Sat Feb 23 11:40:31 2013

At 9 o'clock PM, Day of Thunder, 17th of the Month of the Great Evil
on the Theran calendar Merrol perished, never to return.

Race:	dwarf
Class:	shaman
Level:	51
Alignment:	Good
Ethos:	Chaotic
Cabal:	FORTRESS, the Fortress of Light
Age:	257
Hours:	367

I had been vaccilating about this deletion for the past couple of weeks. Winter break is almost over, though, and Merrol had become more of a distraction to stop grading papers. I felt it was time. Duraskandr, thanks for that one last tilt.

A couple of things I was extremely pleased with:

1. Enemies were a class act. I was left with virtually everything every time. Thank you for that. Dura, I am really upset with myself about that one incident. It was a slip, and I regretted it immediately.

2. I tend to have a lot more fun when my characters fly below the radar. I saw maybe 4 logs of Merrol over the course of his life, and maybe 2-3 posts that referenced him. It's easier to have fun when you play for yourself rather than your forum image.

A couple of things that made me sad:

1. Padwei deleting was a blow, and this character really lost direction after that. I kept the religion going as best I could (thanks, Rostrakfor all of your help), but in the end, I really could have used some immteraction to soldier on. If anything, that will hopefully influence me to be a bit more talkative with Akresius.

2. I really, really wanted Captain, but I think that Tolgrumm is a great choice. Really, Tolgrumm and Brogok (Dwarf Squad!) were great cabalmates and I enjoyed traveling with both of you. Oshui, my plan was to be the less-militant voice of the Maran-side during the Battle-Fort Conflict, but it all turned out for the best in the end.

Other thoughts:

No, I didn't power to hero. It had been a long time since I had last played a shaman, and I really wanted to try out the class. Hero ranks just don't hold magic for me; I like the 25-39 range best. Sorry to those who felt I was level-sitting, but the game doesn't start at 51.

I wasn't heavily rewarded. I got some immxp from infrequent role updates. Padwei's tattoo was a nice touch, though definitely more utilitarian than combative. One of its invokes saved my neck a few times (especially from rot). Mostly, it was just making do with the basic shaman skillset. I enjoy the shaman class and (don't shoot me, please), I don't really see the need for a revamp.

Farewells:

There were a lot of people I interacted with over 367 hours. If you'd like to post, I'll try and reply.

I had a hard time connecting with this character at first, but you
really ended up being a great follower. I can't imagine having the
religion end on a better note.

Good luck with everything. :)

Thank you for the talks.

Class Act right back at you. Pre-Dura you terrorized a few of my lowbie evils so from a pk stand point you were frightening. But RP interactions were consistently top notched, thanks. GLW-Real Life, GLWYN.

Thank you for the complements. You're doing a fine job as High Priest. Keep it up; it's past time Empire was on the upswing.

I'd have my lieutenants, get a good charge, even catch you fleeing and still you'd just waltz out of Galadon easy as that. Really annoying to be honest but quite impressive. And I really had a hard time manacling you.

--Urses

I could never tell whether you and Xupreth were just letting me get away with murder or not. You were a strong Tribunal presence when they really didn't have one. Believe it or not, there were times when I would check to see if you were on before I attacked someone in town. Nice job.

Classy and all around a great vibe from the char.
Frustrations on a lot of the fighting, and I really wish I had reliable way to lag you :)

Good fun though, glad you enjoyed it.

Good luck with the next, and see you in the fields.

You definitely got stronger as you made it to the hero ranks. That last kill I had on you was probably the only scenario in which I'd be able to finish you off without help.

Always enjoyed fighting you. Keep up the good work as Commander.

Very classy char.

I found you way tougher than other shaman.

Also appreciated that you left me everything when I for some reason my client repeated my dirt kick command instead of my flee command, many times. Normally people wouldn't have passed up the chance to loot stuff, so thanks.

.

I really enjoyed Merrol, though I wish our times could have lined up a bit better. I know you would have made a great Captain, and from the comments here and the leader info you were a great fighter too.

I am curious why you planned on being the less-militant voice in the Battle/Fort war, given that you seemed to be a lot more aggressive in terms of attacking neutrals (when given a reason, of course) than a lot of Maran. Something in your role?

Again, great job.

- Tolgrumm

As a Maran, I was all about defending the Fortress from attack and punishing those who struck the Outer. That's as far as it went; to my knowledge, I never entered the Village to hunt a Villager or take the bloody head. At the height of the Battle/Fort war, Oshui and others felt it was a necessary step to pre-emptively protect the Fortress by hunting Villagers down and taking the head whenever possible. Merrol disagreed because he felt that the war with Battle was distracting the Maran from their true task (killinating evil) and that taking the bloody head was only escalating the conflict.

Toward the end, though, I shifted my stance toward being more militant, especially with regards to Nexus. I hunted them down when I could find them and there were no viable evil targets about because I knew that sooner or later they would be at the Fortress helping Empire/Scion retreive or just looking to kill goodies.

There probably should have been a role chapter explaining that, but I felt my RP and actions did that view justice.

I was sad to hear about your deletion. You were a great ally to have against the Empire.

Good luck with the next.

It was nice to have a hidden ally, but better to have an outlander friend who tolerated what amounted to a tree-hugging dwarf.