Now this is REALLY disappointing as I see it !!
I'm disappointed that LS didn't have the warning that some shards had - we had a couple of days notice that it would happen Sunday night.
However, you should be most disappointed about how this event was announced and how some of the times were mangled. EA wouldn't keep the UO.com times updated, some EMs have websites, some don't, some people were looking at fansites because EM websites or UO.com had issues with times, some town criers hadn't been updated in weeks, etc.
To paraphrase somebody else: "95% of the complaints could have been alleviated if this had been announced a few weeks in advance on UO.com, if UO.com was the source for all times, if EA would spend 5 minutes a day keeping the times on UO.com updated, if the EMs and players both referred to UO.com, and if the behavior was consistent across all shards. "
I agree with that sentiment exactly: UO.com should have been the
ONLY trusted source for times and it should have been kept updated.
I was fortunate enough to participate in the majority of coronations, and I saw so many different things going on. I saw screwed up town criers. I saw EMs run out to the bridge with followers in tow, and then turn around and run back, and players were left hanging at the bridge wondering what was going on, then somebody announced their buddy said the gate was being opened in the castle or courtyard, causing everybody to have to rush back, etc. I saw EMs properly attired as Blackthorn on some shards, and then with some kind of mangled red shading Blackthorn costume on others. I saw people running towards gates that were closed in their faces after only being open a few minutes.
It was a cool event, but there was absolutely no reason for there to have been such inconsistent behavior at all levels.
This was not some kind of small event being held by an EM on a single shard, this was a game-wide event that signaled a close to a major scenario and that changed the game's lore significantly.
While I liked the event a lot, there were some simple things that should have been done from the beginning.
1) It should have been announced two weeks in advance, instead of some shards finding out with only 2-3 days notice (LS had less than 3 days warning), or players finding out after the event was over.
2) UO.com should be the master site for game-wide event times. No playing guessing games if times are different or not listed between UO.com, EM sites, and fan sites.
3) Town criers on ALL shards should have been properly announcing the event.
4) If EA is going to allow a third party site to host the EM websites, there should be a consistently updated website for ALL shards.
5) The events should have been consistent instead of everything outside of Blackthorn's speech looking like it was being made up on the fly.
6) Blackthorn should look the same on every shard.
7) Gates should be opened in one place, rather than EMs literally dragging players back and forth as if it's some kind of "keep up with the EMs" game although one EM told me they were trying to make sure people who were hanging at the bridge and the courtyard saw him or her so that they would know the gate was about to pop. Unfortunately, it served to confuse many people, since it could be easy to lose the EMs in a crowd of dozens of players unless they were constantly doing all names to make sure the EMs were nearby.
If you were a new player or somebody thinking about coming back, this would not look good.
This was a 10-15 minute event with no action outside of EM's roleplaying two characters with a 5-minute speech and popping a gate to a statue, not some massive boss fight that took an hour and meandered throughout a large area, interspersed with other things happening.
