The journey to “Return of the King”

Back when we announced Chapter 2 “Build up to NEXT” we made a promise to have three guild smaller guild events, instead of our typical 4-week long ones, that would a week or two and serve as filler for the rest of the year.

That did not end up happening.

Covid, natural disasters, and personal issues proved to be a challenge to make this idea come true. One of the earliest ideas was to have a “speed run contest”, based on the fun conversations I saw from some talented folks in /r/atg & Anthem Enclave servers, and make it something small for those who wanted something unique to do.

Very Early, slapped together logo to give an idea for the guild event.

The name “Great Grabbit Race” was chosen, based on the “Great Grabbit Adventure” name and theming, and was going to feature dailies & postcards to do again for those who wanted to do something that wasn’t speed running anthem from start to finish.

This idea ended up being put down once personal lives of the staff got hectic. So, the idea was rethought up, kept the name for a bit before changing it to “Soar to New Freights”, and was to be a 3 week event, to make up for missing the September release, with some idea of a goal post “From start to finish” for the rewards idea. I went down trying to think it out, plan some things, throw some things together to see what looked right, and hope that I could present to the team and get the ball rolling.

This and the website launch became the guild team’s project during this time, alongside continuing the new seasonal mayhem activities, and it was to launch in October 12th!

That also didn’t happen.

A lot of the blame for delays can go on me. But that is not to say that it wasn’t for nothing. It is a good reminder to always take care of your mental health as you cannot always be running on empty and continuing to burn yourself out.  But after some well needed rest a lot of the ideas clicked, “Soar to New Freights” was scrapped, and the ideas that I had going for the second iteration had a new theme, a new face, and a new clear vision.

The “Return of the King” event took shape, old assets were reworked, new assets were created, and the team helped create and now helping run one of the best looking guild events I think we’ve had. This time around we decided to take advantage of the website to create further clarity of what this event is about, as we know sometimes it was hard to get across what we wanted from people, so the website project also ended up benefiting this event as well.

It was a rocky road to get this guild event out, it turned into a bigger project then I first imagined, and I severely underestimated my own mental health during it all. But it proved for some good lessons, we’re back on the road, and I cannot wait to see what everyone who participates does with the days to come.

Thank you for reading this post. It is a bit personal about me, but I wanted to write down something about this.