Sun Aug 19 15:15:07 2001


5 o''clock AM, Day of the Sun, 6th of the Month of the Frost Giant on the Theran calendar Paneros perished, never to return.

Race:	half-elf
Class:	transmuter
Level:	51
Alignment:	Good
Ethos:	Neutral
Cabal:	WARLOCK, the Warlocks of the Golden Grimoire
Age:	203
Hours:	398
PK Ratio:	21% (closer to 100% is better)

I usually don't post anything like this, but
it saddens me that to date, there is no imm
response here whatsoever to Paneros. *shrug*

lt

I remember ranking with you and Caslandrien for a long time. Then the balance shifted I recalled and waited a bit before I raided you. I was thinking....ooo..that ram is going to hurt.

We had some good fights, and you were one who understood that in Bladjix's mind, it was nothing personal. You also showed up to defend when you were outnumbered and had no chance, which I respect when it is according to your role.

Bladjix

There's an old loony toons cartoon, not many have seen from what I hear, where the coyote and the sheepdog are battling in the fields while the coyote is trying to steal the sheepdog's sheep. The coyote tries all sorts of ideas to get the sheep and the dog pummels him every time.

At the end of the cartoon, the coyote and the sheepdog walk over to a tree, punch out at a clock and smile and wave at each other and say "See you tomorrow, Fred." "Yup! See you tomorrow."

I always thought of that as us (I never figured out which of us was which though, you won most our encounters as i recall.) We had our jobs, and those involved fighting now and then if we were do to them right. I admit I never liked the whole concept of Nexus (speaking as Paneros who couldn't imagine helping out evil so often), but I admired that you stuck with it and did it well.

I figured if you could do your incredibly difficult job so the least I could do was do my job the best i could and defend. At least I didn't have to worry about changing sides every so often, heck I had it easy compared to you. :-)

See you in the fields.

How could you forget me!!!!! I remember you growing up :)

heeeeee

Sorry to forget you. You were the wise old tranmsuter who kept talking about nearing death and dying and making a mark on Thera while you still could to a young 20th level mage who just wanted to perfect shapeshift.

When I was young, I didn't understand you. When I got older, I realized I was you. :-)

Unfortunately I never came to anywhere near the spectacular end that I heard you came to. Never anywhere quite as near. I wouldn't have even said I was in your league in terms of being a good Warlock. You were an inspiration for Warlocks as far as I stand.

Thanks, now go to bed old mage. :-)

I liked travelling with you.. I think we heroed each other from about rank 35 onward. I agree with what you said about no IMMteraction. Besides raiding and retrieving, there were no real goals or things to accomplish. Whenever you do something good on your own, you have to get used to patting yourself on the back.

Good luck on your next and if it was up to me youd have gotten something for your work on that area...

Damn I knew I'd forget someone important. What ever happened to you? One day we're hip deep in the slave mines, the two of us kicking butt talking about all the cool things we're finding and theories about areas, and then I never see you again.

You missed a lot of really good treks and half-baked ideas for treks of mine after that (which probably saved you a lot of con, but that's neither here nor there). You vanishing was the first major blow to Paneros. It's never the same once you lose the people you came up in the world with.

I was just looking over a log of the two of us retreiving, damn it's scary what a ram and alligator could do to a level 30 mob. :-)

Thanks for the memories.

Well, this is it. Time for Paneros to rest.

I really started to lose interest in Paneros after 200 hours or so, my forms were awesome (Ram and Diamondback) and I could solo stuff far and above most other people, but I really was getting bored. I started something I really recommend to anyone else who finds themself bored with their character. I made a promise to log in and learn one thing, and then I could quit. Some days I just teleported around, found a new area, figured out how to walk home and quit. Some days I located random items and went looking for them. Or asked around for hints on items I knew were good but never found myself. Some days it was 15 minutes, and somedays I thought it would be 15 minutes and I'd get sucked into my discovery and play for hours, but each time I came in, I knew I'd discover something else interesting in the world. I must say, that kept me busy for 150 or so hours and then some, and I really, really enjoyed the learning. Thanks Imm's for such a big world with so many nooks and crannies.

Other then that though it was a lonely life. I played off-peak hours. Never saw an Warlock immortal unless I logged in real late my local time, and then I was usually too tired to care. I spent most of my time defending the fortress alone, not even marans or dawnites on, against nexties, scion and later ragers. (In that order too, I tell you nexus raided us more often then scion ever did.)

After about 350 hours the stupidity of it all hit me. I mastered one of the areas people don't go to alot. Even found some bugs in it and was told OOC by the creating immortal I was the only one to get that far at the time. (And yes, I found that key I was missing finally, I should have found it earlier but I kept giving it away without noticing what it really was like an idiot.) :-) When i finished the area, I just sort of waited. I thought this was the point of cf, go out and do something cool no one had ever done before, and you'd get a reward. Nothing. I'm not mad, I understand, the Imm who ran the area would have no IC reason to care about me, so they did nothing. That left my own Imm's but without a a shoehorn to get them off Annalena and nodoze I really couldn't talk to my own Imms. I decided I wasn't going to screw up my own life and sleeping schedules for a game, and so resigned myself to getting diddly.

I did call Savereth down to talk once. I did have an honest question for her and you did help me with it, but pretty much that was me trying to figure out if you knew Paneros from a hole in the wall, you didn't seem to. I figured I was already really old, and it was way too late to start caring about that now.

I spent hundreds of hours, sometimes 8-10 a day in my early days, defending the fortress, helping mentor where I could, exploring, fighitng evil magic and trying to be a good Warlock. I guess that wasn't enough to catch anyone's eye. I never wanted a quest form or special god powers, what I really wanted was once, just once, the Sorceress to turn to me and say "Thanks for not letting me die." Was that too much to ask for? Maybe as a Warlock, it is. Hell, for all the interaction I got as this character I think I should just go play Baldur's Gate II.

For those friends I had, Thevequn, Isham, Kastury, Dachaedan, Bladjix, Satinka, and so many more thank you for your time. You're all the reason I didn't give up on cf.

I realized when my replacement character for Paneros hit 40 hours played, it was time to let the old guy just die. (I had a 4 con anyway and I couldn't bring myself to end it violently, Paneros would have hated that.) :-)

Take care.

Paneros, aka. Zelten

When playing with other characters it always made me smile to see you still around. I thought you were a great warlock and a good guy to travel with, kinda disappointed you didn't get any recognition you probably deserved. Ah well, only a game. Good luck with your next, hope we get to meet up again soon. Peace.

Isham

I rolled up Paneros to try out the new transmuters. I couldn't decide on shapeshifting or arcane. I met you when I was applying to Warlocks back at level 11, and you were level 19 or something and just about to get your interview.

I always tried to ferret arcane info out of you subtley so I could feel like I was learning both sides of the fence without being pushy. You were a great friend and colleague, and those undead xvarts never knew what hit them.

Thanks.

you were kicking it. should you've remained you'd be the magister today ( noone else seem to be interested ). I honestly, on a side note, have never seen theese twins, except for in a log. heh. I guess I'll go out and pray some. must figgure out something to pray for first though. oh well.

Heh, funny you should mention the magister thing. I actually changed my playing time 1 final time before I died. I was basically going to call down the twins and straight out ask to be the magister. (I figured waiting never got me anything and they worst they could do is point and laugh at me and smite me, but even if they did it'd certainly increase my immteraction 100 fold.)

I log in, do a 'who warlock' see annalena, andulvar and the twins on. Read a couple notes, do 'who warlock' again and I see Andulvar is now the new magister.

It's all about timing. Then when he age died within a week of being appointed, I looked at my own nearly 400 hour, 5 constitution character and thought "It'd be really cruel to ask for the title of magister and permanently die 10 hours later and force them to go through the whole process yet again." So I gave up on that goal.

Thanks for the encouragement though. I enjoyed the few times we met and interacted. I have great respect for the arcane, the good ones need more caution and dedication then just about any other class, but the good ones prove it's worth it.

Oh well,

Now, you are making me feel old...I will miss all the good time we had together.

Good luck with your new character.
see you in the fields.

I thought you were (are, sorry) a wonderful character.

I still remember you striding up to me in Galadon in our early days and saying something like "We need to go out and accomplish something for the spirit of adventure burns in my veins this day."

I always thought of that line after all our recent encounters, it honestly almost made me cry each time seeing you go from that to playing with your dolls and 2 word sentences. Still, you seemed happy and you did a terrific job of it. You play the role beautifully and really seemed to accept it without bitternes, or playing on sympathies.

BRAVO!!! You were an inspiriation to me to get off my duff and actually take a roleplaying stance with my future characters.

I just wanted you to know that.

The Accepted Mantra:

" If you want to get noticed, roleplay, interact, take chances, be patient".

What many people have noticed:

" It doesn't matter if you roleplay, interact, and are patient for 300+ hours...zero imm interaction was my reward for all that work"

There are others, however who would say:

"40 hours into my char, after heroing, I got a title, a tat, and many enjoyable imm interactions...Thanks!"

Is the descrepancy due to:
1) some failing on Paneros' (as well as many other heroes) part, as in poor roleplay?

2) Is there some hidden and secret ingredient that is required for some minor form of notice.

I didn't ask that same question because I think I have the answer.

1) I didn't ask for anything. I didn't ask for a tattoo, a quest, a kleenex from an Imm, nothing. As Oddjob put it very well on another forum. "I just didn't feel right asking for anything." Those people who get 80 hour tattooed, empowered, titled stuff usually asked for it. As an experiment once I changed my playing time to when i knew the twin's played and prayed for Savereth at her shrine, bam she showed up 5 seconds later (at this point I was already 375 hours old and pretty bitter anyway). The conlusion I came to was... Asking works. Being patient and doing your best quietly is crap.

2) I might have been noticed without asking for anything, had I not been one of 55 hero transmuters and had immortals of my alignment/sphere/ideology who vaguley shared my playing times. (Don't get me wrong, I didn't expect the twins to change their playing time any more then i intended to change mine for them.) Warlocks just needs more imms at different times. (I thought of asking to imm just because Warlocks need more of them, but though that idea would be shot down.)

What I want to know is, did ANY Imm ever look at me? Did you just catch me during one of my many "15 minutes of trying to figure out what to do next" periods and just assume I was boring?
Was it always someone's elses job to look at me and you were too busy with your own followers?

I'll try to make a few brief answers here...

1) At some point, you have to ask. There are too many mortals and too few immortals for a player to be able to rely on an immortal noticing him or her just by sheer chance. You need to do something to draw our attention, and asking for something is usually the start. We're not going to bite your head off, unless you're asking for something insane, or come asking for a tattoo and know nothing about the religion (nor have thought at all about what it means to your character, etc).

2) Less distinguishing things make it harder for us to take notice. Imms do a lot of things, like busting cheaters, discussing things about the game with other Imms, working on areas/code/etc... and that's in what time our real lives allow us for cf. The time we have to watch Joe Average on the street in Galadon really doesn't amount to much, so it's quite possible we glance in on you when you're sitting in guild wondering what to do. You may be surprised, but there are also people who don't want to have to deal with any 'immteraction'. Would more imms help? Sure, but that's true all around.

Mostly I'd just encourage you to be more proactive at first next time. You won't gain the eye of a director if you don't at least try out for the play, so go try for a tattoo next time.

Bye Pan Pan!
Had fun running around with you and the jest etc etc
A pretty fun character to hang around with.
So take care and see ya again.
Oh yeah, you gonna leave any contacts?

You always made me laugh, Kastury, thanks for that. I always thought there was something about you I couldn't place. You always knew more then you let on to most people. Maybe you were just playing a ditzier character and so held stuff back, but I was damn curious to find out what that was. :-)

Anyway, not sure why anyone would want to contact little ole me, but bob-kaelin@mediaone.net should do it.

Thanks for the fun, see you in the future.

I'm not really sure what your email is
Is it bob-kaelin@ ? ? ?
or kaelin@ ? ? ? ?
Anyway to be safe, kindly send a mail to me?
fellinna23@hotmail.com

Everybody should have a char like this. I started out with a healer who ended up just exploring and fighting all the time and it upped my skill level tremendously (I learned more with that one character than I did with my next three combined). It only gets better from there on out too.

You were cool. Just wanted to apologize for *always* thinking you were an Arcane. No idea why I kept making that mistake. The one thing I remember about Paneros, and what I really admired, was how you shrugged off deaths. I've never been able to be so nonchalant about it - your way is much more healthy. I always want to put my head through the monitor every time I die. :)

Nah, don't worry about the arcane thing. I was in form 80% of my life so it makes sense why no one would ever see me.

You were a good conjurer, I enjoyed our few trips together. My last character or two got me over dying pretty easily. Once you hero all you lose is stuff and Paneros never had any stuff worth caring about anyway. :-)

Being a transmuter helps you get over your dying thing. You're mostly as powerful without anything (just fewer hp) and you can't use all the really cool stuff anyway. (Items that cast spells for instance or heal you are useless to shapeshifters.)

I was fairly proud of the fact Paneros could be 75% re-equipped with his standard stuff by the time he unghosted. A few lucky teleports to get me to the right places and I could have the rest back, protections and all, in another 10 minutes or so.

Now, if I had some of those fancy, unique, hell and other cool area gear, I might care more about dying. But that's the beauty of wearing whatever crap you find. :-)

Take care, and keep conjuring.