Tue Jan 29 22:37:30 2008

At 5 o'clock PM, Day of Freedom, 25th of the Month of the Great Evil
on the Theran calendar Thercic perished, never to return.

Race:	dark-elf
Class:	healer
Level:	45
Alignment:	Evil
Ethos:	Orderly
Cabal:	EMPIRE, the Empire
Age:	178
Hours:	97

Rather disappointed here. I had high hopes, but well... I guess you know. Liked the role, liked the rp. Not much else to say other than.. maybe do a couple key things different next time.

>Rather disappointed here. I had high hopes, but well... I
>guess you know. Liked the role, liked the rp. Not much else to
>say other than.. maybe do a couple key things different next
>time.


I'm not sure too many people will care about the deletion of this character, but I wanted to offer an explanation.

Essentially, I did not choose to delete, I was forced to. It was pointed out to me many times in game by other players that I was always with Zeteget and 98% of my levelling was with him and and a transmuter. At this point I have no reason to lie, so I will just say that it was not a pre-arranged group. It just so happened that Zeteget had similar play hours - evenings from 8-midnight cst. If he was around, I grouped with him...he was a pretty nice ranking buddy. We got to talking in game and decided to hold off on ranking unless we had a bloodoath transmuter with us who came on more and more rarely. (resulting in some unwated level sitting)

Well, after a night of Opoj bitching about how we were always together over the cabal channel and about 4 deaths right in a row, I decided to logoff. When I logged in next time I was in the realm of the dead, accused of perma-grouping (and to be completely fair, if you read help file, my constant grouping with Zeteget met the definition). The IMM who spoke with me took some time to hear me out, but had ultimately made his decision. I was transferred back to Galadon and told to delete.

It certainly is a shame to lose a great character, with a ton of interaction, and I don't blame anyone but myself. But I always thought of perma's as OOC groups, never thought that latching on to two players in game would come back to bite me like it did.

Enlilth is a great IMM, and truly the one aspect I am feeling badly about in losing this char.

Zeteget, seems we got ourselves screwed. Sorry about that.

Why you two decided to wait until you'd "got yourselves a bloodoathed transmuter" before ranking?

That could have been months!

Sorry, but it smells very fishy.

There was a transmuter already, we'd grouped with him several times before, and healer-warrior-transmuter was simply unparalleled ranking ease. I can only speak for myself: when you've got that available, going to another group (as I tried on multiple occasions) and struggling for hours without gaining a level (thanks to mob death -> experience hole) is completely unappealing.

I guess the next time I log on, I can look forward to finding myself in the Realm of the Dead. Fantastic. I think I'll just skip it, and get on my soapbox now: I've just now gone and read HELP PERMAGROUP, and yes, hanging out with the same guy every night -- even if you met him in the game, found that you have similar playtimes and are going for the same cabal -- is functionally a permagroup. But that really stinks. Developing an in-game relationship with someone, learning you can trust them not to get you killed, finding that the leveling is easy and the gold flows in quickly -- those things SHOULD lead you to want to spend more time with each other in the game. If that's an unfair advantage, then so is having cabalmates.

I believe you guys didn't do anything wrong. However, if you three DID know each other OOC and coordinated a permagroup, it would look pretty similar.

It's like that old saying, "wrong place at the wrong time". Got to take this on the chin and next time be extra cautious not to look suspicious. Like I said, I believe you guys, but a LOT of ppl made comments to me IC about how you two were stuck at the hip.

I'm aware that sometimes things like this happen, and situations like this can be indistinguishable from an OOC coordination. It's unfortunate, and I suppose I'm forced to acknowledge that the imms have no choice in the matter if they want to come down hard on unfair collusion. But this issue has been around FOREVER; to quote the Entropy Lich FAQ:


Q: Is it true that Entropy Lich knows Entropy Invoker in real life and they play in the same room together?
A: No. That is just ridiculous.

Q: How can they work so well together if they don't know each other?
A: Some people are just good at this game. Occasionally, random chance will put two of them together.


I'm no Zorszaul, and I've never been a PK terror. It just burns me to know that Thercic got effectively denied for a coincidence, and I'll get the same treatment if I choose to log in again. My next character's going to have to level up solo, or have different groupmates for every rank. Hey, it's like a meta-game! Makes things more challenging when not only is OOC permagrouping against the rules, but you also have to do brainwork and carefully plan your gaming to avoid the risk that you'll APPEAR to be part of an OOC permagroup!

Well, alright, it wouldn't actually take very much "brainwork." I'm being silly, but that's because I'm discouraged.

Still, this interpretation of the rule forces you to eschew advantages rather than seek them out, and that's counterintuitive in a game based on conflict.

Did you only level together, or did you do everything together, including pk, explore, etc? Also, did you rp while together, since an imm is likely to have snooped you and made the decision based on what he saw.

When I was with Thercic, typically we focused on leveling up and grabbing gold for donations. I ran around mostly avoiding PK situations by myself, as I was almost always outnumbered, and did a bit of exploring by myself. I'd always wanted to map out Organia, and on this character I did that.

To be honest, I didn't roleplay very much at all. Just hadn't gotten around to it yet. When I play non-empowerment characters, I don't feel much investment in them until I've gotten to quite a high level. I treat the low-to-mid ranks as a sort of dry run, because I know my tendency is to delete;delete more often than not when things start to go badly for me, and it sucks to throw away 3-4 chapters of a role and hours of roleplay when you've lost 5 con and accidentally practiced kick at level 23. Empowerment characters are obviously different, but with Zeteget I had just reached a point where I was starting to think of something interesting to do, some role to play, because it was clear that this character was here for good.

Now, that doesn't mean I don't talk to people, or that I sit around chatting about the NFL playoffs in-game. It just means I didn't write ten thousand words in a role, and I didn't spend half my time emoting about my red leather dancing pants.

Still, my tendency not to roleplay much prior to feeling an "investment" can't have helped our cause, so maybe it's me who should be apologizing. Seems like Thercic lost an awful lot of immteraction and roleplaying in this deal, whereas I only lost a couple dozen hours of weapons practice.

It's a nice story, but it doesn't check out.

Always curious to hear the story

You have to understand, there are ways that we can figure out things that we just can't tell you about. If we gave all of our ways of catching something, those who choose to act that way will continue to try to find new ways around the system. That, in turn, would require us to make new ways to catch things. Then that will take us away from the things we like to do for the game. Policing the game is just a necessity, not something we like to do.

And he works for The Carrion Fields, LLC, in tracking down permagroupers and griefers. His crazy-eyes are legend.

I'm a gentle soul.

>There was a transmuter already, we'd grouped with him several
>times before, and healer-warrior-transmuter was simply
>unparalleled ranking ease. I can only speak for myself: when
>you've got that available, going to another group (as I tried
>on multiple occasions) and struggling for hours without
>gaining a level (thanks to mob death -> experience hole) is
>completely unappealing.

I don't know, man. Healer + warrior + "warm body" is still a decent ranking group.

Everyone does it.

EVERYONE.

Because I'm taking it up the ass. And I hate to think it's because bitches are OOC'ing me out.

n/t

(We get it. You're the faux-bad-boy of your clique, and dammit, you're going to be Bitter Lite on the forums every chance you get.)

Actually, the reason this trio got caught (albeit later than I would have liked) is because they stand out as highly unusual.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

But dude, you're seriously crazy if you don't think
the greater portion of this playerbase permas. At
risk of getting this post deleted(since you've done
it before when I mentioned it) even your own immortals
perma. I know, I've perma'd with some of them. It
happens a lot more than you think, and while it may
not be everyone it is definitely the majority(pb, not
immortals).

But they don't 'perma-group'. They don't consistantly pk, cabal raid and rank with each other using OOC communication.

Often enough, people who do know who's playing who will be in another cabal killing their mate. That's the way a majority rolls. You want proof? Try the many, many private messages I got over the soloing-a-mage. I've handed out a lot of private tips about that. Does that sound like people who have a perma to you?

I personally have never known a character who hasn't given themselves away on the forums. I have also never purposely rolled a character with the intent of playing 'with a buddy'. I enjoy the freedom of anonymity and it enhances my game - both in roleplay and pk. Anyone who wants to seriously risk a character is doing just that when they pass their identity around.

Yhorian

> (We get it. You're the faux-bad-boy of your clique, and dammit, you're > going to be Bitter Lite on the forums every chance you get.)

Wow that is well put.

I do not hope my serious ranking problems is because he is right though.

And based on your posts I figure you are.

I can't think of any time where I've grouped with someone I know for more than literally 1% of character's life. If I know them, I don't group with them. It's not that hard.

Exceptions are if they are running around and you are both hunting them and have all ended up in the same area already. Might as well group and then summon kill, or chase/bash kill etc.

On one hand, Sunchuaen will be disappointed by your leaving because there's what, 3 divines? On the other hand, you and I were moving up the ladder at about the same speed, and and I got the feeling we were sort of completing for the top gun spot in our sect.

I have to say, I was a little jealous of you when I saw Enlilth go visible for the first time and realized you were his first empoweree. Pretty cool.

There goes 1/3 of our sect, heh.

Sorry it didn't work out.

I liked trying to kill you and your party when I was in the 30's. Didn't see you much after that except that time when the full moon appeared RIGHT when we charged. I hope that didn't ... ya know make you delete.

I hope this wasn't because of all the crap we went through the other night. I think you must have died three or four times, but... well, damn, we made it to 45 even in spite of all that, and 51 is within spitting distance. Was getting used to seeing you on every night, and it was nice to know I'd have somebody to level up with. C'est la vie... good luck with your next character.

nt