Hi, I'm new here! Years ago I used to play Neopets and for some time I played Subeta too. Something that made me really like Neopets was the Altador Cup. Most events here are a bit too individual, you just play for yourself and there's not that much interaction with other users. Since you had to play for a team in Altador Cup there was a lot more interaction in the forums, there were threads for each team where players would talk, plan and share their game results. That made me more active in the site and I made a lot of friends there. So perhaps some kind of event where you have to choose and play for a team? How about it?

i totally agree that group events make for much more fun and meaningful site engagement! we've had a few events that involved working as teams in the past, but since they're very labor intensive for staff to set up, they're not especially frequent.

off the top of my head i remember the pirates vs islanders plot back in 2009 (i had literally just joined the site and had no idea what was going on lol) and the blake vs saggitarius omen island plot which was... last year? the year before? i can't really conceptualize time anymore.

then there have been smaller team-based events such as the snowman competition in 2016 when users chose an NPC duo to support; and a few years before that was the battle of the bands, as part of the peka-boo festival, where some users grouped up to create HAs representing members of their fictional themed bands, and other users picked which band to support with related games and activities.

that one was actually pretty cool, i think we should do another battle of the bands - i'd love to see what people come up with, and i kind of want to actually be in a "band" this time around, as i was way too shy to engage in any sort of group discussions at the time!

so yeah, we do have some team/group events which are generally very fun but it's unfortunately a matter of resources - staff members to create the content (art assets, writing, etc), programming, ensuring site stability and preventing/fixing glitches (the more complex the event, the more likely there are to be glitches), etc.

and as we sadly know, there just aren't enough people on staff, and not really enough money to hire more. projects get set aside as more urgent things come up, or turn out to be more complicated than anticipated, and it's all just... kind of a bummer. because thinking about past events to respond to your comment actually reminded me how much FUN subeta has been and can be at its best! the facilitation of community engagement has been the highlight of so many events, and i really miss some of them, and would love to see things come back that i was too new or nervous to fully participate in when they first happened.

but yeah, the resources are just... not totally there. the site really does need more staff, and that means more money, which would likely come from more users, and i guess that's what we've been going around in circles here trying to figure out because... need better site for more users, but need more users for better site?? help!!

It's always good to see new users willing to give input, because many of us have been here for a very long time!

That said subeta used to be really good with teamed plots! Blackmoon vs. Sebastian Phoenix (I think it was the first, I barely participated in that one as I was new myself), we had Islanders vs. Pirates, we used to have an epicon yearly with two groups restocking against one another.

I think we've just been slim on staff a while and plots have been few and far between, but I absolutely miss these types of plots/activities and would love to see the site regularly host something during summer that's interactive but not as cumbersome on staff.

Y'know "hello everyone welcome to this years Peka-a-Boo festival this year [npcs] xyz & abc have decided to host our quest/battle/restockathon!!" staff can pick two NPCs and build a "prize shop" theme arond it (ex: scifi, going green, fight the power, comicon, it's a banana what could it cost $10, lip sync for your life, pop culture, etc etc). Bonus points (puns) the prize shop could operate just like the event one's do... hate this years theme? New to the site and want stuff from last year? Have a need to sit on currency like a dragon? Fantastic, save your points and use them next year. Less FOMO and punishment for missing today because all is not lost.

(Peka-a-Boo came to mind because it's an established thing, just an example)

I would love epicon to come back. Gaming has changed a lot in the last ten years, new classics and the like.

We don't even need plots for more lore development. The stuff that happened with Gunter in 2018 was an attempt at developing the lore without a plot, we've all been wanting more answers and resolutions to that (like how his brother became a zombie if he was killed rather than infected [unless he was already infected when he died], if he'll ever be tried and sentenced rather than just being stuck at the SAI forever, what Anne will do about all this cause I remember last year one of the staff said she now knows her father is unliving), but people have said there doesn't have to be a whole plot about it, just a news post or two like the one about his confession.

It would be good to have some more one-off events though, but also bring back items from those events. I remember a while back they said they've thought of doing Peka-Boo again, but differently. It would be nice if they brought back the clothing shops and food trucks again, a lot of those foods are needed for achievements and some are really expensive. I also liked the snowman competition event and would like to see another or something similar with different NPC pairs, maybe in summer they could have a similar competition at Peka Park (isn't the whole purpose of that place for events anyway?) or they could do a sand version of the snowman contest at a new area of Delphi or something. I don't know, I'd just like to see more NPC involvement outside of plots.

In fact, Peka Park could be used for Neugarten so it feels less like just a "buy from these shops while you can" event. Maybe the shops besides the brewery could be placed on the map there, and there could be a few activities to do there for achievements or something. Since they're trying to make the event into something environmentally friendly, they could have a thing where you donate specific objects to be re-used or recycled (I should really be suggesting this in a thread for the holiday itself, I've considered starting the thread myself but I haven't really researched other kinds of items to be involved).

I'm in agreement on needing more activities or more lore. This site has some amazing writers and lore already, expanding upon it should not be all that difficult. The last few events have had little to nothing and it's pretty clear users want more. Hopefully staff sees this thread is still active and people definitely are seeking more engagement out of the website. We don't need plots/lore updates 24/7 but every so often would help. The Gunter thing was incredible, I loved the plots for Survival and Masquerade in the past. So, maybe we can get something like these going again soon.

I've also mentioned before that I enjoy the lore that's sometimes seen in item descriptions. I'm sad we didn't get any new lore about the stuff that happened since the 2018 plot in last year's Morostide items, that would have been a nice way to give information.

The Subetapedia could do with a lot of updates as well. We still don't have NPC lists for NPCs involved in games or other site features, some of them are missing from the shop and holiday lists, and some of the entries are outdated both in information and art (Mori and Nori's page still used their really old art last time I looked there). So making changes to that could also give some more lore. I don't know who writes the lore on this website, though, and I'm fairly certain that there have been or will be retcons to some of the really old stuff (they'll probably use the Rift to explain that or something).

I'm always down for more lore! I've been wondering about the whole Gunter and Bubbles thing for a while now! Also Dungarde to some degree I guess.

TBH, with the pandemic I think it might be easier to convince others to join Subeta now if only to alleviate boredom....