I'll attempt to keep this short and to the point as to facilitate an actual conversation. I'll preface the below by stating that I have a particular bone to pick, so perhaps take it with a grain of salt.

TL;DR version: At the first sign of trouble, delete and remake your character - because that in the end will be more rewarding experience than actually roleplaying through a challenge.... because Roleplaying is Dead.

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At what point in your character progression, when you hit a halt in progression do you "give up" i.e., delete?

If the point of character development is to actually have forward movement and have a story behind the character, with more depth then, "I fight ______ because _______", there needs to be a struggle, internal, or otherwise. Something to make the character different. There has to be interaction.

Not that there is anything wrong with, mages burned my village, but if you really want a different experience, you have to do something a little more colorful.

What if that struggle is _never_ ending, and the character _never_ progresses. All stick, and no carrot as the saying goes. What if you are never acknowledged, and instead of progression, you get a game of pass the buck, or the run around, or a month (or over 100 playtime hours) of 0 response.

Would it just be better to NOT have a difficult character concept? Would it be better to just delete at the first sign of challenge?
If one hundred hours goes by in a characters life - which is a significant amount of time considering most characters don't make it beyond 300-400 - What is the point?

And if there is no point to that - then there is no point to roleplay. If there is no point in roleplaying, then what is the point of this game.

Specifically, I've been very disappointed with certain immortals, but it does not bode well for the game when for days and days, notes are not answers, emails aren't responded to, and literally 50 prayers are not answered. At some point, isn't there accountability from the other direction? Or is the answer, "screw you", because you CAN give that answer.

If the only response Immortals can give you is.. well.. now that you've bitched about it, I guess you should just delete...

Then why not do that at the start, and never make the character at all.

If I was an Imm I probably would have had 0 desire to respond to you. But I don't have any information other than what's in this thread so what do I know.

Daily notes/emails because you don't have an immediate response? Come on...

Personally I'm still thrilled everytime an Imm takes some of his time to interact with me, give me some xp, etc. Why? Because I NEVER expect any of it to happen until it actually happens.

From my perspective, it was not 4 days.

It was almost a month.

But, to be fair, I sent 2 IC notes and 1 OOC note, and 3 emails.

All of them were along the lines of.

"I've been looking for you, when would be a good time for us to meet."

Simple, and just looking to catchup.

Life happens and sometimes we (the staff) cannot be around at the drop of the hat to the whims of a player. I have made a few attempts to find your character and it just hasn't happened. What I can tell you is that acting as you have has removed the motivation that I did have to help your character progress. Sorry it didn't work out like you wanted, and good luck if you decide to keep playing.

But over 100 hours of trying to get this accomplished doesn't really seem like anyone is expecting things to happen "at the drop of a hat."

Also, the whole dealing with an Imm and then discovering that they can't help you and now you need to find another Imm sounds like when you get a super-sympathetic customer service rep on the phone and then find out that they just can't help you before transferring you up the ladder for more frustration.

Now, I'm a huge proponent of playing things out, but only if they're fun, and this doesn't sound like much fun to me.

Best of luck to all involved.

His "dealing with an imm" was actually dealing with a hero-imm. Most players, especially ones with a long history of CF are aware that hero-imms are not the same as other immortals.

But I don't think we're aware just how limited the powers are of these characters who are often the most visible immortal representatives of a given cabal.

Can they not induct?

Generally speaking, no hero-imms do not do any induction. Nor are they usually aware of most story arcs that characters are on or the goals that have been set up for them.

I can think of at least 5 characters of mine that were hero imm inducted. They definitely have the ability even if their duties are 'non rp in nature' once they imm.

Some may have it, but not all will.

Asking a heroimm to do something significant in your hero's life is like asking the guy you get on the phone when you call up consumer-level tech support to actually solve your problem. Ain't gonna happen.

All that was required of the HeroImm at the point we were at in the characters evolution and roleplay was induction. Heroimm's can certainly do that.

It was news to me that Heroimms can't read roles tho.

1) Sometimes we ask heroimms to cover for missing / absent leaders, but typically if there is mortal leadership then the heroimms don't do any inducting.

2) There's a difference between induction and re-induction after being removed from the cabal. In fact, a heroimm cannot induct someone into a cabal after they've been kicked the same a mortal leader cannot.

At the end of the day you needed Avderlain's assistance (I don't know if you knew that from the very beginning or not) and from the sound of it you weren't doing the best job of demonstrating that you deserved to be back (yet). But that's a conversation to save for the Battlefield.

No, I had no idea I would need to speak with Avderlain.

And sure, after this blew up, clearly any good reason will be shown in hindsight why something wasn't going to work out anyway. Always a good way to CYA.

I'm glad I at least attempted to have a civilized conversation about it. At the very least, I got closure on the issue.

nt

Probably why she came here in the first place. It was time to delete a hundred hours ago and for sure is now. Lol.

That the generally accepted response to stuff happening .. which is what I see as an opportunity for character development.. is to just delete the character.

That just sucks - and that isn't the CF I remember.

As I said below, if your response to my post was "well, now that you've bitched, you should delete", then RP is truly dead.

I never once said your name.
I never once took this OOC conversation/discussion INTO character. I've maintained boundaries between the two and attempted to have a rational, productive conversation/discussion.

You just did, and now you are taking your ball home with you too? That's great.


As for asking you to help my character progress... the character progressed fine. All that was required at the "end" was for the character to get inducted.

If you are saying that you can't be around at the drop of the hat to the whims of players - I totally accept that. Over the last month I find that completely unlikely, but I'm willing to take your word. However, some things are a little hard to swallow.

For instance. I wrote you a note - everyday. You could have, you know, sent one back? That's how most people communicate these days, right? I also sent you three emails. You don't get your emails? You couldn't write one back? Silence was better?

It could have been one sentence, like, "I heard your prayers, keep on your path."
or "I will try to meet you at the elven hour of blah, on the day of blah."

Instead, nothing. And after 100+ hours and now a month of nothing, I assume you could imagine that the frustration level would be insanely high. Especially after the character "evolved" successfully - all without your interaction to begin with. But with mortal, heroimm, and other imm interactions.

I'll let this 'sit' for a few days and see if we can pickup the threads. If that's not something you are interested in, lemme know.

A note everyday? Over the top. That suggests you put time into the game fast and expect something sorted in a matter of days.

The need for imm induct also suggests you either did something douchy or something that is meant to be very difficult and rare, then expected it to be made only somewhat difficult.

Also doing something different shouldn't entitle you to special treatment. It may attract some, but it may not.

You are welcome to feel frustrated, and I truly do understand. But what is happening here is that you tried to take a shortcut and it didn't work like you hoped. You keep saying 100 hours and a month, but for the first 28 days and 95 hours you were doing it wrong.

When you were told the proper channel to take, you hit it hard and fast. And when you didn't get an immediate response, you felt the need to take it OOC via note. I understood your frustration from the situation and was willing to look past it and still try to find you. The problem is your actual time on with your character turned into 5 mins here or 8 mins there... which basically made it impossible for me.

Two days after the note, four days after you started to pray, and a combined total of 13hrs logged into your character you start this thread. As I said previously, I am sorry things didn't work out how you hoped and good luck.

100 hours would definitely be demoralizing for any player, even if it's just bad luck in timing. 13 hours sounds like the player is being childish and impatient.

My last two fortress characters spent more than 200 hrs as an app. 13 hrs for induction is nothing.

He is saying 13 hours.. after the 95 hours. It's not 13 hours total. It's 108 hours total.

If so....wow....it's taken me 40 hours to even get in touch with an imm for empowerment before. EMPOWERMENT! A necessity of that class! #### happens dude. Calm down.

The first 28 days and 95 hours I was doing it wrong?

No, I did ONE thing wrong, early in the character (20 hours?). And it was a thing that I sort of expected. Not the killing part, but the fighting part.

I was interacting with a HeroIMM the entire time. When he said, in essence, you are ready, he said he would have to "get back to me" about the proper path.

Thus, HE didn't even know you were the "proper channel".

At that point, you are right, my logins became short BECAUSE I'd login to PRAY from work, and wherever, trying to catch you. I would even login from my cell to try and catch you. Obviously I can't login for long sometimes during the day, but I was trying to mesh with you.

I would still have my "long" sessions at night. So please don't try and paint a picture that I only logged in for 5 minutes at a time - that's just not true. Since the HeroIMM told me to find you, I still put on an additional 13 hours or so.

Just by what you said, 13 hours cannot possibly consist of "5-8 minutes".


ONE thing is for certain through this mess.

A certain HEROIMM needs a promotion.

"The first 28 days and 95 hours you were doing it wrong."

That is the window of time after you had completed your transgression and were trying to fix it. During that window of you, you were in fact doing it wrong by trying to have a heroimm fix the problem when they could not. That is what I meant by you trying to take a shortcut and it not working.

At this point, because you insist on continuing with these OOC tirades and such, I will just save us both the trouble. I am not going to help you so stop praying and either enjoy the character as they are or delete. Good luck either way.

Tirade? Mischaracterize much? This was started as a discussion.

You were the first one to out the character, and the first one to bring this IC.

As for not helping me, I already knew that from the tone and mischaracterization of your first post. Quite alright, thanks for getting back to me either way.

Good luck to you too.

TL/DR: Don't expect your problems will be solved in a reasonable time or ever, no matter how hard you RP and no matter how much positive reinforcement you receive. If you don't like that, roll something simple with a cookie-cutter role and just have fun.

I recently had a character that had gone over 300 hours without resolving the conflict or achieving the goals he set out to do, or even coming anywhere close to it. That was despite multiple positive Immteractions from several imms. And it's not like it was asking the impossible. Was a rather simple thing without any additional coding or really much of imm effort.

I had another character who had gone ~150sh hours without finding his specific imm to present the results of the quest previously given by that imm. I.e. the work was done, but there was no talk or even a word for ~150 hours until deletion (due to other reasons).

I have had characters who clearly stood out (both RP and PK) being completely under the radar and overlooked for any immteraction, promotion, acknowledgement, last name, titles, imm xp, role xp, you name it. Then suddenly on a freshly rolled char I get all of the above despite him being much less of a standout, or a relative nobody at all. I think it comes down to timing and luck. Think of it in weather terms. Can you control when it rains? No. Can you move to a sunnier location and hope it doesn't? Yes. Can it still rain there for a week? Yes.
Hope for the best and expect nothing much is my current motto.

Learn not to feel bitter about things like that. I think I did with time.

I had an IMM come vis and send me a tell that they liked what I had just done. Finally, all the pieces come together! I did something cool, an IMM saw it, the IMM was impressed!

IMMxp: none

I liked the kudos and attention, but really want me some IMMxp, too!!

... is to play CF to have fun and not to seek validation from other players or immortals. If you have a role that is fun for you, then play it. If the character is not going the way you planned it to go or you are unsatisfied with the mechanics, or whatever, then you have two choices: 1) push through and make your character evolve, or 2) delete and try something else.

I think that if you go into a character expecting attention, you will end up more disappointed than not.

First,

Thank you for your response. I truly appreciate it.

Second,

The role is fun, and the character was going in a great RP direction. However, herein is the problem:

1) As part of that roleplay, I was working with an IMM towards the goal of the character. I can't go into specifics due to the fact all characters are still active.

2) Over the course of 3 weeks, and about 70-80 hours of playtime, I was led to believe that my characters roleplay would lead to the desired outcome. This roleplay "evolved" the character as you suggested. This evolving occurred over several weeks, and stemmed from interactions with a dozen other characters.

3) Then upon the end of week 3, I was told by the IMM that:
a. He couldn't read my role entries
b. He couldn't actually resolve the conflict
c. He was told that I had to now go and seek out ANOTHER IMM.

4) Now I'm 100 hours into a character, completely stalled, and getting ZERO feedback from the IMM that I was TOLD to go see. I wasn't expecting anything from this IMM, I was told to see that IMM to resolve the conflict in the character.


So, I did exactly as you stated. I did your option (1).

At this point, the only way to revitalize the character, and actually DO what the character has been roleplaying to do for its entire life, depends on the interaction with that IMM.

That's the problem. The character did do your option (1) - which was evolve. However, the character evolved, and the IMM that had the power to allow the character to bloom has been completely unresponsive to over 50 prayers, emails and notes for a meeting over the course of about 5 days.

At some point it just becomes painful to invest MORE time into a character that after 100 hours has gone exactly nowhere.

All I've learned from this entire experience is at the first sign of trouble. DELETE. I could have had a completely separate character in the exact position this one was in, without the headache, three times over. What's WORSE, is that the NEW character would build upon the OLD character, but the building wasn't done by the NEW character. Thus - there is NO character development! What is the point then!

This makes me sad, because if that is true, and it seems thus far that it is, - then Roleplaying is Dead.

Can you at least see the other side of the coin?

From this side of the room it looks like you got a lot going for this character and should keep on trucking. I don't think that as a rule if this stuff frustrates you then don't make goals that require specific imm powers to realize. Emote is your friend.

Here's the thing: The Imms have real lives too, and these things ebb and flow.

I've played out a few age-death characters with complex Immteractions and have been lucky enough to--very rarely-- be involved with in-depth customized global quests and whatnot. It doesn't happens when you expect (or think it should) and you have to be patient for things to play out.

100 hours isn't that much for CF, that's when things just start to get interesting in my experience. If not closer to 200-300 hours or even more, that's when you really begin to stand out.

It can easily take several weeks for things to develop. And it might be a month before your next Immteraction. Don't go crazy and harass them, just roll with it and spend your time working on your rp, pk, and exploring. The Imm stuff should be a bonus, not an expectation. Pray every hour or two (i.e., don't be a crazy stalker) and then go about your business. If you're lucky something cool is in motion and it will come around in due time.

I'll go out on a limb and guess you were Altrana? If so, then I can maybe provide some perspective I wasn't able to communicate in-game.

So no.

Doh! I'll shut up then.