Tue Nov 24 19:36:58 2015

At 3 o'clock PM, Day of the Sun, 27th of the Month of the Heat
on the Theran calendar Jonsen perished, never to return.

Race:	human
Class:	ranger
Level:	47
Alignment:	Neutral
Ethos:	Chaotic
Cabal:	BATTLE, the BattleRagers, Haters of Magic
Age:	43
Hours:	188

I made this character in time to hunt the glut of shapestealers, the class of whom my perception has been tainted by a the griefing of a number of flyto air/offense multikilling murderers. I doubt any of you are the assholes of old who have so scarred me against those who play the class, but it was a delight fighting you.

I made this character with the expectation that I would be fighting almost always out of the wilds, so I went hunter for the defense and I took caverndweller so I had a chance of getting away from the bashers. The result was that I had pretty good survival, but sealing a kill was a challenge.

From an RP standpoint I was in trouble constantly. I started off roleplaying sphere deception, and I would attack someone and accuse them of being Tribunal scum or an Imperial sympathizer. People would assume Outlander, or if I accused someone of being a Scarab maybe a squire, and I would not correct them. I had a roaring good time attacking the mages with a shapeshifter who was in my pk range, and I would not attack him, letting him continue to think I was an outlander and clue me in to where he and his mates were ranking. He assumed that I was misinformed or confused about his groupmates affiliation. I even defended the giant once, but the talk was that I had been recruited to defend. Of course people complained and eventually the Destructor gave a talk to battle leaders and I got a stern warning about showing my pride in battle by wearing my affiliation on my sleeve.

Then there was this charming incident with Tummel where I had scouted out a party of mages and an blade in Arangird. Tummel came and got the key, Terxaxous killed one of the mages, and I slew the imperial, but because I embraced my character's chaotic nature and charged in, Tummel took me (rightly) to task for breaking ranks. Two RL weeks later. After warning me and threatening to burn my hut, he did what thieves do and went into hiding, and I popped off on CB and was (rightly) booted from the village. After a little over a week running around and fighting and occasionally even killing people, I was reinducted, but all my previously mastered skills as a scout were now reset to 70. So given a fresh start, I chose to go down the rager path this time.

So, swearing that I would be a good little Battlerager, after that point whenever I saw a shapeshifter in form, I looked for an opening to attack them. I don't believe I ever attacked someone who was clearly good-aligned unless they were a shapeshifter in form, but a few scrapes with the law, the killing of a goodie guard or two, or maybe due to the complaints of a few good-aligned shapeshifters, one evening when I logged in I found that with no fanfare I had been made neutral. Hmmph. I had wondered if the air/offense warden who had been attacking me on sight was made neutral too? Doubt it, but I don't see the love for the Battle cabal that had once existed in CF.


Adira - Loved your roleplay, loved your threats, enjoyed our battles that never amounted to much other than watching the other person slip away.

Lithodora - my eyes in the shadows, I strove to be your eyes in the brush. I enjoyed the pragmatic nature of our relationship.

Golthazar - Great character, strong but more conservative than I think is necessary. Flurry spam will get you much farther against a hunter than giving me time to maladict you.

Gaspare - I never stood much of a chance against you, and it did irk me when you drove that point home by summoning me and killing me a second time so shortly after I unghosted, but you've obviously done the right things or you wouldn't have succeeded in earning and completing a lich quest or the Imperial throne. I haven't been in a position to see 'the other side' of Gaspare, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist, so keep working your magic.

Tummel - Jonsen did not like you, but I thought you handled Jonsen as well as you could have hoped to. I will say I have no idea what your role looks like.

Varnon - an absolutely great persona, a character whose presence does lend itself to leadership. Dwarves are not necessarily strong in PK, but nothing beats the stalwart demeanor of a dwarf.

Terxaxous - This was the first character I had heard with the lisp flaw, and after I got used to your hare lip, I found it appealing: here you have a race that is known for being elitist snobs, and by giving him this flaw, I was struck with how difficult life must have been like as an elvish child who could not ever hope to have proper diction. Tough build, and I wish much success to you.


Thoughts on hunters in Battle: Aerial shot is much improved over what it used to be, but there just are not enough air forms available to practice the skill up beyond 75. In my own experience fighting, Scout was best when defending against mages, as hunters do not have the offense to use against shapeshifters or invokers in terms of damage, but do not expect to kill anyone as aimed shot lag was negligible. Having had the opportunity to have the exact same character have access to the rager path, if I could catch a foe non-prepared, the minimal lag of aimed shot might be enough to finish them off, but it seems to lag very inconsistently. I think the most effect pk hunters are going to be those with pursuit (terrain or tattoo) and access to big damage (deathblow) or progging attacks. Dodge builds, particularly assassins, just ruined my day regardless of the weapon I was using.

It can maladict quite severely with the right weapon.

Timed attack was harder to disrupt, but most players at hero level recognized what was going on and avoided it (like Dundin) or they had the str/dex loss covered (water shifters, Gorzathar). It still is less reliable than owaza.

The special anti communer one put lag and made me fail a good number of communes. Though at the end of the day you weren't doing that that much damage so I could still drop enough to win even missing a bunch. Had a very decent duration on it though and the -wis/int messed with regen.


I also saw someone using the whip timed attack and rocking as much damage as drum... that was pretty impressive.

Jonsen was great. I was glad to see you get back into the village.

I picked up that you were a bit of a loner. That day in Aran gird Tummel asked to speak with you but had logged out before you returned. You asked me what he wanted and I said I didn't know. I kind of suspected it was about breaking ranks as Tummel made a comment about it but I wasn't sure so I didn't want to stir any #### and figured Tummel would address it in his own time.

There was also that other time that you found the mages ranking on night walkers. I was hoping you'd let me follow you in but you charged ahead and I never got to fight. It really didn't bother me much though or the character of Terxaxous as more power to you if you can charge a group of 3 and win. But, like I said it fit the loner description.

I hope you got a chance to get a few pks out of shooting bird shifters out of the sky. It's a neat niche ability. Just sucks you have no idea where they land to finish them.

Figured I'd chime in, since I was involved in a number of the major challenges your character faced. Although, I will say deception is probably one of the hardest things to manage in CF, PARTICULARLY as a goodie.

As far as deception goes, I've no problem with letting people believe what they want, or even lying to the enemy, but how you did it seemed to come across as the oft-hated "Hey, let's group! Nevermind - DEAD!" version. Even your comments of "I left that one mage alive because he gave me more PKs" strike me as that. Still, it wasn't removal sort of deal persay, so I decided to put the Drillmaster on a witch-hunt of sorts, and see what it came up with. Obviously, he figured it out super-fast, so either you were not good enough w/ deception, or I gave too much hint. Either's possible.

As far as removal w/ Tummel, I actually didn't think your actions warranted it, though the comments may have. I'm quite the fan of rampaging barbarians vs. Imperial Horde mindset. One of the "challenges" of leading Battle.

Re: Evil - This one mostly came down to the sheer fact that I constantly had to be reminded that your character *WAS* good aligned. Goodie PKs were a part, and IIRC, there were situations where you're palling about with evil ragers, who're commenting about having just killed random goodie who was with a mage, and Jonsen's giving them "Good job!" comments. He really just came across neutral as much as I (and others I discussed it with) saw.

Overall, I don't think Jonsen was a horrible character, I just think that what you were trying to pull together into one character made it very hard to do everything "well". I'll admit I've tried some like that where things just didn't mesh together as well as I'd hoped, but hopefully you enjoyed it still.

re Deception. There was one shapeshifter in particular that was sending me tells and posting notes, although I had never given him any indication whatsoever I was Battle, so Tummel had likely received an earful.

re Removal. I was a disrespectful punk on CB. I definitely deserved it, but I didn't think he had the moxy to pull the trigger. Good for Tummel.

re: Evil. I can't recall chumming around with any evil ragers, but I did converse regularly with Zszaun about Imperial movements. He frequently was inviting me to rank with him, but because I did not trust him I cheerily put him off even after I had been turned neutral. I don't ever recall saying "Good job" when a non-mage goodie was slain, but I recognize that once a tainted opinion of someone (Jonsen) is formed, it is an uphill battle to ever fix opinion. People, including me, just don't recategorize well, and confirmation bias serves everyone from peons to presidents.

From the start, I had fully expected to eventually be turned evil, but I had thought it would be through the manipulations and worship of my chosen deity than through casual play, and I never ever thought it would be done offline without any roleplay whatsoever.

No harm, no foul, and maybe we all can learn something from this.

I'll admit I did *frequently* keep an eye on Jonsen's behavior often due to his initial actions, but I never saw anything else really out of line rager-wise for him. Nothing that came across as outstandingly stellar, but nothing horrible either.

As far as evil goes, it was done when you were online, and you did get an echo. Bright red, even, if I recall correctly. Those are always a little difficult since it's done based on the culmination of actions, and rarely one particular instant. I never thought Jonsen was particularly evil, just as I mentioned before...he certainly never came across as very "good" either.

If you're curious on any more details, feel free to email me at Jormyr@carrionfields.com. I'd just rather not air all the details (which also include active characters) here.

Anyways, good luck with the next! *coughJormyrshamancough*

Since I was your patron, I have a few things to note here. You did really good at the deception aspect of the religion but as far as battle is concerned you did a little too good, obviously. It is a hard balance for a battlerager but *especially* more so for a good battlerager.

Good align is about being a good person, even before you slaughtered multiple (trust me it was more than one) good-aligned characters, you did not seem like a good-aligned character.

After you were turned neutral, I was hoping this would be your "big break" of roleplay, but instead you deleted. I really was expecting more from you in respect to roleplay, either trying to become good again or heading straight for evil. I would say I am disappointed but, I really would rather see you have fun than play a role you are not interested in. ... Disappointed as I am, ;) I hope you had fun.

I think the biggest flaw of the character was not coming to your patron imm to discuss things. Not only is it a good roleplaying opportunity, but also a good way to gauge how you are playing the role--if you can take hints ;).

Good luck in the fields.

All I knew about you was that you were opportunistic and probably had no problem breaking the battle code to achieve your goals, whatever they may have been. I watched you and looked into the one complaint I received, but never saw or heard of anything that warranted any action from me until that day we spoke in the village about breaking ranks. I mean, not only did you go in alone, but locked the gate so we couldn't follow and we could not get another key.

I'm glad you thought you deserved the boot, it was not something I wanted to do or enjoyed. As we discussed, it wasn't for breaking ranks, but what you said over CB. Had you said it to me privately, I would have handled it differently. But since it was public, I felt it required a public response. As Drillmaster, you annoyed me, but I didn't have it out for you and would have done the same to anyone else who did what you did.

Anyway, Jonsen was well played I thought and made for interesting times.

GLWYN

You could have escaped the second time we were on the Sea, by the way.

Can't believe you were good-aligned. Ugh. You attacked me once when I was in form at low ranks and I had other characters telling me you were an evil Outlander, etc.

I probably should have not let you have a hut as easy as I did, but that is my way to give a chance.

Seems like you had an interesting time at least.

GLWYN