Sun Jul 11 20:06:26 2021

At 5 o'clock AM, Day of Thunder, 31st of the Month of Futility
on the Theran calendar Zorellaia perished, never to return.

Race:	dark-elf
Class:	shaman
Level:	51
Alignment:	Evil
Ethos:	Chaotic
Cabal:	None, None
Age:	226
Hours:	163

My shadow! A shame we did not cross paths more often! For what it’s worth Mae enjoyed the banter!

You really grew on Alendross. He pseudo sided with you on the fact it wasn't on the bark which is why he suggested you only be removed for a short time instead of the branch burned entirely. I always wanted to learn more about you being Mae's shadow. GLWYN.

I will note that it has been fairly well known, for as long as I can remember, that outlanders do not kill within the tree's safe zone.

I did not make the choice to remove you from the tree, instead favoring to let Scyreth make the decision. I personally would have removed you if there was not a Nightreaver to question, but if Scyreth would have said "let him stay" I would have let you stay.

The notion of putting this on the bark is a good idea, and I am interested in doing it, but it will probably be low priority and will take some time.

Finally, had you NOT come to me semi-OOC and flat out tell me I am wrong (I am a god, and the patron of the cabal. My decision is never wrong when it comes to how the cabal handles things), I might have been interested in offering the olive branch and bringing you back in. It was clear to me that you neither wanted that, nor cared to follow rules from that point forward, so there was no point.

GLWYN

Kicking someone out from the tree with no warning for something that's "fairly well-established" but not communicated through IC means in any way is just flat out wrong. It's not on the bark and the tree in general is not a rules-centric and tradition-based informal-rule cabal.

I came to you completely IC as Zorellaia was mad that an unspoken rule seemed to be in effect and enforced and she (the character) absolutely despised tribunals and what they represented, and this just reeked of the kind of one strike, you're out crap a trib might pull. The Law is above everything, even if that Law is not mentioned anywhere. I've played for 20sh years and I had no idea one cannot attack another in the tree. This didn't come up with my other outlanders for some odd reason and it's not often I play the cabal.

As the player, I was actually fine either way, as this gave me a new Loss to RP around and also maybe try to get into Scions. Sadly, Rahsael went completely AWOL and I couldn't find Morius for the longest while, so the character just didn't go anywhere and I pulled the plug.

The build I had the longest desire to try out - Drow Breaker specifically. I think Nalasul or some other IMM mentioned trying a smart Breaker when I said my experience with the path was that it sucked the vast majority of the time in practical hero PK. I would still maintain that the path leaves a lot to be desired in actual real PK situations because of two-round lag on the supps and the still bad fail rate. It's just not reliable to try to commune it on anyone worthwhile as they'll just make the save and you're doing nothing for two rounds. You're usually much better off with basic shaman stuff than trying to Breaker them. Some communes like the fear ones seem to be just broken as in not working. I think I've tried to fear someone 20+ times in order to be able to retrieve, but was not successful, and gave up trying to use it.

In order to be useful, a fail rate cannot be above 50% and it would be much preferable the spell is actually somewhat reliable, as in success in 80%sh of cases, but I can see how this could make the path borked. In reality, I think my fail rate on Breaker was probably 80%-100%, which meshes well with my previous experience with the path. Partial success is next to nothing, I'd group it together with complete fail. I'm speaking purely from real hero range PK experience against people with saves and not picking off newbies in the 30s. Even the latter is easier done with just basic shaman things I think.

I'm fairly sure that if I'd bugboard it, Ishuli would come back with "I've tested it and it's fine" but the path just doesn't work in my view. Neither the fear thing, nor the "prevent fleequaff" part, nor "try to make them fail spells" worked even remotely semi-reliably and was never worth it (in actual hero pk against people with saves.)

Aristaeia edge was fine, but not actually as useful as I thought it'd be as usually they just fleequaffed way before it'd become relevant or I wimpie worded due to insane damage and/or being lagged out. Drow just doesn't have the hp/defenses to stand up to damage builds and have time to commune, arist or not.

Big thanks to Rahsael for running the contest and giving me this build to try out. Too bad for the timing of RL interfering at the end, but I understand. :) Also big thanks to other imms (including Ergush, who I actually don't hate) for donating their time and effort for us.