Especially concerning turning good this seems to be highly looked down upon. I understand that it should be an exception and a rare occurrence but should the person really have to deal with 200 hours of avid ####? What really burns me is that fire giant who turned good it took what? 40 hours? There has been an orc that just turned neutral why? Cause he wanted to. All I want is criteria, consistency, and a GOOD reason why it is looked down upon.

It was actually shockingly smooth, but it helped that it was something that had been developing through interactions with his Imm (Eshval), and both made sense from the sense of align, druidism, and his w-elf sense of neutrality. Admittedly, he was a very messed up w-elf, but it all meshed together and he was by no means a murder druid because he was evil.

I think the biggest two aspects are for it to make sense ICly, PARTICULARLY when you're dealing with an alignment restricted race. Why is this character, who by his very nature (insert race-determined-alignment), suddenly having this shift in perspective that 99.99% of his race never does? Secondly, don't complain when one day you've got betrayer vuln and missing key class abilities. Continue what your character's about, and it goes pretty well. I was utterly shocked when I got 95% of my powers back in 3days RL and 6hrs of gametime.

My characters develop on their own, over a period of time. Whatever direction they end up going in is VERY seldom a predetermined thing. His role took him in a direction that eventually and gradually led to his being turned Neutral. Had it not been for all the buggyness with his Chieftainship and the align, I would have stuck it out even with the downsides, and probably gotten rewarded down the line for doing so.

Alas.

His attempted align change wasn't something I had planned on happening at all. It was something that just sort of happened out of RP as he grew as a character. I would've stuck it out, even with Anathema, and some goodies still going after me cause I still had the red aura, but my laptop had died. I was really looking forward to how it all played out. I think it's all just more of a matter of how you look at it.

I mean, if you're into a character, screw possible temporary downside to align change, if it's in his character to do so, and it happens, have fun with it. I was.

Roll neutral healer

Hour 0:
role + This character will have an epihany at hour 200 and seek to become good-algined

Hour 25:
role + Now that I'm empowered by a god whose religion can accept neutrals and evils, time to join Nexus because that's what's best for the people of Thera

Hour 100:
role + I'm so awesome they voted me leader, also I got a tattoo

Hour 150:
Role + hmm, I'm starting to wonder if neutrality is the best thing for Thera

Hour 200:
role + OMG I was wrong I've been spending my life all wrong, I'd better spend every waking moment trying to do 100% maximum good all the time more than a paladin would, wear no gear and give all my gold to charity. Also I feel bad about it and anxious about my choice.

Hour 250:
role + Phew, I felt a lot of anxiety but I'm really happy that I've got a gold aura now

Than playing one that is neutral and limiting yourself.

Or playing an evil elf is often times a lot better than playing a drow for swiftstrike and 25 int with no real restriction on your pk.


It comes down to ethos/align are often times detterents or balance features for the desires race/class combo.

I'm sure playing an evil wood-elf warrior with a bonus of the ignite cabal power might seem appealing with all your edged out abilities. But no one else is going to think you are being very fair.


Most people get to play their character for a while with no penalty since they are still neutral. So they don't have a vuln to good and cannot reasonably be attacked by good without justification they are waiting for the imms to hammer down on you.

I don't see how this isn't understood by you. The problem seems to come when someone feels like they shouldn't have been align changed and they weren't trying to do it. Which is a problem, because it shows a fundamental lack of understanding of Help Alignment.

All I have to say about align change and acceptance is: Lochzan

If you can't accept that you will have to play some amount of time with a new vulnerability and the loss of some skills and spells, then you aren't ready to roleplay a character through alignment change.

Alignment changes often indicate someone is playing their role poorly, and often powergaming or satisfying OOC grudges/goals at the expense of the integrity of the character. These sort of align changes can be accompanied with deletions and forum tantrums. This is viewed poorly.

Example: a murder gnome who deletes immediately after he loses his class skills.


Sometimes align changes mean someone has a really interesting and cool concept and is willing to roleplay it out.

Example: an orc chief who believes the preservation of the orc clan requires moving forward into neutrality and getting orcs accepted by civilization. He gets his face eaten in a bunch of times but keeps trucking with a consistent well played character.

This is usually viewed favorably OOCly, but ICl'y many chars on will regard the align changed character as a betrayer and act appropriately.

I should of made this more clear. I wish they were more consistent with how they handled this. There shouldn't EVER be someone who can change just cause they wanted to or someone who gets a full change their skills back within 50 hours while others don't get theirs for 100 or more. I get that there should be bad effects but people have to understand that it makes you a target for powergamers and the douches of the game. So what your looking at is 100-200 hours of dealing with the worst people who play this game trying to take advantage of your weakened character.

The weakened character doesn't bother me, the fact that many people might hate me IC doesn't bother me, and how long it takes doesn't really bother me too much but what does is the fact that people get to almost instantly AND well I have a hard time not letting the douches of the game get to me.

There are generally two instances in which a character will experience an alignment change.

1. They're roleplaying a character seeking redemption or moving towards darkness and they're planning on shifting alignment at some point.

2. They're doing a bad job of roleplaying their alignment, but don't realize it. They're not expecting an alignment shift.

(I know you know this, by the way.)

The reason sometimes people are un-betrayered in 50 hours and sometimes in 150 hours comes down to their ability to RP it out. The vast majority of people in the first camp don't mind the drawbacks because they were expecting them. These people are almost always interested in RPing it out because that was their entire plan for the character. They can probably get un-betrayered in 50 hours.

The people in the second camp are being punished. Not surprisingly, they often are not interested in RPing it out. Frequently they delete. Most of them rail against the punishment and can't redeem themselves for more than a hundred hours.

There are exceptions, of course, but I think that this is generally how it goes down.

How does the RP difference equal almost a 100 hour difference?

The people who are going for "redemption" (by which I refer to acceptance of a new alignment, not necessarily only good) are much more inclined to seek out appropriate gods, go on quests, talk to cabal leaders, and do what needs to get done, as opposed to some guy who got turned evil for killing too many goodies and thinks he didn't do anything wrong. These people probably spend a good number of hours trying to get their alignment shifted back, rather than rolling with the new status.

Kudos to anyone who doesn't delete when faced with becoming a betrayer, but I feel like it's really possible for almost anyone to get un-betrayered in 50 or so hours if they're accepting of what the change means and how they should play it out.

Granted, this isn't always the case and sometimes, no matter what you do, you can't catch up with the IMMs you need to, and that sucks.

How come some people get a tattoo very young and some don't? It is essentially the same question. The simple and straightforward answer is they are seen by the immortals more.

Having said that, it goes back to that old saying which is something like "If a man lays ten-thousand bricks then he is a Mason, but let him screw one goat and he is a goat f***cker his entire life". Person b who took 100 hrs may have let an imm see that one time when he was trying to get align back that he really shouldn't have and it cost him an extra 50 hrs.

Maybe one day I'll do better or maybe I'll get lucky who knows.

One how long it takes, it probably depends largely on who you are working it with and how strong your justifications are. If you are working it through an Imm that plays once a week and likes to watch a lot, it will take longer than if you go through someone who is around everyday.

As far as people taking advatange, if your char is supposed to be hated IC for betraying, why wouldn't they take advantage, and if you are a evil or neutral gunning for good, why wouldn't evil characters hate you likely even more than goodies who were born that way?

I am sure you know what I mean. I'm not talking about 90% of the player base I'm talking about that minority that treats people like dirt normally.

Like Oshui repeatedly going after the neutral orc that was still nerfed? Got it.