy. you used to be able to pay for off screen labour and then you couldn't anymore so the only value of my gun was another one. defo a downgrade, might've been okay if you could buy weapon parts still.
A major reason for people burning out and leaving the server was the "status quo".
The server really should've done stuff akin to how Willard has come to (and had been endlessly yelled in suggestions):
Give players a major impact on story events and otherwise. Like, to the point where player actions can cause map change events early, or mass death / interesting situations. An incompetent city administration that has 50 shotcops an hour would obviously be removed etc.
Like that's a major reason people were put off/lost motivation, I know of quite a few friends/etc I have that left neb specifically due to that. Once they get a look inside and realise none of their actions have any impact on server stuff outside of self-contained events even in the semi-short-term? They lose interest quick.
i think that neb's always been better suited to short bursts or more drawn out atmospheric stuff anyway. its appeal to me was the incredibly talented people with lightning in a bottle. big server events, or shorter, more densely packed and tighter narratives. also (even if cringe sometimes) how seriously people took it, and how much of their energy they invested into worldbuilding, even unknowingly. the stuff
@Numbers and
@Appetite Ruining Kebab did was amazing and one of a kind.
i have tried willards, i have found it to be, in a dev sense, extremely innovative. small stuff like a status over your head, or the popups for what you've wrote out, the customization in clothing, attire, character. the way you interact with menus, with the cwu recycler, the banking system for withdrawals. its brilliant. the crafting and leveling up however, promotes a sort of run-around and grind rp. no one slows down because when you do slow down, you've still got something to interact with, and more often than not that thing isn't more roleplay, but the systems in play, which are anti-roleplay in the sense you're more likely to ask someone if they've got 5 glue than how their day has been.
if you removed all of the bloat, levelups, crafting system, and the quirks there-in, I think it'd probably be my favorite place to play. if people were ALLOWED to slow down and soak it in. too many impressions, i am old. the random crit system and gun stats effecting dmg etc put me off quite a lot too, the fast and heavy gunplay of olden times was terrifying, and gave me an adrenaline kick over gambling 2 year characters I'm still chasing, and won't find
i wouldn't have been happy with a neb that looked like willards. but i also don't think it was ever fair to impose devwork no one was interested in doing. im glad it lasted this long on the backs of talented people running stories as stories, even with as much or as a little to work with as we ever had.
