Wow. I just saw a couple posts on the other forum that talked about the powers that the old Master cabal had, and they are way off base.

Original Master powers:

Transform - doubled current max hp. This lead to chars who would have full "HP suits" that they would carry around in a backpack (limited items could go in containers). When transform wore off, they would do the "transform dance" where they'd pull out all their +HP gear and put it on, cast transform, then put their normal gear. Often Masters at hero-ish levels would have upward of 2000 hp with transform up, many quite higher. Transform was NOT an offensive spell in any way.

Mana transfer - syntax was c 'mana transfer' otherMaster. You'd grant them an amount of mana (I think it was level based, don't remember specifically) and do a certain amount of damage to yourself. Transform had that one tick where you had double your max hp when it wore off, so often when that happened, Masters would shoot a bunch of mana to their fellow Masters because the damage wouldn't matter once the tick happened.

Mental knife - much the same as it is now, generally cast by the Archmage in the Scion cabal.

Demon summon - Demons were not servitor-type mobs like nightwalkers are now. They were basically just a charmed mob that was at the caster's level. I believe they would throw fireballs and bash. They could be ordered, so o all rescue, o all get all corpse, etc.

Scourge of the Violet Spider - Area spell that was fireball, blind, poison...and it seems to me one other spell. Weaken maybe? Very badass spell that Twist WAYYY underutilized.

Master powers that came later:

Transform - was changed not to work in conjunction with barrier, and only to double the characters natural max hp, not with EQ. Also having transform hurt your skill learning capability (Your mind clouds as your health increases.)

To compensate (a bit) for that, two new powers were added:

Brew: Use an item that was type trash, furniture, or plant (I think?) and brew a potion. Three types (I think? Maybe only two). Silver potions generally did some sort of area spell at high level, gold potions were generally benediction-types (haste, sanc). If there was a third type I do not remember what it was.

Tome: Create a tome that increased your learning capabilities (I believe it exactly offset the decrease from having Transform up, and of course if you didn't have transform up it was a boost). Worked much like the tomes that can currently be purchased in the Consortium.


There's your history lesson for the day, kids!

I specifically remember being able to use transform one of two ways.

1. You could cast transform without a target, and get the 100% hp boost. I seem to remember this doing something to the wilds in the room if cast this way as well.

2. You could choose a target to cast transform on. You got 75% of the hp boost, and a small amount of damage reduction. The target you cast it on ate some pretty big damage too. DEVASTATE at least.

Anyone else remember this? Or am I crazy? All I used to play when I started CF were masters and ragers, and I am pretty sure transform could be used on a target.

You're remembering the second version of transform which came in several years later.

It was a good couple years before I had a character over 20, I sorta just dabbled in computer labs for most of my high school cfing, never took it seriously until like my senior year.

I knew there was some sort of transform offense spell, but #### after so many years I can hardly remember which came when and how. I do remember the old bloodthirst was awesome though. Just awesome :)

Pretty sure brew was one of the original powers... I used it a lot, but most people didn't, since potions were so easy to come by.

I stopped playing before tome or barrier were added to the game.

I think it was built on a codebase which was a rip-off of a much older version of CF which then developed in a different way, given some discussion on dio's. One reason I found CF playable when I first began, there were all sorts of echoes of things I was familiar with. And Emerald Forest. (The countless hours powerlevelling there have paid off in CF since I know all the camoed ranger locations by heart)

You're correct.

Random history: my very first character on CF (which was terrible) was inducted into Master by the character Vilhazarog was playing at the time.

n/t

Transform: +25% max hp (I know this had gotten toned down over the course of that mud's history - there was deathblow there too which was +20% damage on hits that it fired on)

Mental knife, scourge (of the violet spider), summoned demons all included. Even the brew skill, with the same gold/silver potion deal. But no tomes.

The original Mordwen was a leader I had in that cabal which had been re-themed so that the mages were aspiring to godhood - making them more offensive to the battlerager analog, whose coherent reason for magic hating was that it was power 'stolen' from the gods (ragers there accepted cleric members and being communed on, since priests asked permission. If that sounds OP, remember the significantly toned down deathblow, and resist was taken out entirely.). That shaped CF Mordwen's roleplay. I'm still bummed that she con died just as it was taking off.

I wish it was still around. Great cabal location, too.

I'd like to see Maran split from Acolytes, and Acolytes + Warlock be a cabal.

you big goober

Well not right now, and not when I made that post. But in general.

Every character currently logged in = Twist now.

Way to go.