Generation

The term generation is used to divide the Avlissian player population into groups by joining date and/or main character creation date.

The first few generations were set apart by the availability of magic items on Avlis. In the first months of Avlis, items of +3 or greater would drop regularly for characters above level 18, and that continued for a long time in the Underdark. After the first few, a new generation usually started when Avlis received some major attention by advertising.

• See the Good noobie influx topic on the Avlis forums for the original discussion and source material used here.

One Percenters

The First Generation of players created the first few characters in Avlis in July, 2002, and they joined together in an adventuring band called the One Percenters. They were the most powerful characters around in terms of PC power, and while some are rarely seen in Avlis today, a few are still active.

Their names are:

Feeb Ironfist

Harthgrepa Daemonsbane

Sammy Valorian

Tri'as Ju'eir

Vian Valorian

Second Generation

These players joined just after the players of the One Percenters, around mid-August/September, 2002. The start of this generation was not clearly defined, and the end was considered to be the cut-off of the so-called Balor Loot.

Examples of characters in this generation are: Alladorn Echindar, Amonien Amana, Green Raven, Peregryne Twostep and Timo Karr.

Third Generation

Characters in this generation could get their hands on +3 items quite easily from random chest drops, for example in the Underdark. The end of this generation was when the custom loot script was put into place, in July, 2003. Another group of people belonging to this generation were the players who came from Mythos. Avlis was linked to the Mythos persistent world from May 22, 2003 until July 21, 2003.

Fourth Generation

When the chests no longer dropped loot according to BioWare's tables, and used Avlis' own loot script and tables instead, powerful items were becoming increasingly difficult to find. While the Third Generation could easily get their hands on multiple +3 items, this was difficult for the 4th.

The end of this generation was September, 2003. Several loot nerfs were made at the time, and hoards of +1 items were no longer being dropped, making it much more difficult for PCs to obtain millions of gold easily.

Fifth Generation

This generation was the first group of players able to go to other CoPaP worlds, as links to [Hala] (Sep. 2003) and Rockhome (Nov. 2003) were made. Like Avlis a year before, those two worlds were relatively new, and were not necessarily balanced in line with Avlis' standards. There was a net flow of powerful magical items and gold into the Avlis economy, making this generation wealthier than generations 3 or 4.

BioWedders (1)

On Wednesday, June 02, 2004, the World of Avlis was featured on BioWare Wednesday, a weekly feature on BioWare. Many people found Avlis through this page, and the first BioWedders are the most numerous generation to this day.

This generation is also called the Sixth Generation.

BioWedders (2)

Then on Wednesday, September 01, 2004, (part 1) and Wednesday, September 08, 2004, (part 2), CoPaP was featured on BioWare Wednesday. This also led to a big influx of players, although not as big as the first BioWare Wednesday.

This generation is also called the Seventh Generation.

Eighth Generation

This generation was spread out over a large time period, unlike the previous two generations, which were more like a sudden wave of players coming.

A small wave of players did come from the BioWare Wednesday of January 05, 2005, when NWNX2, the program that makes things like VaultSTER and true persistence possible in Avlis, was featured. It included several links to Avlis, and also mentioned both Avlis and CoPaP quite often. The amount of people coming from this feature wasn't really that big, but significant.

Other players who came to Avlis during this period were the ones who came from the Brynsaar and Exaria, two NWN persistent worlds that shut down.

The end of this generation was at the end of May, 2005, when the links to Hala and Rockhome were closed, and the gold drops were changed.

Ninth Generation

This generation was greatly defined by the end of the longest running plot on Avlis: The M'Chek T'Nanshi war plot. At the plot's end, many DMs and players, who had put in a lot of effort, needed time off, leading to somewhat of a lull in major events. There were also many epic PCs, who had to move from the war plot, back into the mainstream. This generation, as a result, saw a focus on smaller plots and tweaking of systems, to rebalance Avlis in light of these changes.

This generation was from June, 2005 to the beginning of January, 2006.

Google Generation

This group of players included the ones who found Avlis with Google Ads, when Avlis started advertising, and ones from the BioWare Persistent World poll (Look here for the results).

This generation is also called the Tenth Generation.

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To be continued...