[Quiet Man Cometh]

Originally Posted by Lestrade

There are definitely a TON of characters when they're all dumped on you at once. When reading a novel generally only a few characters are introduced at a time. If too many are introduced at once it's really overwhelming and hard to follow.

Also I tend to read novels with fairly small casts, I guess. When I think about the last few novels I read, which was basically the complete works of E.M. Forster, they were basically all slice-of-life stories with only a handful of main characters and a small supporting cast. But it's honestly moot; the number of characters in a novel alone doesn't mean anything, it's how they're used. Personally, when I try to read just this event, I'm left confused because there are a ton of people and I can't keep them straight at all. They also all have pretty weird names that I don't find very easy to remember.

I mean, obviously that's just my opinion and you guys are certainly under no obligation to just please me. I'm just trying to explain why I feel the way I do.

Short answer, as Sheol said, really newcomers are jumping into the middle of a story. Start a novel in the middle and you will probably have the same problems.

Sightly longer answer, I understand where you're coming from Lestrade, but we simply can't re-introduce every character in each event for the newcomers who are always coming because we often has limited time to work through it as it is.

We do understand the problem and are working on means to fix it or to at least make it easier as we address each issue. Nexess and Ultima have already taken the time to sort the event scenes to that they can be read in order without having to fish for them.

This current event story could be seen to include material from four previous event lines that have now crossed. It's a natural story progression, but one that is hard to grasp without background when you're jumping right in. We will make it easier but a lot of back material to read also means a lot of back material to organize and sort. It's just going to take time.