It was a hectic and a long run. 470 hours is much for me. I wished to play him to age death, but it was not meant to be.So i did not get enough kills to set a new personal record this time. The increasing curse of work and plague from gfs withered Grunlath away. Just playing an hour each day was not as fun as the 3-5 hours log ins.

A few regrets: With just two anathemas i was to kind, but i regret making one of them. To that newbie assassin..Sorry!
I am also sorry that i was pretty hard on the villagers...some of you pissed me off and i let all of you pay..Sorry.

Goodbyes:
Eshval- I was very impressed by you. From the first approaches around rank 11 until the very end. Thanks for the good words, tat, title and small rewards. It meant a lot.
Khasotholas- I know you better than you think, but Eshval stole me this time. Just before i headed towards your shrine actually :). It was fun to see your very evil side. I have some thoughts on the councilvote, bloodoath and imperial punishment that i will send you one day.
Dalteric- Thanks for liking my role. It was very unexpected.

Mortals:
I interacted with several hundred during his lifespan. All my log ins were actionpacked, so forgive me if ignored tells and such. Thanks for making Grunlath fun to play.
Instead of naming each i remember, i will let you post first and then reply.


Cheers!

I liked you. Wish I got to do more with you IC but our public relation talks were fun. Great Job! Hope you liked the pendent.

Awesome job on Grunlath. I have already said it all in Ilimya's goodbye threat, but the mention of Njaal made me want to chime in again.

I remember some vary painful weeks trying to get from 42 to 51 with Drokk, my first hero (though not my first high level) while dying all the time to one extremely annoying shaman named Njaal.

I also remember looking over each fight and thinking, what could I have done differently, how could I counter this and that. Eventually, you (and Jinroh!) taught me the ropes the hard way. Thanks a lot.

I think based on your actions in the game and your responses on the forum that you have a great attitude towards the game. A quality player in my book.

I hope to fight another of your chars eventually.

PS: Are you from Scandinavia perhaps? I seem to recall the last name of Njaal being something that sounded decidedly Norse. Also, your playing times match with that as well.

Thanks.

Njaal was not so focused on pk as Grunlath was. This time i tried to set some sort of shaman record, but since i deleted middle-aged (had leader age almost all the way) the number can easily be beaten.

From fighting Illimya i say you have turned into a pro player. And you will probably kick my ass all over the mud when i return.

Njaal is an ancient viking name from Iceland actually. The saga of him and his sons is recommended reading.
And you were correct on your guess.

Awesome job. You never sat still for a moment. Always pressing and taking the fight to us. Interacted with you with Onaelith (gnome mongoose/monkey), Alidove (Hyena/osprey), Remoldezaire (conjie) briefly.

Awesome all around.

I knew Onaelith and Alidove were played by you. And as usual very solid...seemed like you put more love into Onaelith though. That was one tuff ape. We have been on opposite sides so many times now...hopefully when i have time to roll up something again one day we will be on the same side. I would like that.

as to how far you would go with the empire ending the black sect thing. I hated your and Liked you but mostly hated you. few good spots of rp though, and for that cheers.


I also wana know what you think of krag :)

I put much weight on the information i got from Krag. You directly had something to do with the faith of two blades. And i still think you spoke the truth about them. You were also a tuff warrior....not my best match up of the villagers.

Had the village declared war on outlanders and marans i would have anathemaed the whole black sect. I was serious about that.

when I die I will def post up my whole concept on the idea. I think it would of been some crazy #### though.

I wish I could of been around for the seccond rights, they changed teh dates and the time I cleared was not able to be cleard the next week, not the first time it has happened, wont be the last time heh.

well it wont be too long now I dont think, heh.

but till then good luck in the fields.

Grunlath was seriously my choice for Emperor as I saw you with a few other characters of mine during your up-bringing. As I brought Suarvina up through the ranks (in record time for me) I grew attached to your Emperorness. I attached Suarvina to you through some very intricate interactions. Such as our trip to Aran-Gird and various other trips. The only thing that irked me about you was the full intention of ganking. I still can't believe I inticed you to run up to UdGaard after Ysal, just the two of us when you had clearly stated that Gharahka was to come for lagging skills. In the end I was very disgusted because it turned out to be me, you, Nysveld and Gharahka against Ysal (Yes, she is a beast, but doesn't deserve that ####).
By the end of Suarvina's long life it was curious that I had partial control of the Empire when you were about and it was readily recognized by others. A little persuasion and you would do almost exactly as I suggested. You were a very good ally and a very good character. Thanks for your interactions and the five-color mail (which I gave to Gohum not 20 minutes after you gave it to me)

Actually i found it the other way around... The gnome shifter squads hatred for villagers is well known and its always handy to bring more force towards the Destructor. You stepped in where lightmage left, and aided us in killing villagers. A usefull pawn in the conquest of Thera. As i said many times to the Empire an arcane was not to be trusted further than you could piss :).
This Order of Mages that were about was not something i supported, but i had enough with the 4 wars i already waged. The truce relieved some pressure on us.
And i dont remember the Ysal incident, but you got close to death when you spat on the blade at the end of your life.

Perhaps one day we meet again in the fields..

You did a great job as Emperor.

While there are many of a variety of skill levels among the Outlander's enemies, I could always count on you to be challenging and when you were about, we were guaranteed to have to defend the Refuge usually.

Defending the Refuge with you leading a group almost always meant we were going to be forced to teleport while faerie fired so as to not get summoned one by one and slaughtered :)

While most people complain about rots, there were definately a few times when it was effective ;)

Whenever you rotted me, I was determined to spore and thornheart you as a sort of tit for tat...I knew in most cases you worry going to recall and druids have no way to stop that during three moon phases.

I hope you enjoyed some of the ambushes I layed out for you :) I tried to keep your level of Outlander Apprehension high...but there sure were some tough times when it seemed there were a lot of imperials running around.

Great job and I hope the next Emperor rallies the troops as strongly.

We fought a lot before any of us got leadership. You were always a dedicated hunter and there was many good fights. Enjoyed is not the word i would use of your good ambushes, but it was at least over quickly. Unfortunately as my playing times changed due to more and more work i saw less of you. You were on my top 3 list of enemies i wished to skin.

I thought Aeria was a great char. Keep trucking.

n/t

Ha..

dam I enjoyed fighting you..
Thanks for the fights
hope the Curse and Plague eases abit down the road
so you can get time to play again..

Cool Emperor. Suave, took your knocks and handed out some serious beat downs. Definitely the rally point for the Empire - you would log on and what ever idiots that were running around at the time would suddenly become a semi-cohesive force. Empire will hit a low point for a while until someone comes to adequately fill your shoes.

Sorry most of our RP interactions tended to be abrasive and filled with taunts, but what can you do when the leader of a warring cabal is also your racial enemy.

Good luck with RL things hopeful you will find some time to roll another quality char like Grunlath sometime soon.

You are very tuff warrior to fight. Well done on the commander thing...the village needed a leader to fill the void that Kaisse left.

And nice curses btw. Good luck with hunting those mage bastards down.

Overall, I liked Grunlath immensely. My one wish was that he'd be more a leader of Empire, less a leader of groups. However, you set an excellent example I wish most Imperials would follow. You struck fear in the enemy, did what you were supposed to do, roleplayed fairly well, and most of all, on the rare occasion when you got knocked down, you were up again in a few minutes. Good stuff.

Well I'm not that new just never been in any cabals, and certainly never in Empire. Ya think it showed? ;-) I mean, I DID give the codex to the wrong mob, haha.

It's tuff to discern what's going on and figure how to ask questions without breaking RP.. especially in Empire. Next time maybe. Nope, can't stomach donations.

Anyways, I got my revenge on you buy killing you with another char, so yay-yo for me (yes I had help but still).

Nice job big G dogg, I enjoyed our nemesis roleplaying back and forth.

Now on to the serious stuff.

Instead of needing more cowbell, we need more PBF ACTION!!!!!!!!
LET THE INSANITY BEGIN! It's MARCH MADNESS BABY!!!!!

Grysh

I'll preface this by stating that as a sword/pole spec rager, I never expected to kill you solo.

I both loved and hated fighting you. The downtime that I needed to get all of your supplications off of me was just unbelievable. There were a few times I considered just feeding myself to you to get the pace going again, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it. The last time we fought, I wasn't sure if you knew or not what I was up against. I'm guessing that you knew and were using that, but I can't be certain. You seemed like a skilled player doing what you could with a shaman. The fact that alot of wither and plagues came out of you says more, I think, about the class than the player.

By the way, you were incredibly close to getting me the last time. That was also the best chase that anyone has given me with this character to date, and most likely til deletion. I had to leave for my standard 2:30 appointment but I felt bad leaving you hanging without a victory. That was like blam blam blam and you played it perfectly. Also, why I could never seem to cut your escape off, I don't know.

Oh well. Thanks for all the fights, all the fun, and some of the frustration. Take care in the real world.

I got looted 10x as hard by groups of three imperials without you in them than in groups of 5-7 imperials with you in them. For that, I have to respect the action, the respect that the imperials gave you, and you the player.

Very solid Emperor from all what I've seen. We did not fight a lot.. I do not know if it is good for me or no but anyway you were very lucky that each time I and Ilgirinia catched you without fly.. Ilgirinia did not trip or one of us miss the trip. Hehe I was wondering how many charges you worth but seems I will never find it out :)

I liked out talk but for some reasons it could not go somewhere else but what we came to.

Good luck with your next.

> Hehe I was wondering how many charges you worth but seems I will never find it out :)


You don't want to know. It'd probably make you cry.

I mean it neppy, how many?!

About getting the estimated figure tagged on to his Imm comments :)

I don't doubt its equal to his pk ratio in some way. I'd guess about 8-9 charges. Maybe time for a contest on the contest board to guess the charges to the nearest decimal (11.6!), could be fun.

Yhorian.

>About getting the estimated figure tagged on to his Imm
>comments :)
>
>I don't doubt its equal to his pk ratio in some way. I'd guess
>about 8-9 charges.

You're low. :)

nothing

In Grunlath's case, it was roughly 15.

You were right. I am going to cry a river now ;)

I remember starting with a wither on you that got volleyed, so i dropped my weapon and almost got 3 rounded..not fun.

You owe me for ordering the soldiers to return your trinkets that time in Hamsah.

Shame my plans with you did not work out.....it would have been very cool for us both i think. Good luck with everything!

I generally liked Grunlath. Nice job.

Guess you watched the ganks with love, beer and popcorn! And just hated the solo fights :).

Thanks for being around..and doing what you do.

Much of the enjoyment I derive from this is the interaction with the palyers, it would not be nearly as enjoyable if I wasn't given my 'fix' of interactions. As we spoke the other day, sometimes you just get worn thin and it is time to move on, and I respect that decision. Thanks for 'handing' me Empire, that was a pretty nice gift. Now you need to learn to be a bit meaner. :P

See you around, and Luck.

I am not certain i wish to become meaner, sorry.

Thanks again for everything. You are on my all time top 3 list of imms now :), so one day i will "seek the Muse" again.

You seem to have done fine without me, what a shock!?!?! I thought the Empire was going to be lost without the leet-assassin, thanks for proving me wrong. Anyway work and girlfriends is what is keeping me away from cf which sucks, but hey I need em both to survive.
Good luck and all that shizzle.

My role should be interesting reading for you, hehe. I think i added a chapter about the election and conspiracy against Niaz. I was actually sincere about voting for you the first time we spoke of it.
And Khas did refuse my request for a councilvote on Niaz, so i spoke the truth about that. Dulmissa was a known khaslover, so i did not push the issue with you.
Niaz had ordered me to hold a dark mass for the imperial lords...something i did not wish to do. So he had to get off the Throne before i became anathema. I am certain you would have become a fine empress, but better luck next time :).

I didn't interact with you too much with this character other than Gharaka entwining you dispelling me fun times and a few very pointless one on one fights(shaman vs healer sucks, but healer vs healer sucks worse). But for what I have seen in the past with my last character you were a solid imperial leader, though I could tell you were learning the shaman trade(but still knew what was going on in regards to CF in general). It was nice to see an imperial that would fight alone, and sometimes even against the odds, it is something rare, and for that fact alone I respect you.

I also was able to get a few talks with you(albeit across a distance) with one of my past characters, and I enjoyed them, but for whatever reason I could not tell that you were an Eshval follower. I did get the hint that you were willing to have imbeciles walking around in the Empire as long as you were able to conquer all. It was pain for Alenysi when she would log on and see 8 imperials on, though those times stopped, which I did kind of miss. In any case, good luck with your next, and if you want...play another pansy herald :P(I play oh so many of those).

That thing about me just playing heralds before was meant to be funny...sorry:). This was not my first nor second nor third shaman...dont make me count the hours i have spent playing them. At the top of my head i remember Njaal and Hedda as the latest.

Let me tell you one thing about being an Eshvalite in Lord Khasotholas Empire...it was not easy. That old bitter drow is scary at times, so i kept a low profile. Knowing all to well he was eager to have me replaced if a worthy Khas follower came around.

Thanks for the kind words, and keep trucking.

My bad with the shaman then, I thought you were a bit new with the class, but maybe it was just the times you catch me you just needed to spam comm dispel :P or with my last character, I didn't see you too much outside a group(though you were willing to fight solo at times which is something).

And the heralds, I was trying to be funny too, but I guess it didn't come out like that, but come on pansy heralds all the way!!! They rock, honestly!!!(joking)

Messed up here, forget it.

To be quite honest I won't be missing you much. ;)

There's very little I can do about a shaman (who isn't confused, stupid, or just plain caught pants down) in the first place, and the fact that you had extra damage reduction as well as could see me most of the time, more or less, kinda made me just stay away and bide my time, hoping you'd get confused, stupid or drop your pants.

Good job, but don't do it again at least until I'm gone, heh!

No worries. I wont be around for some time. You did not have much to worry about though..you stayed out of sight well. I just caught a glimpse of you now and then. You were always close to mind though even if you were out of sight. So i always sent someone in first to check for snares when we raided/retrieved against the Outlanders.

Good job, a nasty ranger you are. To many of my soldiers died to you.

n/t

I liked retrieving with you from the Outlanders, you always seemed to buy me enough time to kill the Huntress before I got bioempathied.

You were a solid Emperor, seeing you stick it out for hours on end was really inspiring.

I hope the next Emperor can show the same fortitude that you did.

If you don't mind my asking was this your first hero shaman?

That aside you carried yourself well and were always willing to get down and dirty. I fought you with both flunruk and throt and I saw a remarkable improvement in you from one to the other. You had the best withers of any shaman I have played against in a few years though. You consistently hit -20 withers through my way above divine svs and made me run with my axes between my legs a more often then not because of it. I also applaud you for not always being attached to the imperial gank at the hip and doing a fair amount of pk on your own even when you had the option of using allies.

Yes, i have only played heralds before :).

Both of your chars were tuff fighters. Usually warriors are an excellent match up for shaman, but village defenders are the exception. So i do think the improvement you noticed was the difference between defender and non defender...alas the difference between Flunruk and Throt. You would be surprised if you knew how many solo fights ( or solo vs groups) i had with Grunlath, and i always enjoyed them.

And for those who wish to sell the energy drain, healing curse strategy....I do not buy it. A skilled defender will always be able to find a city before plague gets him.

>And for those who wish to sell the energy drain, healing curse
>strategy....I do not buy it. A skilled defender will always be
>able to find a city before plague gets him.

Let me be the first to ask: What would that get you?

>
>>And for those who wish to sell the energy drain, healing
>curse
>>strategy....I do not buy it. A skilled defender will always
>be
>>able to find a city before plague gets him.
>
>Let me be the first to ask: What would that get you?


I think he means that once a foe makes it to the city, whether they are immobile and nearly dead or not, they are mostly safe from any law-respecting Imperials.

As an imperial it would not get me much. In the very best case a villager who is stuck in a city until the plague wears off or another defender shows up. Counting on others to break imperial law and kill the villager inside the city would be poor form, eh? I remember warning lightmage about that once.
Most of the times they would not have any trouble getting back to the village as most fights take place on eastern or areas nearby.

I could be wrong though....

First off both throt and flunruk were defenders, well throt was but most of his life at hero he was uncaballed.

Healing curse prevents all defender skills except double block. The only way you could beat me if you couldn't str drop me was with healing curse. Well honestly the energy drain tactic works extremely well when it works and its most effective against villagers (because we can't recall). The thing is your not going to manage all that without having to flee and mend wounds a few times, but thats ok because the longer the fight is the more it favors you as a maledictor.

Best way to kill a villager as a shaman is energy drain plague and summon till they are out of mv's then smack them with wither weaken and what not. maybe 7 times out of 10 they make you retreat in that tactic (if they are an axe or hand spec) but the other 3 times they die and you should survive the other 7. I mean weaken them up and run them down works too but a good player will very very rarely be caught when they decide to run unless they can't word/teleport or run out of mv.

Well played.

My loyal ex Dread Lord....likewise.

I hope things work out for you !

I only fought you once or twice, but you definitely knew how to lead a group and were by far the strongest presence in Empire. The one question I have from the perspective of a cabal enemy is your curious choice in sect leaders. Because the only one that isn't active atm is Gharakha, so let me ask you this:

Obviously, Gharakha turned out to be solid (he's a good player), but at the time you promoted him, there was, from my POV, a much more obvious choice: Azatrak. Gharakha didn't really become a presence until after you made him sect leader. So here's my question: Why would you choose Gharakha over Azatrak? Politics?

Do you mind answering? I suppose it's Azatrak's question to ask, but this is one of those things I've always been curious about.

A fair question to ask. I thought Azatrak was a boasting bastard that liked whipping the younger blades around while he did not have much to show for himself. And Kragathian (at the time drillmaster of battle which i had much respect for) told me more than once what a coward he was and how Azatrak had said it was just a matter of time before he took the throne from me. It ended with me ordering Azatrak to duel Kragathian at the village. Krag spanked him easily while wielding just one weapon. I guess i should have anathemad Azatrak at that point or at least demoted him. However Grunlaths aim was to conquer Thera for Eshval, imperial politics came second. So i did not weaken my army and let Azatrak stay as elite while telling him some lies. Later he chose to anathema himself in some way.
I think Azatrak might have been a better War Master than Gharahka in the way of wipping blades and causing friction among the sects, but that was not something i wished to see. Ispris and Sylus were not options at that time for different reasons.

>However Grunlaths aim was to
>conquer Thera for Eshval, imperial politics came second. So i
>did not weaken my army and let Azatrak stay as elite while
>telling him some lies. Later he chose to anathema himself in
>some way.

Figured it was something like this and tried to tell the Empire followers it was so but you were so well entrenched they could not or would not see it. :P

Superb character with amazing and consistant roleplaying bringing a quality to a leadership role hard that will be hard to equal I think.
Well done.

nt

You were a good emperor as far as I could tell. You were able to gather the troops and get a lot done. Seriously, there could be five imperials doing nothing, but as soon as you logged on the #### started hitting the fan for me. I hated defending against any group you were in. You planned extremely well, and unless Fort had the numbers, I would normally die.

You deletion saddens me. I like to play the underdog, and Fort no longer is even close to the underdog. With you gone, the Imperial Horde has lost any semblance of cohesion that was left (heh... cohesion != perma so lets not hijack this thread, eh?).

We had some good fights. Sorry for looting your things some of the time, but looting honestly depends on my mood... and normally if you were around, I was recently the victim of a perfect imperial gank down.

Keep pumping out the solid characters, and I hope to interact with you some more in the future.

So yeah, keep on keeping on.




Haageran

P.S. I find life easier if I have plagues from a single gf, not multiple gfs. ;)

Thanks!
You were a tuff cookie. Seems like all paladins got faith virtues and you got stance as a bonus. I bet someone saw how you always came to defend against any number...well deserved.
You also nailed me a few times, not many did that..props to you.

Dont worry about the looting; what goes around comes aroud.

Good char...keep trucking.

When Grunlath logged in, I knew some asses were going to get wrecked. It was very fun having you grab whatever imperials there were, even if it was just me, and watching you go to work on our enemies. You were smart, aggressive, and were a strong presence without being overly cautious. Thanks for helping this newb healer along.

"Poke", Did i not tell you that i never wished to see you without aura? Nice to have combathungry healer around..you will go far.

Very solid healer. I had plans for you, but unfortunately the big man did not approve. I knew from the first day that you were a vet...the way you spoke of combat and knew Thera ;). So i was blessed with two skilled healers. Remaron was cool in his way too, so three healers.


I was a bit uncertain about what to do with your high donations...like 3x my donations but i let it slide.

Cheers!

I find it very very hard to actually not despise Imperials sometimes, but I respected Grunlath alot, you got me pretty good a few times and I was impressed by that. Its a sad day for the Empire

nt, yo

You impressed me. First by attacking Alriac when he "tainted" our fight at Kiadana. Second time when you sacrificed all your armor because you did not want any pity from me.
You had my respect, and my armies were not to take anything from your corpse. I had actually planned to conkill Yhorian, so you could become commander. Ysal is pretty cool, so things looks bright for the village now.

Now the other person I fear in Empire is gone. :( Feared you more for your ability to lead..it was incredible to watch even from an opposite point of view. When you were around to lead the Empire, Fortress dies (most of the time at least). :) Very patient, quick and smart.

Anyway, I throughly enjoyed this character..duels, fights..and thanks for returning eq everytime, it is very much appreciated. Tried to reciprocate the favour.

Well, your deletion is a major blow to Empire. Do hope more rise soon to fight heh. All the best with work, gf, life. I very much respected this character.

Thanks. I was pleased to see you get maranleader. Well deserved, you had heart and was not afraid to die for what you believed in.

Many good fights and duels. Good luck!

And Empire will always rise again :).

I wasn't about to let it get to the point of death solo you versus I. I think your group got me though when my group had a major debacle on eastern. Was fun though. I hope you weren't put off by my declining of a duel, it just seemed like a bit of a waste since it'd boil down to who runs out of mana first (probably me) and a good old teleport after.

Either way, was fun, luck with next. My life just got bit easier, and, sadly, somewhat more boring :(.

Dont worry about the declined duels. It was just that it was hard to find solo fights and duels is something i like. If i had just gotten forceduel instead of chain afflict, heh.

A. From reading these, apparently you really did fight alone. I am now doubting is the thug thief was sitting by your side, actually almost sure he wasn't, now. You have to realize that from Farigno's perpective, the empire was a bunch of people who saw an enemy and rounded up everyone they could find to go gang em down.
B. Due to Farigno's RP, a duel with you was not top on Farigno's priority list of things to do. Anyway, well rp'd, although I can see why you would doubt it of Farigno, without knowing more of him.