Yes, I realize I’m ‘outting’ myself, but I had planned on doing so since about 250 hours into this character’s life, right after Nep outted himself as Cabdru. The player response was not at all what I expected; it was a lot more positive than I thought it would be, to be honest. I figured, “Why not? I’ve got nothing to hide!” We’ll see how that goes…

Warning: I wrote this in advance, and I like to write, so it’s long. Continue at your own risk!

I rolled Kharghurln in an attempt to learn what was so difficult about playing an AP. This was my second attempt at that class, the first being Zechterian, a duergar Scarab AP about five or so years ago, who had mixed success and never made it past level 40. I chose Empire because it’s always been my second favorite Cabal, and I love killing Villagers (sorry guys, I do). My last few characters hadn’t been ‘power builds’ (dark-elf assassin, anyone?), so I figured why not roll with the tried and true fire giant? My only concession towards uniqueness was deciding to go with an unholy flail vice axe – a choice I never once regretted.

Being made Emperor at level 35 or so sucked. First of all, I didn’t want the job, since I didn’t think I’d have the time to devote to the character. Second, I didn’t get the Emperor powers at that level. Third, Empire was in the crapper, and I had no idea how to get it out, hence my subsequent demotion to Sect Leader. Fourth…hell, there is no fourth. It was freakin’ awesome being Emperor! Woot!

I spent the time as Sect Leader learning how to run a Sect, which is harder than it looks, and learning how to be a successful Emperor, which I think I did as well. I used a lot of the leadership tools I learned in the Navy (though I tried to make them EVIL leadership tools) to keep things under control and position myself to take the throne when the opportunity arose. When it did, I was ready. The rest, as they say, is history.

APs are definitely tough to play, but a lot of fun. I think they’re the one class that has a way of dealing with pretty much any other class in the game. Conversely, I think they have weaknesses that can be exploited by pretty much any other class in the game. These two things combine to make for a lot of interesting tactical combinations and choices during fights. I never went into a fight that I knew I’d win, and I got pasted by some excellent (and often surprising) tactics on the part of my enemies. I had a pretty easy aura source, a tough as all hell barrier source, and a shield source that I didn’t find until about two-thirds through Khar’s life. That and a few fly potions were usually the extent of my preps (though I’d whip out the random reduce when I was feeling lucky).

I was no Cabdru, but I like to think I made my own niche: proving that you can lose a boatload of pretty good to awesome unholy weapons and still be one deadly character. If you’re good enough to get that first charge, then you’re good enough to get that first charge again and again! I also found that charges really didn’t make all that much of a difference until you hit about thirty; from there until fifty charges was a dangerous period. That’s enough charges to tip the scales in a lot of fights, but not enough to tip them every time, so you’ve got to be conservative. Once you get fifty, there’s not a lot of folks that can take you down solo if you’re prepared; the run from fifty to 100+ can be pretty quick and dramatic.

I tried very, very hard not to loot very much (I did that by having way too many magic sticks in my inventory). And 99% of the time, I was pretty happy with whatever current set of gear I was wearing at the time. I’d guard the corpse if I could until you made it back, but sometimes (usually when I was exposed, or there were enemies on the way) I just couldn’t. Khar felt that strong enemies were better than weak enemies, and felt that your gear helped make you strong enough to face her. She also felt that taking too much would discourage you from fighting her again, which she didn’t want. Sometimes something shiny would catch her eye, and she’d take it to sell for donations (but if she couldn’t, odds are I’d try to give it back to you). That being said, if other people got your things (for whatever reason), she didn’t feel obligated to do really much of anything to get that stuff back to you. As a player, I’m not against looting by any stretch of the imagination, but I realize that it can impact the funstick for others at times, so that was my attempt to minimize it. Every time I returned to my corpse, I expected to find it empty. To those of you that returned any gear to me (especially the Unholy Scourge), thanks (a word that Khar did not know how to say). To everyone else, no hard feelings! I usually had some pretty sweet gear, and could understand why you’d want to loot it. To the four-player gank on Eastern last week, I actually ended up with more gear than I had when I got killed – that was pretty cool, so thanks to you.

Immortals:

Zulg – Thanks for the recent coding additions to Empire. I know how busy you are, and I appreciate the time and effort you put into the Cabal when you can.

Grurk – You were a great Empire immortal, and I missed you towards the end of Khar’s life. Thanks for giving me the shot when you did.

Khaso – I’m glad you’re back in more ways than one. You really bring a lot to the table. Thanks for kicking me in the ass towards the end there; I needed it, even though nothing really came of it (for Khar at least). Keep doing what you do.

Lyristeon – Thanks for the echoes, they actually made my all misty. Was exactly what I was hoping for. Now you know why I didn’t have any questions.

Other Imms – Thanks so much for enjoying what I did with Khar, and for the time and effort you put into the game.

Players:

Khar interacted with, literally, hundreds of characters over the course of her life. I’ll probably just leave this to active characters, since if you deleted/died, I already threw my comments out there on your various Battlefield threads. I’ll probably forget most of you, but I’ll try to get as many of you as I can. If I do miss you, post and I’ll respond.

Across the board, pretty much everyone I interacted with was ready to RP and RP well. Maybe Khar brought that out in you; I prefer to think that the playerbase as a whole has evolved to the point where RP is the norm. And exceptional RP is more and more frequent. So for that, I thank you all. Khar was as much fun as she was primarily because of all of you. Keep on keeping on!

Empire

Hunsobo – You are an amazing character, and have one of the best mixes of PK skill and rock-solid RP that I have ever seen. Your malapropisms consistently cracked me up, and I tried really hard to free my schedule up so I could log on during your play times. Good luck as Emperor.

Waserax – Brilliant character. Take what I said about Hunsobo’s skill at PK and RP and apply it to you. Thanks for the bloodletting ceremony. It was worth my wife’s dirty looks when I told her I had a MUD thing to do that night. Good luck as Emperor.

Ktaar – You stepped right into the Shadow Lord’s job like it was made for you. Deadly, deadly character. Good luck as Emperor (though I think you’ll have a tough job beating the other two out for the position).

You three make me wish I had a Hero range good-aligned character, but I only play one mortal at a time.

Black Sect Leader – To all of those Black Sect members who I spent my hard earned donations on promoting, only to see your worthless hides on the Battlefield a week later, kiss my fire giant ass! My biggest regret at age dying at this point is that I feel like I failed since I didn’t leave a full Council.

Battle

Vhloughvang – Man, you whooped my ass good! Svirf berserker whip / flail is a beast. I refused pretty much all of your challenges because I figured the risk just wasn’t worth the reward. If I got lucky, I might be able to kill you and get three to four charges. If I didn’t get lucky, I was most likely dead and would lose the Unholy Scourge. It was just a lot easier to wait until you didn’t have the head and try to take you out then. You are a first-rate Villager, though, so props for that.

Brinkmun – Scouts are tough for us iceballers, man, especially those wielding hard-to-disarm polearms. You were pretty much always up for a fight, and I don’t recall ever managing to kill you. You’d just flee and let me impale myself on your polearm, and then lay in with the critical hits. Smart, smart strategy.

Scion

Khar was ambivalent towards you for most of her life, especially the mages. She’d never ally with you, and would jump you if the mood took her, but she had no problems looking the other way and just letting you walk by. She didn’t consider you a short-term threat to Empire for the most part, and there were always more pressing matters to deal with.

Haratzi – A few fights, very few of them what I would call nailbiters. If I got the deafen off, you were gone (and rightly so). If I didn’t try that tactic, I’d usually end up having to flee. Elemental protection does a lot to minimize the AP toolbox; it doesn’t eliminate the options (especially with Emperor powers), but a lot of the raw damage (which I tended to rely on for the kill) gets taken away. We didn’t have a lot of RP interaction; I like to think that those we did conveyed some mutual respect and admiration. I think you are one hell of a tough character, and wish you luck with the Chasm.

Victoria – “Should I cleave Victoria or Haratzi? If I cleave Haratzi, I might get slept. That would suck. I’ll just cleave her.” You should have seen the look on my face when it worked. Dark-elf AP has to be a hard play, but I think that you’re still early enough in your career to see it work out well. You’ve got the potential to be a powerhouse. Get those thirty charges if you can, man!

Fortress

In general, you guys have really stepped up the PK quite a few notches since I started Khar. I remember when pretty much everyone in the Cabal was a punching bag, and I’d routinely raid solo against three defenders and send you packing. Not any more! Maybe some more skilled players have moved to Fortress, but I tend to think you habitual Fortress players have just gotten better. Kudos to you, it made things a lot more interesting when I was running from you as often as I was running towards you.

Thoric – You have big brass ones, sir! One of the few that would happily and actively hunt me solo. I think you are doing a great job with the Fortress, and I wish you lots of luck.

Nierh – If I had a copper for every storm giant sword spec that bashed me into the ground I’d have easily doubled my Imperial donations. You were a beast; I was very happy my strategy for killing you worked (at least, I’d like to think it was the strategy that did it). Keep on killing evils; maybe one day I’ll see you with the strange bracers.

Niheriva – Class act through and through. You were always a very, very tough fight for me, and backed it up with great RP. I thoroughly enjoyed our interactions, and you definitely deserve your leadership position.

Outlander

The refuge is probably the toughest place for me to raid solo. I tried a few times, even with a fairly robust weapon, and it just wasn’t going to happen in less than three ten hour attempts. During which period my paranoid self would just naturally assume someone in my range would log in and lay waste to me. I died or got other Imperials killed more times raiding that place than any other.

Xin – Classy, classy character. I loved our interactions. You exude Sunwarden. I never thought you were an easy kill by any stretch, and would always prep as best I could before fighting you. The last kill I had on you (not counting the raid the other night, which was actually Waserax or Hunsobo) was surprisingly quick and painless for me. You have an excellent build, and I expect great things from you.

Zekaris – Not a lot of fights between us, but you were smart in the few we did have. I expect great things from you as well.

Nexus

Khar never raided (actually, think I raided once, but I wasn’t Empress then), since she felt that letting you do your “job” was a great excuse for getting to kill you. And I think she tipped the balance pretty heavily towards evil just by logging on, so killing you was always an option.

Geran – Interesting character, the few fights we had were fun. Trading that staff of wonders back and forth was a blast, even though you had to die for me to get it back, and I just had to get knocked out. I liked that you always were willing to warn me when the balance had shifted to the point where you were coming after me.

Tumerellen – Loved our interactions; you were exactly how I pictured a leader of Nexus. Damn invokers could really neutralize my ability to take on multiple opponents. I tried all sorts of different strategies (mana draining was my favorite, but it only worked once against the Fortress), but would usually just fall back on deafen. Well played, keep up the good work!

Zesam – Very solid RP, and you were skilled as a healer. Look forward to seeing what you bring to the table as an Imm.

Herald

Khar didn’t interact with you very much; a lot less than I wanted to, to be honest. She never viewed the Inn as enemies of Empire, but since Khar rarely sought out allies (except for raids), she didn’t have a lot of reasons to group with you.

Tribunal

Not a lot of the current batch stand out in my mind, sorry.

Orcs

Khar didn’t mind orcs, but she did, for the most part, find them too uncivilized for her tastes. Not to the point where she considered them enemies, but she was definitely leery of grouping with them. She wasn’t above using them for spies, and actually had quite a few reporting her enemy’s whereabouts.

Uncaballeds

If you weren’t an enemy of Empire (which included good-aligned, rangers and druids), or weren’t grouped with enemies of Empire, Khar pretty much left you alone. I tried to ask new faces that question when I could, just to avoid random killing (which Khar felt was bad for the Empire in the long run. Can’t just have wanton butchery everywhere in a civilized world, now can you?).

Derasori – I loved that you were always up for fighting Fortress. I also thought your RP was pretty one-dimensional, but that could just be a reflection of what we did when we grouped: fight Fortress. I’d love to see you develop yourself more. Though I will say, you weren’t a “lacky”; you fought plenty on your own, and weren’t afraid to mix it up solo.

Mobs

Xoltrindar – ####er. I think I had a 98% kill ratio against you, but considering the number of times I fought you, that’s still a lot of deaths (and con) on my part. Stupid lich!

Crystalline Dragon – I took the dragonslayer edge just to fight you. Man, you would still bite the hell out of me! Good times, thanks for almost single-handedly funding the lion’s share of my donations.

That’s it! Though I’ve got another mortal role I’m itching to try out, I need to take a break and focus on Kastellyn for a while. I’ve got a lot of projects that have been on back burners for too long, and I’m itching to clear them off my plate. I also miss running quests and having random interactions with players, stuff I just haven’t had the time for lately. That being said, I like to think that Imms playing mortals can have the same level of positive interaction impact as Imms running quests and interacting with mortals as themselves. It’s just impact in a different way.

See you in the fields!

Kastellyn the Devourer of Magic, Lord of Legends