I'm choosing to reply to Kenshin's post here rather than on the Battlefield because it feels a more appropriate forum for this discussion to me.

So let's just grab the bull by the horns, kick it in the groin, and talk about it.

>Why all the anonymity? It just makes everything look some
>sort of cheap cover up. I don't get all the behind closed
>doors stuff that the staff puts up.

Speaking for myself, it amounts, essentially, to a desire to play the game like anyone else and be reasonably left alone about it.

People don't become imms because they hate playing CF. By and large, we want to stick around because we love the game, and while we want to contribute to it in other ways, the spark that made us want to in the first place never really dies.

Frankly, there is no policy or attitude towards imms continuing to play the game that would make all of the players happy. Not one. I've played games where the volunteer staff wasn't permitted to play at all, and it's not a solution. It seems like one in the short term, but a year or two later you get why it isn't.

So we play. I won't apologize for that.

Sometimes, like anyone else, we play because there's a role idea we have that we think is cool. Sometimes there's an area or set of areas we want to explore. Sometimes it sounds like fun or it's a good way to kill time. Sometimes we see a cabal that's losing badly and want to try to play the underdog and equalize things a little.

Sometimes we play a new or revamped class or class combination that hasn't seen much play yet in order to try to find the problems or fix the bugs in it, and god help us if it takes trying something out in play to see if it's balanced or works right before we fix it.

But sometimes, like anyone else, we just want to play the game. Really play. To take something you think could be tough and just play the hell out of it and see if you can accomplish half as much as you think you can.

When I play, I don't want 50 tons of baggage to come with it. I don't want to have to defend daily whether the way I killed you was a smart, innovative tactic or a "obvious bug." I don't want to have to explain to you that the "super-secret item "I have is, in fact, something I got by tripping the last guy who had it to death. I don't want to have to tell you that other the limit-4 "super-secret item" I have was maxed out the first time I tried to get it, so obviously at least four someones who aren't me must also know how to get it. I don't want to have to read you second-guessing the choice if I end up tattooed, in a cabal leadership position, or if I get a quest spell. I don't want to have to deal with OOC tells trash-talking me twice a day.

I sure as hell don't want to read fabrications and #### for eight years after I play a character from the very small but vocal chunk of the playerbase who will seize on a small truth (e.g. Nepenthe played Istendil) and use it to tell ridiculous but sinister-seeming lies for years until even sane people are starting to believe it might be true (e.g. Istendil was part of an all-imm engineered team to take over Empire, Istendil had a full set of A/B/S the day barrier wands went in, Istendil mudsexxored with kobolds.) The most frustrating part of that syndrome, really, is that some of the worst offenders are people who seem rational, normal, and likeable 99% of the time until the just start making #### up.

I don't want to deal with any of that ####. I just want to play the ####ing game. To compete, win, and lose like anyone else. To make friends and enemies, laugh about it when it's all said and done, maybe share a log or point out moments of brilliance or stupidity.

This a game of players with colorful personalities and big egos. It's a game of intensely competetive people. These are, incidentally, some of the things we all love about it. If you think there's any way besides an attempt at anonymity to get something resembling a fair shot at just playing the game in a community like ours, I'd like to hear it.

1) It's over a year old. Baby Floofi cries when people bump huge, sprawling, ancient threads.

2) The most recent activity has involved a combination of accusations based on incorrect information (re: role contest judges and prizes), and good ol' Deathweaver/Shadowmaster/Conclave going back to his roots and trying to troll as anonymously as possible.

3) The rest of the thread covers about 12 different topics.

I think all of those topics have been addressed, but if you have further concerns, feel free to start another, more focused thread.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

Ever hear the phrase "bad code smell"? Well it just doesn't apply to coding. There's really no way to describe what bothers me about some code other than that it "smells bad". In a similar vein, there are some situations about Imms-playing-morts that get that "seems like cheating" smell to them.

Specifically, for me at least, the part that irks me is when I look at a situation (be it some skill that seems way out of whack with game balance or character decked in gear that no one else has even heard of or some game mechanics trick that looks very buggy) and say to myself, "Gee, that's probably an Imm playing that character." When that happens and I'm correct, it has that "seems like cheating" smell to it. I don't know how else to phrase it. If it weren't that predictable, I don't think I'd have an issue with it.

Point blank example - Arolin's character getting denied over rescue. Rescue has always worked that way and I don't really consider that a bug, but he was pretty much railed for exploiting it. Counter-example - Yanacek. There was a ton of stuff with that character that most people looked at and went, "Holy crap is that broken." But he did very well despite that. Now I could go on with the counter-examples all day, but there's very little need. I think we're all fine with immortals playing, we're just not fine with immortals abusing stuff to gain an advantage over non-immortals.

Point blank example - Arolin's character getting denied over rescue. Rescue has always worked that way and I don't really consider that a bug, but he was pretty much railed for exploiting it.

Specifically, exploiting it in tandem with his RL buddy, after the two of them had exhausted their warnings about permaing/etc. You're neglecting the fact that Arolin required cooperation, and where it came from.

Couple that with him describing it in advance on IRC as a bug exploit, and you have a clearer picture that he knew what we was doing. (We knew in advance that something was up, but not exactly what.) I don't get why people claim that Arolin was unfairly busted when he himself knew it was dirty. It's all revisionism.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

To be frank I don't care if someone did screw with him behind the scenes to get rid of him. I'm just glad he's gone. He was bad for the mud.

>So let's just grab the bull by the horns, kick it in the
>groin, and talk about it.

Lets try not to get Vlad banned in the process.

>Speaking for myself, it amounts, essentially, to a desire to
>play the game like anyone else and be reasonably left alone
>about it.

To be blunt, you don't play the game like just anyone else. You have an intimate knowledge of the hardest areas/mobs/wands and most obscure facets of the code. That gives you an advantage available only to other people who are imps. To be honest I would say your knowledge of the game mechanics is probably second to none (Though Arvam would give you a run for your money I bet) and your knowledge of eq/areas is unquestionably the strongest. In a game like CF, that knowledge gives you an immense leg up over "anyone else".

>People don't become imms because they hate playing CF. By and
>large, we want to stick around because we love the game, and
>while we want to contribute to it in other ways, the spark
>that made us want to in the first place never really dies.

Nor should it. I don't think anyone is suggesting the imms stop playing mortals. I do however think you have a skewed idea of what it is to be "just" a player, because of the sheer amount of insight you have into how the game works and what is where.

>Frankly, there is no policy or attitude towards imms
>continuing to play the game that would make all of the players
>happy. Not one. I've played games where the volunteer staff
>wasn't permitted to play at all, and it's not a solution. It
>seems like one in the short term, but a year or two later you
>get why it isn't.

No, I wouldn't like this because that would put the staff even more out of touch with the players.

>So we play. I won't apologize for that.

I don't think anyone ever suggested you do.

>Sometimes, like anyone else, we play because there's a role
>idea we have that we think is cool. Sometimes there's an area
>or set of areas we want to explore. Sometimes it sounds like
>fun or it's a good way to kill time. Sometimes we see a cabal
>that's losing badly and want to try to play the underdog and
>equalize things a little.

Spiffy.

>Sometimes we play a new or revamped class or class combination
>that hasn't seen much play yet in order to try to find the
>problems or fix the bugs in it, and god help us if it takes
>trying something out in play to see if it's balanced or works
>right before we fix it.

Not that I'm accusing you, but some on the staff have been known to abuse things that need "fixing", but of course it doesn't get done till the character is gone. These kinds of things cause a good chunk of the problems people have with imms playing mortals. You guys have all the control, and when an immortal is left to run loose doing thats that a normal player would get at the very least slain for, it sets tongues wagging.

>But sometimes, like anyone else, we just want to play the
>game. Really play. To take something you think could be
>tough and just play the hell out of it and see if you can
>accomplish half as much as you think you can.

But how tough is it when you already have a leg up over people?

>When I play, I don't want 50 tons of baggage to come with it.
>I don't want to have to defend daily whether the way I killed
>you was a smart, innovative tactic or a "obvious bug." I
>don't want to have to explain to you that the "super-secret
>item "I have is, in fact, something I got by tripping the last
>guy who had it to death. I don't want to have to tell you
>that other the limit-4 "super-secret item" I have was maxed
>out the first time I tried to get it, so obviously at least
>four someones who aren't me must also know how to get it. I
>don't want to have to read you second-guessing the choice if I
>end up tattooed, in a cabal leadership position, or if I get a
>quest spell. I don't want to have to deal with OOC tells
>trash-talking me twice a day.

To be honest, if you don't do things that will set people off there's no reason why anyone could ever really do any of those things. Take Kasty/Kargh. Nobody ever even hinted (to my knowledge) that anything was inappropriate about Karghulin. Kasty came right out and admitted to being the player when the character was gone. There was no ####storm of critics coming out of the woodwork. Why? Because there was never any question that everything was done on the up and up. Nobody ever saw him doing shady (IE things another player would get ROTD'd for) things. Certain immortals have more than once been in the center of some EXTREMELY shady things, and these people tend to be in these situations repeatedly. The more it happens with certain people, of course the less the playerbase is going to trust in the fairness and honesty of said staffer.

>I sure as hell don't want to read fabrications and #### for
>eight years after I play a character from the very small but
>vocal chunk of the playerbase who will seize on a small truth
> e.g. Nepenthe played Istendil) and use it to tell ridiculous
>but sinister-seeming lies for years until even sane people are
>starting to believe it might be true (e.g. Istendil was part
>of an all-imm engineered team to take over Empire, Istendil
>had a full set of A/B/S the day barrier wands went in,
>Istendil mudsexxored with kobolds.) The most frustrating part
>of that syndrome, really, is that some of the worst offenders
>are people who seem rational, normal, and likeable 99% of the
>time until the just start making #### up.

Speaking only for myself, these things start to happen after the previously shady things start to appear. I backed you up 100% when speculation started that you played Cabdru. But to be perfectly blunt after everything started to come out about the character I felt kind of like I had been backing up someone who maybe wasn't entirely on the up and up. I'll be frank, someone else who also won the exact same role contest and got the same level of recognition got nothing as a reward, and you got a point over your racial max in int. You have to understand how that makes people feel, and how it looks to even people who weren't predisposed to distrusting you. Your fiance' judges the role contest, and then you get a reward out of line with what other people who also won recieved. Coupled with the rumors (many of which to be equally frank came from people who were/still are on the staff) about tinkering with eq, the way things progged in ways they shouldn't have, and really what other reaction do you expect but mistrust? Then Valg attacking people on the forums who speculated that you were Cabdru was just the #### icing on the cake of bad feelings. Those speculators were right, but the attempt was made to make them look like paranoid freaks. Thats just not right. Either don't say anything or own up to it, but don't ####ing parade people out like paranoid morons when they were right.

>I don't want to deal with any of that ####. I just want to
>play the ####ing game. To compete, win, and lose like anyone
>else. To make friends and enemies, laugh about it when it's
>all said and done, maybe share a log or point out moments of
>brilliance or stupidity.

But you're NOT like anyone else. The fact that you have such an intimate knowledge of the game that is unavailable to anyone else is just not something that can or should be overlooked.

>This a game of players with colorful personalities and big
>egos. It's a game of intensely competetive people. These
>are, incidentally, some of the things we all love about it.
>If you think there's any way besides an attempt at
>anonymity to get something resembling a fair shot at just
>playing the game in a community like ours, I'd like to hear
>it.

Kasty seemed to do just fine with it. Always has. Arvam could take your own weapon away from you and ass#### you with it, but he never had huge ####storms surround his characters (yeah a few people griped about Lariya but not nearly as many as have been up in arms over Cabdru). Other staffers have played mortals, cabal leaders and kickass characters without a whiff of controversy. Maybe you need to lok at the circumstances that cause the controversy if you want to avoid it, instead of just pretending you didn't play certain characters.

"Your fiance' judges the role contest, and then you get a reward out of line with what other people who also won recieved."

I'll let Nep deal with the rest of your dead-horse-beating if he feels like it, but the role contest in question was judged by Dalteric. Last I checked, Dalteric has never been engaged to Nepenthe, and it is not legal to do so in Nepenthe's home state.

Link:
http://forums.carrionfields.com/dc/dcboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=7&topic_id=381

He also entered a second role contest, judged by Grurk and Dalteric, and did not win. Grurk is also, to my knowledge, not engaged to Nepenthe.

Link:
http://forums.carrionfields.com/dc/dcboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=7&topic_id=397

Any and all concerns you have about who won those contests rests with Dalteric. I don't know who he did or didn't talk about roles with, but he made the decisions.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

I'll let Nep deal with the rest of your dead-horse-beating if he feels like it, but the role contest in question was judged by Dalteric.

Shall we assume by your lack of response to Vladimir's other points, that you agree with every one of his allegations except for this role contest issue?

nt

My question was - Did his lack of response to the rest of the points denote his agreement with them?

Saying he wasn't going to address those points hardly answers my question. In fact it was the very basis for the question.

He refuted the one thing he knew he had concrete proof for. If I was him I wouldn't feel like spending most of my day digging in archived logs either. Notice the dead horse statement, meaning this has all been touched on before. Even parrots get tired of repeating the same #### over and over.

It appears you are saying Valgruarnera cannot prove anything Vladimir says is incorrect except that one thing. I was hoping for this type of response, but from Valgruarnera. Thanks for answering for him, but in this case I was looking for an answer from the person I asked the question of.

For those watching at home, the reason I am curious about this is twofold.

One, Vladimir has a long history of alleging conspiracy, with little factual support. I am curious if this is one of those times or if he is correct on his other points in this particular instance. It is obvious Vladimir was alleging conspiracy with no actual factual support on the instance of the Role contest rewards, as documented by Valgruarnera.

Two, Valgruarnera has a well-documented dislike of Vladimir, I was curious if he was just picking out one point out of many to make the rest of Vladimir's points appear ineffective, while ignoring the many other points which were more 'the meat' of Vladimir's posts.

Valg provided some info on something easily researched. As I said in my previous post "IF I WERE HIM, I WOULDN'T WANT TO SPEND MY ENTIRE DAY DIGGING IN ARCHIVES EITHER" If it were me I would officially file it under "I don't have to prove I'm doing my job to randome assholes", and regret what I already put up to prove that I was.

Shall we assume by your lack of response to Vladimir's other points, that you agree with every one of his allegations except for this role contest issue?

No. That would be a remarkably stupid thing to assume.

I am trying to minimize the time I spend arguing with brick walls, though. But thanks for making a new account just to troll.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

What rule was broken? I was courteous, on-topic and not in the least bit argumentative?

Let's not foster a forum environment where people create multiple anonymous accounts explicitly to stir #### up.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

>What rule was broken? I was courteous, on-topic and not in
>the least bit argumentative?

If you honestly believe that's true, no offense but you're socially retarded.

(On-topic, I will give you.)

Please do not make further anonymous trolling accounts on our forums. You have been, in no uncertain terms, asked to go away.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

If he didn't want to answer any of these issues, he shouldn't have started this thread, should he? He said he wanted to grab the bull by the horns, kick it in the groin and talk about it. If you're just going to turn into a pissy pants when people bring the questions up, on the official forum where they can finally be answered, then don't ####ing start threads saying thats what you want to do. You can't have it both ways.

Also to my knowledge, none of the things I brought up have ever really been answered wih any sort of solid statement from the staff, just a lot of allusions and thread lockings.

As for the role contest it was judged by Dalteric AND Crysserea. Her bitchy mean spirited comments got posted to the forums afterwards. Or did you forget about her participation and the ensuing deletion of her comments?

Again, none of this addresses why someone else who got honorable mention got zilch and Nep was given a reward that was certainly far above what anyone else who got an honorable mention recieved.

If you're just going to turn into an angry bitch when these things are brought up, don't ask people to talk about this ####.

>If he didn't want to answer any of these issues, he shouldn't
>have started this thread, should he? He said he wanted to grab
>the bull by the horns, kick it in the groin and talk about it.

I did feel like talking about it... well over a year ago when I started this thread.

>As for the role contest it was judged by Dalteric AND
>Crysserea.

There was indeed a role contest that they judged together. I did not enter that contest. Dalteric judged lots of them.

>Again, none of this addresses why someone else who got
>honorable mention got zilch and Nep was given a reward that
>was certainly far above what anyone else who got an honorable
>mention recieved.

I'll have to see if Dalteric still has the reward list for that contest, but I'm 100% positive that all winners/mentions got rewards. I'm pretty sure all the other rewards were (in my opinion) stronger, also.

I honestly don't see +1 int on a character that already has most of the skills he uses the most high/perfect already to be that big of a reward. The difference between fire giant int and duergar int for any purpose is just is not that big.

>I did feel like talking about it... well over a year ago
>when I started this thread.

Date Tue 31-Jul-07 03:26 PM is what it says on the first post in this thread as the date. I don't read the forums all that often, and don't recall seeing this thread before. Judging the the new responses, I doubt I was the only one who missed it. If you don't want to talk about it anymore, I'll drop it.

>>As for the role contest it was judged by Dalteric AND
>>Crysserea.
>
>There was indeed a role contest that they judged together. I
>did not enter that contest. Dalteric judged lots of them.

I thought this was one she judged as well as part of her heroimm duties. If I was mistaken I apologize. Doesn't negate the fact though that others who got honorable mention got nothing, while you an imp got something veeeerrry nice.

>>Again, none of this addresses why someone else who got
>>honorable mention got zilch and Nep was given a reward that
>>was certainly far above what anyone else who got an
>honorable
>>mention recieved.


>I'll have to see if Dalteric still has the reward list for
>that contest, but I'm 100% positive that all winners/mentions
>got rewards. I'm pretty sure all the other rewards were (in
>my opinion) stronger, also.

One of the other honorable mentions said he got nothing as a reward. That I am certain of. I'll try and find the link if you care to read it. If not I won't bother.

>I honestly don't see +1 int on a character that already has
>most of the skills he uses the most high/perfect already to be
>that big of a reward. The difference between fire giant int
>and duergar int for any purpose is just is not that big.

Only an AP's spells are highly dependant on INT. I see int points above racial max as a huge deal. If not, why bother even having racial maxes?

>One of the other honorable mentions said he got nothing as a
>reward. That I am certain of. I'll try and find the link if
>you care to read it. If not I won't bother.

Sure, dig it up if you can and we'll see if we can set the record straight. Obviously the note Dalteric wrote to that person to tell them what their reward was won't still be around, but I hope his or our notes are still good on that count.

>Only an AP's spells are highly dependant on INT. I see int
>points above racial max as a huge deal. If not, why bother
>even having racial maxes?

It's a prize; it's not nothing. But it's equally not as good as, say, +1 charisma on a bard (which has gone out half a dozen times), +1dex on a class that has dodge, etc.

I might think of this differently if it were +int on, say, an arial or d-elf a-p, a character that's already got a strong point there... but the difference between fire and duergar a-p spellcasting is just not that big... and it's not even that much of a difference, because a real duergar a-p still has that much more wisdom than a fire giant.

To put it another way, how good would +1 racial max con on a d-elf warrior be, assuming you got it at level 30 or so and had already picked your specs, etc. assuming you would have the normal 16 con? It's not nothing, but it's not game breaking either.

http://www.qhcf.net/cforum/vpost.pl?113356

Now he says he won, and the way he wrote the post it sounded very much like he was saying it was the same role contest as Cabdru, and he got nothing. But when I checked the list of winners for that particular role contest, he wasn't on it. I don't honestly know if it was a different role contest he won or if he thought he won and was mistaken, but either way I was wrong about it being the same role contest and for that I apologize.

That being said, same level of prize and he gets zilch. You got the int. Doesn't strike me as the kind of thing that wouldn't add fuel to the speculation fire.

>To put it another way, how good would +1 racial max con on a d-elf warrior be, assuming you got it at level 30 or so and had already picked your specs, etc. assuming you would have the normal 16 con? It's not nothing, but it's not game breaking either.

Mon Mar 12 13:57:47 2007 by 'Daevryn' at level 36 (61 hrs):
D-elf in a fire giant body role seems like terrible whoring for more int. P.S. Wolveryeti.

If it's not game breaking, where was the harm in someone writing a role with a specific reward in mind? If he had won, you wouldn't have had to think too hard on a reward. Seems no different than anyone who writes a role with a specific goal in mind.

>Now he says he won, and the way he wrote the post it sounded
>very much like he was saying it was the same role contest as
>Cabdru, and he got nothing. But when I checked the list of
>winners for that particular role contest, he wasn't on it. I
>don't honestly know if it was a different role contest he won
>or if he thought he won and was mistaken, but either way I was
>wrong about it being the same role contest and for that I
>apologize.
>
>That being said, same level of prize and he gets zilch. You
>got the int. Doesn't strike me as the kind of thing that
>wouldn't add fuel to the speculation fire.

If it were true, I'd agree with you.

As far as I can tell via forum searching, he did enter that same contest, but wasn't a winner/runner, and didn't enter any other contests with that character.

Edited to clarify: I remember/liked that character, and to be clear I think he was confused/mistaken. I'm not calling him a liar or anything.

>If it's not game breaking, where was the harm in someone
>writing a role with a specific reward in mind? If he had won,
>you wouldn't have had to think too hard on a reward. Seems no
>different than anyone who writes a role with a specific goal
>in mind.

It personally strikes me as in poor taste, but I'm sure that's skewed by having read hundreds of not-very-good roles angling for a specific quest form.

>If it were true, I'd agree with you.
>
>As far as I can tell via forum searching, he did enter that
>same contest, but wasn't a winner/runner, and didn't enter any
>other contests with that character.

Fair enough. This is one of the drawbacks to staff not posting on Dios. You guys can't just come out and correct people who are mistaken.

>Edited to clarify: I remember/liked that character, and to be
>clear I think he was confused/mistaken. I'm not calling him a
>liar or anything.

Nope, never thought you were. I'm not calling you one either. I just knew he said he had also won, and got nothing. I really am sorry about the misunderstanding.

>It personally strikes me as in poor taste, but I'm sure that's
>skewed by having read hundreds of not-very-good roles angling
>for a specific quest form.

Yeah, I can see how that would get old after a while.

>Not that I'm accusing you, but some on the staff have been
>known to abuse things that need "fixing", but of course it
>doesn't get done till the character is gone. These kinds of
>things cause a good chunk of the problems people have with
>imms playing mortals. You guys have all the control, and when
>an immortal is left to run loose doing thats that a normal
>player would get at the very least slain for, it sets tongues
>wagging.

I can't think of anything I've "fixed" after playing a character.

During the life of a character, all the time. But then I've got a problem: If I post and say, here's ten things about invokers that just got gimped down, probably you know I'm playing an invoker who can do those things. I don't really want to do that.

So probably I fix it, keep playing the character as long as I feel like playing them (which isn't usually more than another month or two -- I have a short attention span), and two months later someone figures out that you can't send nightgaunts from indoors anymore (or whatever.)

I'm not sure there's a good solution there.

Often you're in a position to need to make difficult judgement calls there. If I'm Yanacek, I'm basically the first successful poisoner ever. If my X ability seems really good, how do I decide to draw the line between 'this is really good, but this class has these other disadvantages or mitagating factors' and 'this is broken good'? Typically you need to play with it it a bit and get some other people's opinions.

(Explore Area Cool Axe) was that kind of case for me. It's from an area I had nothing to do with the implementation of at all. It's also (in my opinion... this might differ for other styles of players or other characters) by far the hardest to get piece of gear that character ever had. It's immediately obvious on using it that it's really, really good -- but is it too good, or is its goodness appropriate for its difficulty? There's not much question that there are tougher items in Hell.

It took me about two days to decide, yes, this is too tough and start to make changes to correct it. I'm not really sure how I or anyone is in a position to do better than that.

>Speaking only for myself, these things start to happen after
>the previously shady things start to appear. I backed you up
>100% when speculation started that you played Cabdru. But to
>be perfectly blunt after everything started to come out about
>the character I felt kind of like I had been backing up
>someone who maybe wasn't entirely on the up and up.

Pretty much everything I can remember seeing 'come out' is either based on someone making something up or getting the facts wrong... like the Cryss and the role contest thing. I mean, enough should be in the forum archives to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that that particular contest was just Dalteric, but here we are talking about it.

>I'll be
>frank, someone else who also won the exact same role contest
>and got the same level of recognition got nothing as a reward,
>and you got a point over your racial max in int.

I keep hearing this, and I know it's not true. I'll ask Dalteric if he still has the details from that contest. I know for certain that everyone who won/placed in that contest got something.

>You have to
>understand how that makes people feel, and how it looks to
>even people who weren't predisposed to distrusting you.

I can only do so much about the stuff people make up or get wrong.

I missed all this Cabdru drama because I was on CF hiatus so I only know what I see in posts, and insane logs. I know you are sick of talking about this but the one thing that really bothered me about this that maybe you can clear up is about that item that basically insta killed whole groups that fought you. It was speculated that it was from the Silent Tower and was basically impossible to get without an army(but you got solo) and was toned down/made impossible to get after you got your fill of kills with it. Is any of that true? Did Cabdru have a whole crew he got his uber leet gear with or did he somehow manage to Solo most of it?

That which does not kill us,
makes us stronger.

I haven't read all the below but your post reminded me of a post of mine on Dio's a short while ago about veterans. Here's the gist of things.

Information is now at a premium. Veterans grew up in a time when you could master hand to hand with boxing gloves on kobolds at level 5 and there were immortals leading trips all the way to the center of hell.

I grew up in a time when if someone whispered to me how to get the (now nerfed) traveling boots then the boogie man just might come out of nowhere and stomp my nuts.

Over my years of playing I've come to know quite a bit of Thera... maybe even more than half of it by my own ignorant estimates well enough to get around. I know a few wand locations, and the one haste location I once knew is now gone. I know a few stone skin preps but they all suck because of the drawbacks. Over all, I'm satisfied with my mediocre PK and other game skills. I enjoy CF when I do play (which is rarely).

I'll be damned if I'm going to waste hundreds of hours of in game time wandering around aimlessly looking for stuff which might not even be in, ESPECIALLY if it can up and vanish in a second because TLB makes a forum post. The worst part is that those posts are removed so I can't even see the list to know which of my preps is now gone... I have to figure it out by trial and error, sometimes to my demise because I'm only half paying attention when collecting the same old prep I've collected dozens of times. It's ridiculous.

The argument that the reward for figuring out a quest is diminished if everyone else read the walk through is hogwash. Anyone who makes that argument is making it plain that they do not value exploration except for the competitive advantage it gives them with respect to gear/preps.

The current system supports cheating. Two players only have to explore half as much as I do to be on equal footing. Three only a third, etc. I won't cheat and I choose not to compete against those odds, so I must be content to stay at my current level of mediocrity. My skill level will go up over time, but my game knowledge will not. The game, at its current pace changes as fast as I learn new areas (given my frequency of play).

It's great that you make this game and I appreciate it but seriously, who do you think you're kidding when you say you want to play like us? I know you don't intend it to be that way, but it's seriously insulting. You can't play like us, not without open sourcing CF which isn't going to happen. The more secretive we are the more competitive advantage the vets who were here before the Age of Secrets have, and even MORE of a competitive advantage goes to immortal staff.

>Anyone who makes that argument is making it plain that they do
>not value exploration except for the competitive advantage it
>gives them with respect to gear/preps.

No offense, but this argument is stupid.

Players are meant to be able to see some in-game rewards/advantages for excelling in different aspects of the game, be it killer-style stuff, achiever-style stuff, RP, etc. Why should exploration be any different?

Equally, in every case, cheating is a possible shortcut.

If you take your argument and cross out exploration and sub in any other aspect of the game, it becomes obvious pretty fast how silly it is. For example:


Being good at PK shouldn't be an advantage in CF -- you shouldn't be able to loot other players or gain advantages from PK in any way. All this does is empower the people who get five real-life friends and make a perma to waste everyone with. People should just fight, and at the end, one of them could randomly die. Anyone who says otherwise makes it plain that they don't value killer-style play for any reason but its rewards -- the 'real' killer players will know they're better even if there's no way to ever tell or prove it.


In game design, you need to make some allowance for cheating, but equally it can't dominate your every decision.

Exploring has become a single player thing or perhaps something for small groups. The extreme enforcement of secrecy has made quests and area explore an ooc advantage that if you reveal it too widely it punishes you.

If my battle bard character found an entrance to silent and some archmages it would probably be perfectly in his roleplay(or even bad roleplay not to) to write a note to battle and explaining how to get to these new mage killing grounds and the perils that awaits. But of course one cannot do that because it would be punishied and/or silent would be closed again.

If my fortress mage decided to write a note to help his fellow mages with their protection by giving out a large list of wands, then again it would be punished.

This system will of course reward imm knowledge and small closed communities that share information without it becoming public knowledge. And also exploration knowledge does not reward you in a way that makes you a better explorer. It rewards you so you become a more powerful player killer.

You missed the point completely, but I'm not really in the mood to argue about it.

No, I got it and perhaps I just did not adress it well enough. You want people to be rewarded for exploration and thus creating a system that gives powerful rewards to people who know the areas of the game. I've never really been a power player myself, more of an explorer who likes to grab a goodie conjie and go to town by myself.

I just disagree how it is implemented and how it promotes a weird unrealistic attitude towards things in game. If a goodie ask my goodie character about some things in the game I should not be forced to think, "If I help this guy then it might become common knowledge and it will be removed or changed so the reward is a death trap", as wands, quests etc have so many times in the past.

For some players, exploration is a reward in and of itself.

A good example of this is Loch Grynmear. Loch Grynmear does not net you much of an ingame reward at all if you 'solve' the area, though you do get something. That said, the process of going through the area is so much fun, the background and story so rich, and the underlying implementation so well executed that the Loch could have *no* end reward other than 'knowing what happened', and it still would have been one of the best 20ish hours I ever spent on CF.

It should also be noted that the staff seem to have taken up a more dynamic policy with regards handling information becoming common knowledge. Rather than nuking, they are throwing a new layer of paint on the area/quest which means that people who actually explored/learned about it IC once can easily do it again (mildly irritating, but not so bad) whereas those with cheatfiles are shafted. Yay.

Now a dig at Nep since I did some work for him.

I'm not sure silent works as above, but rather does reward you with a bonus in pkilling with little pure wonderment in return. It is sort of like The Chocolate Factory except you are the fat kid rather than the puckish Olliver Twist ripoff.

"New payment options w/ Iron Realms"

Yes, I am one of those players. I've spent my hours in the Loch. I've played two orderly good conjies that did pretty much nothing but explore. As soon as a new area was added I was there poking around and I knew my 8ish(I think, might have been more) haste preps for example. I've spent tons of hours soloing and running around in Hell, down to the fifth circle. Just reading descs and looking at mobs, because it was fun. Done it with most area explore. I also did look around in silent tower and found 5ish archmages, although two I really don't know how.

Problem is that the rewards are supposedly so powerful that if the puzzles would become common knowledge then it would severly imbalance the game. So that is why my comeback character, using my hard earned knowledge, got full looted by the tower. Died 2 more times trying to get it back and then deleted because I was pissed. But sure, this is not a whine about the tower. I'm fine that it is for more dedicated and better puzzle solvers than me. But saying to a newbie at a forum that "Oh, and go to Gralan around level 5 and you will get a quest which will give you a decent reward" should not cause an outcry.

I just disagree how it is implemented and how it promotes a weird unrealistic attitude towards things in game. If a goodie ask my goodie character about some things in the game I should not be forced to think, "If I help this guy then it might become common knowledge and it will be removed or changed so the reward is a death trap", as wands, quests etc have so many times in the past.

It's been said before and I'll say it again here for your benefit: you can share information in character, in game. If some guy asks you for help finding out where the Blademaster's gloves come from, or how he might get into Silent tower, or where he can buy a cheap potion of flight, you can tell him - if it's within your character's RP to do so. Wand locations are similar; I traded wand information with other characters as Khar, and I also showed a few people where one or two of my sleeks were located. It was always IC, and Khar always got something for it.

I've done the same thing with my good-aligned mage characters, though it was always with other characters that I had developed a good working IC relationship with; i.e., "trusted" with the information. As for sending notes with Silent Tower instructions to Battle, or lists of wand locations to good-aligned mages...meh. I can think of half-a-dozen or so IC reasons why that would be a bad idea from the get-go, for any character.

I also think you're exaggerating when you say that you telling one dude where one item in game is will result in it becoming "common knowledge". I also am completely unfamiliar with any instances since I've been on staff where any "rewards" got changed to a death trap. If you know of any of these, shoot me an email and I'll see what can be done about removing them. We've been making steady progress towards removing the vast majority of death traps in the game, not adding more.

To be really honest, your stating that we've done that sort of thing "many times in the past" makes your post feel like a troll to me for some reason.

Kastellyn the Devourer of Magic, Lord of Legends

*** Email me your testimonials or two-line blurbs. Help our marketing efforts! ***

>I also think you're exaggerating when you say that you telling
>one dude where one item in game is will result in it becoming
>"common knowledge". I also am completely unfamiliar with any
>instances since I've been on staff where any "rewards" got
>changed to a death trap. If you know of any of these, shoot
>me an email and I'll see what can be done about removing them.
> We've been making steady progress towards removing the vast
>majority of death traps in the game, not adding more.

I was thinking of angreal of the now gone white tower, which was made into a hard aggro mob instead of a quest reward if I remember correctly. This was usually a death trap for a lot of chars doing that quest for the first time after the change. And also of course the silent tower that changed a step in a quest to a death trap without warning.

>To be really honest, your stating that we've done that sort of
>thing "many times in the past" makes your post feel like a
>troll to me for some reason.

I've played some chase the barrier(and also a/s) in my days, mistress of magic->moria->something (might be moved, not sure. Was never in last time I checked) But of course it is not really a big problem for me personally as I'm not that affected by it. I guess it is just against my instincts that the game is balanced around that only x% of people are "allowed" to know something or it will be changed.

>And also of course the silent tower that changed a step in a
>quest to a death trap without warning.

I actually don't know what this would be.

Actually I kind of regret that I brought it up. I'm perfectly ok with silent being different and not for all and I'm also sure that you are watching the progression and tweaking it from time to time so it is not impossible still challening. It is a nice place for a char to end it's life and spend some con before deleting and still have fun.

The change I was refering to was not so much a quest step (even if well almost all actions in there seem to be one ) but more how a certain room of wealth suddenly decided that I was too greedy and..well I died horribly a couple of times. A change that surpised me a lot and punished me quite hard. But enough about that, even if I was pissed at the time I can see the need for Silent to change if too much is leaked.

You'd always die under the exact same circumstances in that place since the area's opened. Nothing has ever changed there; although that being said, I've seen no small number of people think it had changed at some point because they hadn't really understood all of the pieces to the puzzle there -- maybe they'd get half of it and sort of luck out on the rest a few times.

What happens after you die? That changed some.

Weird. Sure as a lot of the the tower has been extreme trial and error by me, just figuring out how to move has probably worn down my flee buttons. But I was sure that it must have changed in some way as before I could grab several items and now I seemed to be limited to one. Doing it the way I used to do it. I guess it might have been luck or something .

I guess I will visit it some day again when my comeback character hits hero and I have some con and eq to waste. Just need to find my old computer with my silent.txt where I saved tons of information as I had no idea what was important and what was not.

I was thinking of angreal of the now gone white tower, which was made into a hard aggro mob instead of a quest reward if I remember correctly. This was usually a death trap for a lot of chars doing that quest for the first time after the change.

White Tower went away in September of 2003. I don't remember when that quest got tweaked, but it must have been well before that. I Imm'd in late 1999, so I stand corrected - a quest reward was changed to a death trap.

Though it has since been removed, which is a good thing!

I can't talk to Silent Tower, though.

I guess it is just against my instincts that the game is balanced around that only x% of people are "allowed" to know something or it will be changed.

Right on. Though I don't have a good or easy solution to this on hand.

Kastellyn the Devourer of Magic, Lord of Legends

*** Email me your testimonials or two-line blurbs. Help our marketing efforts! ***

and then like 3 weeks later the angreal was removed. Pity was fun carrying a paladin in my pocket. sedai shield, heal, and wrath was good times.

>It's been said before and I'll say it again here for your
>benefit: you can share information in character, in game.

This is an obvious lie. Here's some quick scenarios...

Bard makes a trip through hell, adds a few adjectives and tells the tale in great detail through bard notes to all Therans, basically detailing how to get through Hell. Bam, note delete, site-banned, area probably closed.

Sphere knowledge dude decides to master pen by writing down on paper in game the solutions to many quests and leave them around for others to follow. Once you probably would think is awesome, but this guy wants to spread knowledge to everyone so he does it hundreds of times.

Every good mage character I roll tells every other mage character in my cabal where more than 30 wand locations are. While I probably wouldn't be banned, that information would be made obsolete soon enough. This one is the most frightening because the exponential growth effect of wand knowledge in an open and free communication environment would mean I really only have to tell 1-2 people, those people tell 1-2 people, and so on until wands are basically free. The system will be changed.

* Re-read your post and I edited to add that just because you can come up with IC reasons not to bardnote a Silent Tower walk through doesn't mean I can't come up with equal or more IC reasons to do that very thing.

The point being, information can NOT be share freely in game because if enough people share the knowledge it will be changed regardless of how they got it. This is particularly troublesome with regard to 'old' information. The longer the quest/item/whatever has been in game the longer its exponential growth of spreading has taken place.

If so, then it shouldn't be an issue. Seriously, how many characters do you actually develop a solid relationship over time? Share with them.

--Nightshade

Disclaimer: I'm speaking only for my area; other explore area authors may have other opinions about their own areas.

>* Re-read your post and I edited to add that just because you
>can come up with IC reasons not to bardnote a Silent Tower
>walk through doesn't mean I can't come up with equal or more
>IC reasons to do that very thing.

The problem with that with respect to the Silent Tower in particular is that if you did that, a particular NPC would kill your grandfather many years before your father was born to prevent it... but there's really no good way to resolve that in game.

just after Nexus came in. Basically... I've struggled with the wands system. Found A/B with Nefla and had shield as a spell, but no joy in any other attempts. So I considered that as a Nexus (say bard because I thought it would be useful) I spread the word that to combat the battleragers I'm collecting and passing on magical info. Basically, you send me a note with some wand location or quest with magical reward, and I send you back my whole list adding your stuff and passing it on in likewise fashion. While Silent Tower might come and silence me by killing my grandfather, if I excluded that info, then the list of magical info would grow and spread pretty rapidly without need for a note to all. It would make sense IC, since I'd be spreading it to those who had interest in finding magical things (ostensibly for combating ragers) and one note to all announcing it would really be all the notification necessary. How would this character concept fly? I can't imagine it being well received, but it seems to make perfect sense to me...

I'd probably be happiest with this idea if you made the effort to include things the people sending it to you could reasonably have found IC -- i.e., ignore the level 1 druid who rolls up and sends you a note, but overall it doesn't really bother me.

Granted, you're probably going to end up with some misinformation in the list since you can't really verify all of it yourself.

If you're not careful you're also providing Battle with a list of extra stuff to give to Tahren, but that's part of the fun of the whole thing, right?

even it was mildly successful, just the proliferation of information would eventually rub someone the wrong way and it'd get shut down, but I'm not running with the idea anyway, so I guess we'll have to wait until someone actually does to find out.

or how he might get into Silent tower

Is it not true that the last time a group of players was spreading this information ICly, that the entrance method(s) in question were changed? I don't say this in an argumentative way, I am genuinely curious.

If changes were made, it wasn't for that reason.

>If my battle bard character found an entrance to silent and
>some archmages it would probably be perfectly in his
>roleplay(or even bad roleplay not to) to write a note to
>battle and explaining how to get to these new mage killing
>grounds and the perils that awaits. But of course one cannot
>do that because it would be punishied and/or silent would be
>closed again.

Actually, I'm pretty much okay with that.

Note to all I have a problem with -- IC, it feels like your character is trying like crazy to spread word to anyone will listen. There are NPCs who will take exception to that for reasons that go into the Tower's story. They would have the resources to silence you permanently, which isn't really very fun from a player perspective and isn't something I really want to do from an NPC perspective even if it makes the whole thing make more sense.

But sharing entrance information with your cabal I'm okay with, as long as it's all stuff that character has seen IC.

>
>>Anyone who makes that argument is making it plain that they
>do
>>not value exploration except for the competitive advantage
>it
>>gives them with respect to gear/preps.
>
>No offense, but this argument is stupid.
>
>Players are meant to be able to see some in-game
>rewards/advantages for excelling in different aspects of the
>game, be it killer-style stuff, achiever-style stuff, RP, etc.
> Why should exploration be any different?
>

Don't call the argument stupid and then go on to reiterate what I said.

>Don't call the argument stupid and then go on to reiterate
>what I said.

I really didn't.

It amounts to, I have just a little free time to spend on CF today, and I'm choosing to not spend it on beating my head against this brick wall too much. Short posts! Maybe I can get some value in here somewhere.

You:
Players are meant to be able to see some in-game rewards/advantages for excelling in different aspects of the game, be it killer-style stuff, achiever-style stuff, RP, etc. Why should exploration be any different?

Summary:
You're loosely alluding to the idea that exploring is a tax for competitive advantage and is not interesting for the sake of puzzle solving. I merely suggested that for people who enjoy exploring the competitive advantage isn't really valuable. For everyone else, exploring is a tax as your statements seem to indicate you feel it is.

The problem with the rest of your points is that achiever stuff and RP rewards don't even come close to the competitive advantage granted by quest item knowledge. So, the thing that gives you the most competitive advantage is the thing that's most secretive and the easiest to cheat about. To me that seems broken. *shrug*

Conclusion:
This has nothing to do with the staff playing anonymously so I'm going to stop responding. Also, it's largely the same points rehashed over and over. Maybe I'll take this up on the 'wands system promotes cheating' thread.

>The problem with the rest of your points is that achiever
>stuff and RP rewards don't even come close to the competitive
>advantage granted by quest item knowledge.

I don't agree with that at all, so we'll just have to agree to disagree.

Hello from abroad.

I couldn't have put it better. The slander has a way of biting at your accomplishments as a mortal character. It also wreaks havoc on the motivation to 'do' for the playerbase.

It's a shame to have to read that it still continues.

Cheers.

** First off, I don't have enough time to **
** read this entire string of posts, so I **
** apologize if this is redundat **

That aside, it does leave a bad taste in my mouth and would rather never really know. But it does leave something to question, you have to admit. If your the only one who can be so sucessful, do you really have no advantage?

There are always chars who are well above average, however yours seem to always make them look like scrubs.

"Speaking for myself, it amounts, essentially, to a desire to play the game like anyone else and be reasonably left alone about it." I think this is the problem. You are reasonably left alone about it, when you play reasonable chars. Something like Cadbru, appears unreasonable to the playerbase. Every single person who plays this game wants thier chars to dominate. For this I don't blame you. But when you redifine dominate and appear to be invincible, expect there to be some drama to come along with it.

>That aside, it does leave a bad taste in my mouth and would
>rather never really know.

I'd rather you didn't know either, but I made a mistake, it's out everywhere, and we might as well talk about it.

>But it does leave something to
>question, you have to admit. If your the only one who can be
>so sucessful, do you really have no advantage?

I don't think it's just me. Certainly a lot of the people who have played CF for 10+ years could accomplish similar feats. Granted, a lot of them, like Zulg, Sebeok, Gareth, etc. are imms or ex-imms.

For some A-P-specific examples, to this day I think Nabburak was starting to see that kind of inertia when his council betrayed/anathed him and he deleted. (That whole episode is still one that there's a certain amount of disagreement about, so let's just leave it there.) Certainly Tikar couldn't have been killed the way he was in today's CF; ditto Palan. I'm not going to tell you they were unbeatable, but the specific ways they died would not be possible today.

>But when you redifine
>dominate and appear to be invincible, expect there to be some
>drama to come along with it.

I do expect that; yet, to not play something to the best of my ability within the character's role, etc., is really not to play at all.

If you're playing chess with your dad, who has played for many years and is better than you are, is it more insulting if he whips you mercilessly, or if he just lets you win? I'd think the latter.

Kinda off topic...but...


ditto Palan. I'm not going to tell you they were unbeatable, but the specific ways they died would not be possible today.



Wasn't palan called to a no-recall area by a "friend" necromancer (lich) and slept and spelled up by said necro(lich)?

Are you saying that today, a lich has no chance of killing a well charged up ap by sleeping him and maladicting him to hell?

Zorszaul did not kill Palan by fighting him in melee. He made him drop his axe with maledictions and then stole it using a phylactery. I guess what Nep is saying is that this won't be possible nowadays (either the dropping with maledictions part, or the stealing part).

>He made
>him drop his axe with maledictions and then stole it using a
>phylactery.

This is partially incorrect.

It used to be that any character, even those without the steal skill, could successfully steal vs. a sleeping target something like 5-10% of the time. Eventually, this changed -- a single necromancer or A-P who could sleep you, load you up, AND steal all your teleport potions was a bit much.

Edited to add: It's also worth noting that more than a few high-end A-P vs. A-P fights of that era went pretty much this same way.

Wow, I never knew you could steal without a steal skill. That's why I assumed Zors used a phylactery.

>>He made
>>him drop his axe with maledictions and then stole it using a
>>phylactery.
>
>This is partially incorrect.
>
>It used to be that any character, even those without the steal
>skill, could successfully steal vs. a sleeping target
>something like 5-10% of the time. Eventually, this changed --
>a single necromancer or A-P who could sleep you, load you up,
>AND steal all your teleport potions was a bit much.
>
>Edited to add: It's also worth noting that more than a few
>high-end A-P vs. A-P fights of that era went pretty much this
>same way.

When I had my spectre recently I actually tried to steal potions from people a few times and was surprised when it *never* worked. If the possible success rate is 0% you can still try at least.

Nep:

Do what you want. It doesn't matter to me. I figured you were Cabdru, but you know what? If you've seriously spent the con to explore that ####, why should I be the one to rain on your parade? Personally, I think it's great you built a big evil guy up. Some of the greatest logs I've ever read were Cabdru logs. Good on you.

You've contributed a ton to the game, more than the conspiracy theorists can bring you down. To be honest, some of these people who are really good NEED opponents like you to keep them on their toes otherwise the game would become boring. So, yeah, come back, and Sebeok as well despite the rumours should get his ass back and play as well.

So again, yeah, an immortal presence where people can talk frankly even about their characters without detractors going "Oh, because you know X you could do it" constantly would be welcome. It would certainly up the player quality by a ton if you played more often and perhaps people could up their own game to deal with you in the future.

Speaking for myself, it amounts, essentially, to a desire to play the game like anyone else and be reasonably left alone about it.

There is nothing wrong with immortals wanting to play the game.
But what differs immortals from mortal players? You may notice that they wish to "be reasonably left alone", while mortals don't really care about anonymity ( after a character dies ).
You've listed some reasons and they are valid.
But they are symptomes. The reason is "secrecy" and how CF is designed around it.

I don't want to deal with any of that ####. I just want to play the ####ing game. To compete, win, and lose like anyone else.

The price of being an implementor in a game that evolves around "secrecy" is that you can't really compete, win and lose like anyone else.
People on staff have big advantage. For example, the wand system.
Every immortal with the "snoop" command may easily find many wand sources just by snooping skilled mages even if they don't really were looking for wands. You don't even have to be an implementor who places those wands.
To make a fair competition immortals would have to put big restrictions on themselves ( like not wearing uber eq, not using wands, not snooping other imperials if they play imperials themselves so they wouldn't accidentally run into a conspiracy against them ). It is not a fun way to play the game and I'm not one who would demand that from immortals.

The only way to solve that problem is to reduce secrecy as much as possible and thus create fair competition.
I've heard from immstaff that mystery and secrecy it is what makes the game long-living. But there are many other games that don't rely on mystery and still are fun to play.
Chess, poker, football. Hell, a lot of people ( many more than CF playerbase ) still play Starcraft and Quake ( almost for 10 years already ). So there are ways around. Secrecy is not necessary to make a great game. Actually it may attract some players and turn away other players. I know several CFers who don't play CF anymore and one of reasons why they don't want to start again is that they are far behind and don't know new areas/wands/etc nor they want to reexplore CF from scratch ( or don't have time to do that ).

I don't believe that CF will start to change and reduce secrecy as much as possible ( at least as long as Valg rules ) though I, personally, don't think that exact skill/spell description, full identify of tems ( except, perhaps, quest ones ) would kill the game. CF is much more than that. For example, there are many RPG games where you can obtain a lot game mechanics info from manuals ( or web ) and they are still very good games.

You just have to understand that as long as you keep that level of secrecy in CF immortals will have big advantage in competition and accept that. The only thing you can do about it is not pushing that advantage hard and put some sort of restrictions on themselves if you aim for "fair" competition. Also in order to avoid jealous players immortals would want to stay anonymous. Mwahahaa.
In "opened" games implementors usually have a lot less reasons to stay anonymous, as they can't really be accused in using "unfair" advantage.

Also, in case of Cabdru, anonymity wasn't really needed
The playerbase was more positive about him, than negative. There always will be bad apples but you can't make everyone happy.

Are there advantages and disadvantages between different players? Sure. But those advantages are not necessarily equated with who is an immortal or who is not.

I can guarantee you that the vast majority of active players know substantially more than I do in terms of wand locations, even after being an imm for years and years. So whatever advantage there might be between some item-saavy imm and a non-imm, and a non-item-saavy imm and an item-saavy mortal.. it's all irrevelent. Fundamentally speaking, most imms are good players not because they are imms, but because they are veteran players. (And for the record, for every Nepenthe there are plenty of imm characters that are not earth-shattering or even noticed. Hell, for every talk-of-the-town mortal some imm is to discovered to have played, there may be half a dozen other characters played by the exact same imm that no one had a single conspiracy theory about!)

You really don't want equity. At least *I* don't want equity. At the risk of getting into political discourse, socialism is bunny-fluff happy in theory but insideously destructive in practice.

Your analogy to games like chess or football are irrelevant because games like chess and football DO have inequities. Some players are stronger, faster, smarter, whatever. You have to learn to work around that, and just do your best against stronger players and strategies, and have fun. Whether you are physically stronger or not is equalized in a MUD. Instead, the factors of competition in CF are in part items and knowledge. It's what gives the game longevity, to constantly be expanding your knowledge and thus improving your game.

If everyone could just look up locations of items on a database somewhere, it would remove a factor of long-term competition. Not to mention, it would ruin the exploration element (which is fun for a LOT of player-types, myself included). Even people who refused to look on the database are screwed out of exploration challenges when those things become common knowledge. Similarly it would ruin roleplaying opportunities.. bargaining or flattering another character for knowledge, etc. That's the beauty of it.. you insert these elements, and they become a major player in PK, and by extention, a player in exploration and RP as well.

To take an extreme, everything would be *most* equitible if you just dropped everyone into the game with identical stats and sub-issue items, popped them all to level 51 and queued them into equally balanced fights in some perfectly balanced battlefield. But, that would be a different game (and I dare suspect, one you wouldn't play as much.) Again, that is an extreme, but the theory still applies.

What makes any game or story interesting is conflict, mystery, uncertainty. Does my opponent have him some good wands, or not? Where can I find my own? How can I find my own? Maybe I can persuade him to share them with me, or explore on my own... And on and on.

This isn't just some strategy/twitch game... it's a strategy/twitch game interwoven with story elements, and with relationship elements. "The cat sat on the mat." is not a story. "The cat sat on the dog's mat.", now *there's* a story.

If someone can see what Nep has seen, I presume they can know:

- exactly what hidden effects skills have (akin to kansetsuwaza's slowing), should they choose to look, whilst other players are often not in a position to work these out. This is a big advantage. But others can learn from it so it evens out.

- What factors influence specific skills' success rates. This could be a big advantage if the factors are numerous and thus had to isolate and test as a mortal. This is hard for others to equal unless they simply clone the character.

- where to get items that no mortal has seen and how to use them.

Playing lots of hours will not necessarily yield you these things, in particular the latter.

It feels a bit like insider dealing to me and however great a char Cabdru was or imm Nep is, the latter does feel like unfair to me because it is a concious choice to get those things, whilst the other issues are something that he cannot avoid.

Sure, it would be harsh to stop imms playing morts and probably undesirable, but would it be so undesirable for imms to avoid gathering gear that the entire cf populace has never figured out how to (correct me if I'm wrong on that point), unless they genuinely have to puzzle the whole thing out themselves? The lack of such items shouldn't break their character, stop them having fun or prevent them from testing things, should it?

>If someone can see what Nep has seen, I presume they can
>know:
>
>- exactly what hidden effects skills have (akin to
>kansetsuwaza's slowing), should they choose to look, whilst
>other players are often not in a position to work these out.
>This is a big advantage. But others can learn from it so it
>evens out.

Yeah, I think this is pretty minimal, except possibly with very new skills/spells.

>- What factors influence specific skills' success rates. This
>could be a big advantage if the factors are numerous and thus
>had to isolate and test as a mortal. This is hard for others
>to equal unless they simply clone the character.

I think we've gotten a lot better about putting this kind of stuff in helpfiles. Beyond that, I think it's pretty even up. Is bashing a good option as a giant warrior? Often. Is it a good option as a felar warrior? Definitely less often, but still sometimes. I don't think even the formulae could give you as accurate of a when as just playing a warrior and seeing what works and doesn't work for you.

>Sure, it would be harsh to stop imms playing morts and
>probably undesirable, but would it be so undesirable for imms
>to avoid gathering gear that the entire cf populace has never
>figured out how to (correct me if I'm wrong on that point),

I'm pretty sure pure-mortal characters have seen every mob in the Silent Tower. Whether or not they were able to kill those mobs is, in some cases, another story, but it's generally not a story of knowledge but one of general character toughness/resources. Even still, most of it's been out at some point, though not all of it's seen real use. (For example, I've seen an awful lot of characters that don't get the polearm skill with a certain polearm in their inventory, for some reason.)

First of all I want to express that CF is multi-dimensional game and here I'm only talking about PK competition part. I don't touch player interaction, RP "competition" and other aspects of the game that are also good reasons the play the game.

Are there advantages and disadvantages between different players? Sure. But those advantages are not necessarily equated with who is an immortal or who is not.

True.
For example, I consider myself above average when it comes to CF knowledge ( though certainly not the best ) and it gives me some advantage. But I'm ready to give away that advantage by opening related information. Because I feel sorry for newer players. Hehe.
Also I prefer to see competition in how you apply public information, not the amount of info you possess.

Fundamentally speaking, most imms are good players not because they are imms, but because they are veteran players.

False
They are good players because they are veterans AND immortals.
After all, there are many veterans who weren't immoratls and they are overall less good.

Being an immortal gives you great advantages in PK.
The snoop comand alone may greatly increase your PK skill.
If you watch skilled people in action, you study their behaviour patterns, their hidding place, wand locations, etc, you become much better in PK.
Code knowledge gives you another edge. If you know important factors in assassinate success, if you know what is improtant for bashing you may capitalize these factors and become more dangerous in PK.
Areas knowledge is another important factor where immortals have advantage. For example, if I don't know what amulet of Ultimate Evil does, I may just drop and sac it because it may look as it does nothing. And I didn't know that pre-Cabdru.

You really don't want equity. At least *I* don't want equity.

There will be no equity if game mechanics are public.
There is some distance between knowing something and properly using it. That is where player's experience, overall skill, smartness, luck comes into play.
For example, you may describe how exactly flurry works, what are significant factors in its success but you would still have to learn when to flurry and when don't. That would make "fair" competition between immortals and mortals.

Your analogy to games like chess or football are irrelevant because games like chess and football DO have inequities. Some players are stronger, faster, smarter, whatever.

Some players may be smarter and thus win. But they win because they are smarter, not because they create the game and don't tell others how it works. When a stronger boxer wins a match, people usually don't blame him for being stronger and he doesn't really want to stay anonymous to avoid blames. But if you create a game and win because you know something special that other don't, well, you should be ready to be blamed.

Instead, the factors of competition in CF are in part items and knowledge. It's what gives the game longevity, to constantly be expanding your knowledge and thus improving your game.

Here is a dangerous place.
A while back I would agree that striving to expand your knowledge and improving this way may add longivity to the game. But when it comes too far it becomes the game's grave. Newer players start far behind and have no real chances to compete with veterans unless they put a few years in. Some of them actually just give up. And as I said before I know several old players who stopped and don't wish to start again just because they are "afraid" to be far behind in knowledge.

If everyone could just look up locations of items on a database somewhere, it would remove a factor of long-term competition.

No, there still be a competition in proper using them.
Everybody knows chess rules, a few are good at applying them.

Not to mention, it would ruin the exploration element (which is fun for a LOT of player-types, myself included). Even people who refused to look on the database are screwed out of exploration challenges when those things become common knowledge.

I'm irked each time I hear that argument.
There is a fine border between:
1) loving exploration
2) loving advantages that exploration gives above those who didn't explore this or that certain place.

If you like exploration you are not obligated to look into databases. Go ahead and explore. You will have fun.
If you like to have an advantage because you explored something that Joe Blow didn't, well, after sharing info you may lose that advantage. Is that really bad for the game?

To take an extreme, everything would be *most* equitible if you just dropped everyone into the game with identical stats and sub-issue items, popped them all to level 51 and queued them into equally balanced fights in some perfectly balanced battlefield.

That's how Quake or Chess works
Still they are great games with a lot opportunities for competition.

You may leave CF as it is. It still be a good game.
( Like "Heroes of Might and Magic 5" without a good manual, where you have to figure everything from your own experience. )
But I've noticed that a such games are appealing for younger people ( 16-years old ), but, in general, elder people, once they gain some experience in games and life, come to conclusion that, public game-mechanics usually helps to create more solid and long-living games.
And when you keep secrecy as a key basis of the game, implementors will always have big advantage and you are not going to solve ####storm problems when immortals play the game and actually use their advantage. Anonymity is avoiding the problem, not solving it. ( Keep in mind they aren't obligated to use their advantages. For example, Nepenthe may create a herald ranger and just drink whole time in the Inn, nobody would cry about it ).

Just a few points I'll touch on here for now:

If you like exploration you are not obligated to look into databases. Go ahead and explore. You will have fun.

That's not true. If you spend 3 weeks puzzling something out and finally achieve the aquisition of the Widget of Wazoo, it's much less satisfying if everyone and their uncle also has the Widget of Wazoo because they looked up step-by-step instructions on a web site.

What you say can be true of a single player game because in such a case, you are in your own isolated little game - your achievement is yours alone. But part of the appeal of a multiplayer game is to measure your accomplishments, not just in PK but otherwise, against other players. It's much less fun to get the said Widget if other people aren't saying "WOW! JOE has the Widget of Wazoo! Incredible! I've only seen that TWICE!"

Now, this isn't to say I don't understand what you are saying. Games like World of Warcraft have all the mechanics and items and such up on web sites galore for the taking. I on and off play games like World of Warcraft, much of the time using those sources because, because, well, self-achievement on solving a World of Warcraft quest is utterly meaningless. But I still have had fun on games like WoW, but in the end, when I want that, I play WoW. When I play Carrion Fields, I'm looking for something more sophisticated, frankly. I'm not interested in seeing Carrion Fields turn into a text version of WoW.

I will say I've played roughly 742 games over the years, including other MMORPGs/MUDs, and Carrion Fields is the only one I've played fairly consistently for 12 years. There's gotta be something to that.

But if you create a game and win because you know something special that other don't, well, you should be ready to be blamed.

I suppose so. But from the other end, it's also foolish to assume that someone's achievement is entirely because of what they know. I can look at code and snoop and such until the cows come home, and I'm never going to be as skilled in PK as, say, a Jinroh. Just not going to happen. I don't have the personality, game focus, twitch, or style to do it. Period. Similarly, we could make all the game knowledge in the world public tomorrow, and the vast majority of players aren't going to be as good as Nepenthe, either. And I can guara-freakin'-tee you that if all the code was public, and an imm still wiped the floor with his character, everyone would accuse him of cheating/having unfair advantages anyways. It's a no-win situation.

But going with your premise, playing fields just aren't always level. Period. There are people in this world born with a silver spoon in their mouths that crash and burn, and others who have ambition and intelligence and drive and become billionaires. Some of it may be their opportunity and education, but some of it is still just comes from within. That person with ambition AND wealth/contacts/whatever may have advantages that the rest of us don't, and people burn with envy/judgement/whatever, but in the end that person gives the rest of society a whole ####load of jobs and some nice condo complexes to live in or whatever. It works out. Just because someone achieves something you don't, whether it's because they are smarter or born into more wealth or whatever, doesn't mean you're a less valuable person or that you should just throw up your arms and give up on the game of life.

I can say with some level of confidence that the staff of CF is on the straight and narrow WAY more than the majority of MUDs out there. Whatever advantage an handful of imms might have is honestly earned.

Talking about a level playing field, there's nothing to stop you from becoming an imm, doing a buttload of work for years, and knowing just as much as any of us do. We're equal-opportunity "employers".

That's not true. If you spend 3 weeks puzzling something out and finally achieve the aquisition of the Widget of Wazoo, it's much less satisfying if everyone and their uncle also has the Widget of Wazoo because they looked up step-by-step instructions on a web site.

That means you like to be rewarded for exploration, not exploration itself ( or you like both, the reward and the process ).
A rude analogy. There is sex and there are children ( as a result of it ), liking children is not the same as liking sex.
I admit that there are players who likes to be recognized as badass explorers. ( And that's ok ). Just don't mix them with people who likes the process of exploration.

I'm not interested in seeing Carrion Fields turn into a text version of WoW.

There are cabal wars, roleplaying, player interaction that differs CF from WoW. Public game mechanics won't turn CF into WoW.

Talking about a level playing field, there's nothing to stop you from becoming an imm, doing a buttload of work for years, and knowing just as much as any of us do. We're equal-opportunity "employers".

You've hit a nail.
Many actually join the staff to gain access to immknowledge.
Though, perhaps, easier way is to sleep with staff elders.
But I don't feel that I wish to win CF so bad that I would be willing to put years of work for that.

For me, doing buttload of work and thus expect to gain "deserved" advantage is similar to paying money for in-game perks.
It somehow damages "fair" competition whether you to put money or work to gain advantage.

In ideal world I believe it should work that way:
If you work for the game you gain respect, perhaps money ( in other games ), opportunities to develop the game as you see it, whatever else except one thing - you shouldn't gain competition advantage.
And one of ways to achieve that - public game mechanics.

Many actually join the staff to gain access to immknowledge.

I obviously can't read everyone's motivations, but I would highly suspect most people who join with this motivation burn out quickly.

In any case, I know one thing Shokai always told new imms is that "When you become an imm, you become the proverbial man behind the curtain. Much of the magic is lost."

And he's 100% right, which is why I personally avoid looking into anything that I'm not involved in building or developing. I like some of that magic to be there. It took me at least 3 characters and a dozen attempts, but I finally solved the Loch Grynmear quests on my own... and it was magical! Not only because I solved it, but also because other characters were impressed with me for doing it. I suppose Kastellyn (the author) could take his morts and blaze through it, but I doubt he'd have nearly as much fun as I did.

So whatever knowledge imms gain, trust me, there's a price.

Be careful what you wish for.. consider it might be possible that you'd look at all the game mechanics, and the game would then lose it's novelty and magic for you.

I don't see myself trying to immort anytime soon
So CF magic for me is not in danger. Yar!

>In any case, I know one thing Shokai always told new imms is
>that "When you become an imm, you become the proverbial man
>behind the curtain. Much of the magic is lost."

This is oft repeated, and as much as I like Shokai, I'm not sure it really holds true. At least, not with regard to Heroimms. I might agree with, "When you become an Implementor, you become the proverbial man behind the curtain."

>Areas knowledge is another important factor where immortals
>have advantage. For example, if I don't know what amulet of
>Ultimate Evil does, I may just drop and sac it because it may
>look as it does nothing. And I didn't know that pre-Cabdru.

In that particular case, players who've taken Hell trips to that circle have the advantage.

There's still a lot of stuff in Hell that looks cool and I assume does something but hell if I know what. That's a particular case where I did know, and it was "on my way" to get something else.

>That's how Quake or Chess works
>Still they are great games with a lot opportunities for
>competition.

It amounts to, we're not trying to make Quake or Chess here.

Out of curiousity, have you ever seen the test or any of the stuff about different types of mudders including Killers, Achievers, Explorers, and Socializers, with most players being some mix of those?

If we were trying to build the perfect game for the Killer archetype alone, I'd agree 100% with what you're saying. Quake and Chess are built for those kinds of play. Instead, we're a game that while catering certainly to the Killers more than anyone else, still has aspects that are fun for other kinds of players.

It amounts to, we're not trying to make Quake or Chess here.

Nor I'm asking for that.
They are just examples of games which aren't ruined by public game mechanics.

Out of curiousity, have you ever seen the test or any of the stuff about different types of mudders including Killers, Achievers, Explorers, and Socializers, with most players being some mix of those?

I've seen.

In past year CF had a lot of problems caused by secrecy.
Problems with Shadow Cabal, people sharing info, the whole wands issue, Arolin revealing quests, and more and more and more.
Sometimes I start to ask myself if secrecy caused so many problems maybe it would be better just to drop it.

Public game mechanics just create fair competition for Killers. Achievers, Explorers and Socializers aren't really touched. There always opportunities for roleplaying, exploration and interaction.
Public game mechanics don't necessary include every quest walk-through, eliminating RP rewards, cabal politics, etc.

These are just my opinions.

I think that there are a few issues at play, which, if finessed, can bring a lot of enjoyment to a lot of parties in the game.

1) The quest system for CF is at times somewhat sloppy. Ditto for the wand system. It isn't that people mind challenge, or exploration. Its that the miriad of boggling dead ends (dead ends that make little sense) are discouraging and at times, seemingly random. I've brought up a few items to Nepenthe, which just hit me off the top of my head. I'm sure given enough time I could work out a number of others. But, mainly, the consistancy is a tad off and if that were rectified, it would give more incentive to explore. One key example is work vs reward (consistant rewards for similiar tasks) and consistancy in behavior of quest NPCs. For instance, expanding quest NPC vocabulary, having them react similiarly to logging out (preferably not at all unless its a time based thing), etc. Another example is that if something should by logic work, it should be cleaned up so that slight variations don't break it.

2) I believe a lot of people worry about whether or not the type of exploration parties that are required for some areas are possible in CF currently. Additionally, a lot of people are afraid to even go to these areas in exploration parties because they feel that without an experienced 'in the know' guide, they won't make it anywhere. This poses a significant portion of the "getting those items was unfair" line. I can say that at hero, given the raiding schema, lack of players and typical balance of support characters it is very difficult to get exploration parties together. Not impossible, but, certainly not very easy. I'm wondering if there's some rebalancing or cabal based quests that can help grant incentive to this portion of the game, and not make it feel 'gear-whorey' and 'disloyal' for a cabal to go and explore. Half the time I'm too busy raiding/retrieving/regearing, it would be nice if the cabal itself helped push exploration because that would help me 'get away' with exploring.

3) There are a lot of areas/quests which, for the amount of effort required to navigate/complete them, the reward is very, very small. This should maybe be looked into, and goes back to point one.

4) Finally, between the raid system and high end exploration areas, it may be worth considering given a con penalty reduction for deaths in an area explore. A lot of people just cannot afford to burn 5 con on exploring areas that require 30 con to figure out.

No one really cares if Nep does well, so far as I can tell (at least, not many people if anyone at all), however what you're seeing is their own frustration boiling through. They cannot get item X, yet the Imm who coded it can. Now, I'll trust Nepenthe if he says its more of a brute force thing, and parties haven't been assembled which can kill said mobs. Regardless, that dissatisfaction I think can be cleared up with a few relatively minor changes.

In general, you're trying to build a game for a very particular type of player. As Nep mentioned, lots of people play the game for different reasons, and we're interested in making a game interesting for many kinds of players.

Frankly, I think the overall game would be far better off with fewer pure-Killer archetypes and more people with a more balanced skill set and interests. A number of zero-RP all-combat games exist, and I've never understood why people with no interest in roleplaying or exploration don't try them.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

In general, you're trying to build a game for a very particular type of player. As Nep mentioned, lots of people play the game for different reasons, and we're interested in making a game interesting for many kinds of players.

Trying make the game interesting for many kings of players you may end up with making the game interesting for nobody. ( If your design would be bad for each of player types ).
For example, if you make unfair competition, you lose some "killer", but you don't gain any additional roleplayers or explorers.

Frankly, I think the overall game would be far better off with fewer pure-Killer archetypes and more people with a more balanced skill set and interests.

Perhaps so, but how it is connected with secrecy-public issue?
I don't see why you assume that public game mechanics will turn the game into pure-killing type. They will not, your assumption is wrong.

The only kind of players you may lose if you share game mechanics is players who likes to have advantage from better exploration/knowledge over other players. As you can see, you don't lose those who likes RP, you don't lose those who likes exploration ( as process ), and you gain more killers for your game.
I don't see that as a bad trade-off ( nor I insist that it is very good trade-off ) to have a bit more killer and a bit less lovers of rewards of exploration.

A number of zero-RP all-combat games exist, and I've never understood why people with no interest in roleplaying or exploration don't try them.

People with no interest in roleplaying or exploration sure try them.
And many of those games are much more successful than CF. But again, how it is connected with what I'm saying?

As an aside note.
I think immortals should make a pool one day with a question "Why you stopped to play CF" and ask playerbase to look for old CF friends/players to gather their opinions.
It is insteresting to see what reason is most popular.
Aging? Less time? Pissed with imms? Relocation? Addiction to other games? Less fun more job? Lack of RP? Lack of PK? Whatever else?

>The only kind of players you may lose if you share game
>mechanics is players who likes to have advantage from better
>exploration/knowledge over other players. As you can see, you
>don't lose those who likes RP, you don't lose those who likes
>exploration ( as process ), and you gain more killers for your
>game.

It eliminates a lot of the point of exploration to make that public, though. I think the sense of exploration / figuring stuff out / etc. is one draw to the explorer type, but so is having knowledge others don't and being able to show off the Magic Pants of Never-Before-Seen.

As an analogy, let's say I make it so you can't actually kill other players. You can beat the crap out of them, but they never drop below 1 hp no matter what. We don't really need killing and looting to make killers (which, really, is just Bartle's way of naming players that prefer player-vs-player direct competition) happy. I mean, you'll get into a PvP fight, and pretty soon one of those players will have been convulsing on the ground for a while and maybe the other guy is gushing blood. They both know who won, so we don't need to officiate that by having a death or give one an advantage by letting the winner loot the loser. Only players who want an advantage from being a killer should care -- real killers will be content to enjoy the fighting and winning as a process devoid of rewards.

Please tell me you wouldn't think that would be the dumbest change ever, but essentially, that's what you're asking us to do to another kind of player.

As an explorer type player, it annoys me to no end when I see (different) people constantly bringing up how much of a job it is to explore new areas, read room descriptions, find things which are all over the place (wands, preps, poison ingredients), etc.

I feel like posting every week saying how bothersome it is for me to constantly type "where" and "who pk". Think how much faster my exploring would go. It ruins my immersion when I'm really getting into the atmosphere of a new zone and I have to quickly skim room descriptions to type "where" because some bash spec was chasing me before and he might have tracked me here.

Just like you can't understand why I enjoy exploring, I can't understand why you enjoy beating the crap out of my pansy-assed character. I am no threat to you. Why don't you go beat up somebody who will give you a good fight?

But...rather than post here to complain about it, I deal with it. I knew this was a PK mud when I came here. But I saw past that when I saw how well designed the zones were, how well-written, how interactive, how detail oriented (thank violet woodlands for that--great newbie zone).

And this post isn't necessarily written at you, Dwoggurd. I'm just getting tired of being in the silent explorer population who is weekly assaulted by the newest "I don't like having to read so let's dumb the game down and just make it text Quake" type posts. It seems that pkers in general are very vocal about the mud going downhill, while I think its going in a great direction: Less mindlessness and more depth.

Nebel

P.S.

>being able to show off the Magic Pants of Never-Before-Seen.

I've got those pants!

Well, if we're going to be speaking out here, I guess I'll pitch in, too. Now, I'm not the best CF player or anything, so I can't really say I have have had those Pants before , but what I can say is that the quests I have figured out and the places I've explored, finding hidden exits and areas, etc... all that has always excited me so much more than bashing down some random player (not that it happens often ). Same goes for RP'ing. I was at the Inn once, and another character was in the process of proposing to me, when some random orc comes in and starts bash-spamming for no particular reason. I mean he was an orc, yeah, and I was an elf, but there was no particular reason beyond that. So, I have to agree. I came here knowing this was a PK MUD, and I deal with it (hell, I even enjoy it sometimes even when I'm on the receiving end, especially if it's RP'ed out), and just like I deal with that, the PK players need to learn to accept this is also an exploration/RP/etc... MUD as well.

And they hate elves and wood-elves above anything else. I can't think of any emote that conveys the orc's feelings towards your elven persona better than bash. The orc could choose peaceful RP if he would think that he'd lose the fight because of the bouncer, as orcs are cowards at heart. But otherwise, holding hands with elves or even tolerating them in the neighbourhood if you can bash them down is unorcish behaviour or fairly poor orc RP.

>Frankly, I think the overall game would be far better off with
>fewer pure-Killer archetypes and more people with a more
>balanced skill set and interests. A number of zero-RP
>all-combat games exist, and I've never understood why people
>with no interest in roleplaying or exploration don't try
>them.
>
>valguarnera@carrionfields.com

I don't know of many all-combat games in which the staff takes such an interest in fine tuning the combat mechanics as frequently as you guys look at and tweak the mechanics of CF. Your attention to detail, and quick response time to flaws in the system are huge turn-ons to the killers amongst us. You can blame yourself for that one

You are posting this in a thread that is about Cabdru. A char that ignored help giant speech, a char that did NOT really stand out by his roleplay. But instead he power gamed and did everything you hate. He practiced for 25 hours, he pked a lot, he got the best gear there is.

And still he is the most interesting character in a very long time. Everyone seems to think it was so cool to fight him and even if he did not go orgasmic with emotes and weird speeches his actions and aura of toughness brought a cool badass thing to cf.

I think it is sad that nep does not guide cf the same way as he plays. Because I think he knows how it would be fun for more people than those that like to say cshajdhska'dsads 10 times fast and then emote for 5 minutes.

>You are posting this in a thread that is about Cabdru. A char
>that ignored help giant speech, a char that did NOT really
>stand out by his roleplay.

I knew it was inevitable that someone complained about this.

I've read the helpfile. I've played numerous giants who talked that way. After writing Cabdru's role, I just couldn't see it. His role made perfect sense to me for a Fire A-P, but a character with that role would never talk that way.

Anyway, he had 16 int for most of his life, and no one would freak out if a duergar talked the way he did.

I think there's a lot of interesting RP to this character; ironically, the things that were most in-character for him are also the most complained about for other reasons. For example, a paranoid lunatic who believes that everyone is out to get him is not going to bring a caravan of random people to Hell with him, when he knows he's going to die and leave a 300 charge unholy weapon in his corpse for any of them to grab. There's just no way.

>I think it is sad that nep does not guide cf the same way as
>he plays. Because I think he knows how it would be fun for
>more people than those that like to say cshajdhska'dsads 10
>times fast and then emote for 5 minutes.

Hi! I'm a straw man!

You are posting this in a thread that is about Cabdru. A char that ignored help giant speech, a char that did NOT really stand out by his roleplay. But instead he power gamed and did everything you hate.

The day you play a character with 1/10 the style Cabdru had, then start writing this post.

He won a role contest, got picked as a leader, did some great interviews, and led by example with his RP.

I think it is sad that nep does not guide cf the same way as he plays. Because I think he knows how it would be fun for more people than those that like to say cshajdhska'dsads 10 times fast and then emote for 5 minutes.

Based on that statement, the problem is that you couldn't ID good roleplay if you did see it.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

Ok, I'm not sure this is where I wanted to reply, but man that was a heartfelt "kaboom" from you Valg. Anyway, my fights with him were enjoyable and I wish I had seen him more to have more of them, even though I know I would lose.

I think the thing with Anonimity and Imms is that we do end up finding out some of the time what characters you guys played, the thing is, we only find out the "great" ones. Well, Nep has said he played a handful of other AP's that we never have heard of.

I guess, here is my thought, why would it be so bad to post that you played those characters? Why not let us know that you played "so and so" mortal. Now, I don't think I'm like the rest and jump on "conspiracy" band-wagons, cause I've been around awhile and I've always liked Nepenthe. I think its great that you Imms play and I like to think I've been whooped by and whooped up on a few of you. I guess my question is...

What is the harm in posting on most of your characters that you played them?