In Perseria, on Saturday (players' world time), because the city council decided to increase patrols on the main roads leading to the city, as well as reinforce outposts’ garrisons, they had no choice but to loosen the lockdown in the city because of a lack of manpower. Visitors to the city, who can now venture beyond the marketplace and haunted parks, would find heads on pikes at the main entrances to the city, as well as on the city’s main streets. However, as the grip loosened, the city’s residents still feel like some griefs went unaddressed. As an angry mob marches on the city hall, with ghosts watching their every move:
“Down with the ghosts!” an angry protester shouts while a few others distract the ghost packs.
Elsewhere in the city, riots are erupting, especially around the “haunted routes” of Lower and Upper Perseria, whom the residents perceive as the symbols of the city’s ineptitude. Of its failure to control the ghosts, and the torments they inflict upon the population.
Back in Jutudiel’s camp, her rebel cell, filled with rogues and other elements who fell on hard times, realizes time is short to act. Monseigneur changed cells for this occasion.
“The city is on fire, we must get to the sewers, now!” Jutudiel hollers, before turning invisible and leaving the camp with her cell.
Karine didn’t take me to Perseria since I warned Karine not to go there, a little over a week ago. I warned her about the consequences of doing so, but perhaps I can use these consequences to the advantage of the rebels. I cast holy flare on a tower top, then fall back with guards on my back, and celebrate high mass later, Monseigneur ruminates while she approaches the city’s main gate.
Then another player, who’s taking a character new to max level into Lower Perseria, finds himself caught in the crossfire:
“When I ran this place last week, there wasn’t any trash; now, mobs are breaking windows and burning buildings down!” the player tells his guildies about what has changed since his last run of the dungeon.
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As that player submits a support ticket, the manufacturer starts realizing that bugs have vastly increased in variety over the past two weeks, most of these being non-reproducible. First from Karine, and then from other players...
The manufacturer’s QA and CS teams then hold a meeting with the engineering team as well as the game’s management.
“What’s happening? It seems like the number of bugs we can’t reproduce has increased to the point we might need to re-code the game from scratch!” the QA lead shouts.
“After over a week of the Perseria dungeons being trash-free, we have reports of players seeing trash in Lower Perseria, and of that dungeon’s background assets being vandalized by NPCs!” the CS lead rants.
“Dungeon background assets aren’t supposed to be vandalizable by NPCs!” the game’s chief engineer retorts, while he keeps ranting. “Add to that demon corpses being thrown into the river, sleep deprivation debuffs on adds that are absent from the code, and this happened in a single-boss dungeon that hasn’t been released yet!”
“Do you have any idea of what re-coding the game would imply? The things people loved about MAA before these bugs began were mostly about the following: character creation, fashion and housing, and how you can interact with content without necessarily having to grind for it!” the manufacturer’s CEO is taken aback by the suggestion of his staff to deal with the rash in bugs. “However, I don’t think everything is lost. We can have the character creator, housing creator, music and outfits carry over”
“If you feel like re-coding the game is necessary, or even create a new one with assets reused from MAA, how can we ensure that we won’t be exploiting the new world’s residents?” the CS lead asks the QA lead.
“What do you mean, we are exploiting the residents of another world?” the QA lead rolls his eyes, not believing the accusations against the manufacturer. “Thus far, the bugs appear confined to content from the newest expansion, and if we could just create a classic server without any of the content and features from the expansion...”
It’s clear the manufacturer’s staff doesn’t agree on how to deal with the rash of bugs this game has been afflicted lately, even as the game is losing players by the day.
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Yet, as the manufacturer gets bogged down on how to deal with the bugs, around Perseria, Monseigneur realizes that the column of smoke coming from the city on fire has also alerted the outlying garrisons to the goings-on in the city. The bishop contacts Clavet, using a magic tablet to do so as the enemy chases her around the desert, out of range of the city’s defenses:
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“The enemy has emptied the border garrisons to relieve the city! We need help!”
As much as I’d love to help our fellow rebels in their siege of the city, we can’t leave both our footholds defenseless, Clavet ponders the implications of reinforcing the city for her rebel cell, and what Clavet’s rebel cell can dispatch to help Jutudiel’s, along with any other rebel cell operating inside the city. However, if we capture an outpost, maybe we can split the enemy force, or otherwise beat the enemy at their own game… damn it, who would I fool? I must decide quickly how much to deploy to reinforce our brothers-in-arms in the city!
“Heathrow, this is command. We need all units you can spare to aid in the fight for Perseria, now!” Clavet yells at the leader of the garrison left behind in Heathrow.
“Can’t spare anything! Remember what would happen if Heathrow falls?” the ranking officer at Heathrow retorts.
And I wonder how much I can afford to leave behind at the Gates of Tartarus; Pandemonium will seek to recapture the Gates, but there will be no reinforcements from Heathrow. Yet, I believe the Gates of Tartarus being in the hands of the living has hit the demons’ morale, Clavet feels like she holds the Perserian rebellion in her hands. Yet, she feels like something is amiss; she feels blindsided by the pace at which events seem to take place in the game’s world. Speaking of which, a day in the players’ world lasts between 19 to 20 MAA in-game days.
“Béteulle, you’re in charge of the Gates while I am going to reinforce our brothers in Perseria! They have begun the siege of the city!” Clavet gives her instructions before assigning units to the reinforcement of the rebels in the city. “Move out!”
While Clavet made sure she left behind sufficient forces to hold on to the Gates of Tartarus while the city is under siege, she has her force move with all speed, in the dead of night.
Meanwhile, in the city itself, the remaining guards, paighan or neyze-daran, i.e., living or ghost, fight the rebels in the streets, mostly in Lower Perseria at this stage. The city council appears reluctant to redeploy the remaining guards of the upper city to help out in the lower city. Even when the lower city has fires erupt in various places.
Where are the other rebel cells? We suffered casualties and, at this rate, my supply of stolen medicine is going to run out! And we might not be able to fight off the enemy reinforcements! Jutudiel looks for medicine to steal on the bodies of the dead guards. As a magic-user, however, I am not nearly as powerful as Clavet, so, as much as I would have liked to make things go boom, all I know of magic is healing a few traumas and invisibility...
Once the medicine is looted, she resumes using magic to administer it to fellow rebels. And keeping quiet to cast it, while this rag-tag band of rebel cells leaves a trail of blood. The city’s guards, not used to fighting at night, are at a clear disadvantage against rebel ninjas.
And yet, the death toll of the nocturnal engagement doesn’t seem to faze the city council in the upper city. The city council directs the city’s defense even when the lower city is burning.
“Mr. Mayor, we’re taking heavy casualties in the lower city! Should we sound the retreat?” a distraught city councillor, whose constituents live in the lower city, asks the mayor.
“Yes; however, keep in mind that we’re sounding the retreat to lull the rebels in a false sense of security. Especially as reinforcements are approaching the lower city! The rebels are going to be toast in broad daylight!” The mayor then turns to the bugler. “All units, fall back to the upper city!”
As the mayor sounds the retreat within his own city, the kamandaran, or archers, on the upper city’s chemin de ronde shoot flaming arrows near positions they have an idea of where the rebels are fighting, or moving towards, to cover their retreat. The rebels are now faced with a tough choice: try to storm the upper city or face the relief force coming from the outside, the mayor chuckles as his reinforcements are on the move.
Some of the reinforcements are chasing Monseigneur around in the outlying desert like headless chickens. blinded by crossing magical bright lines drawn in the sand, and the same color as said sand. With holy flares being hurled their way if celebrating a high mass to sleep is not a viable option.
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Yet, somehow, another player gathering desert night roses sees Monseigneur, whom the player sees as offline, being chased around among the dunes by the city guards, well beyond their regular patrol zones.
“Why is it that offline characters are putting players in danger like this? The guards could have gotten me killed!” that player fumes, while opening a support ticket for a report of offline characters being in active open world gameplay. “If they are offline, they aren’t supposed to be out and about in the open world!”
By this point of the in-game siege, the manufacturer’s QA and CS teams are swamped by the sheer number of bug reports, most of which appear related to the siege in some manner. And these bugs weren’t limited to NPCs vandalizing buildings without there being a provision for it in the code.
Because of the skyrocketing number of bugs found in the game, MAA’s QA lead is summoned into the manufacturer’s CEO’s office:
“Dear QA lead, it appears that lately, players of the game have found new bugs at an alarming rate that have caused MAA’s players to desert the game!” the manufacturer’s CEO screams at MAA’s QA lead.
“These bugs appear to be irreproducible!” the QA lead attempts to defend himself from an angry big boss.
“Do you have any idea what the loss of a player base means for the game? Your failures as QA lead have caused it! You’re fired!” the manufacturer’s CEO then hands a pink slip to the QA lead, who leaves the office with his head hunched in shame.