Tue Feb 21 10:31:22 2012

At 7 o'clock AM, Day of the Bull, 22nd of the Month of the Winter Wolf
on the Theran calendar Jolfyr perished, never to return.

I'll take one more stab at explaining this for you and/or anyone else's future benefit and if you get something out of it, great, if you don't we'll agree to disagree.

There's a segment of actions you can take that aren't necessarily bad roleplay for your character, but can get you in trouble with your cabal. Breaking Imperial Law is a classic example of this. Ganging someone you really shouldn't as a Battle berserker. Choosing allegiance to something other than a pure execution of the Law as a Tribunal in order to flag someone you shouldn't or not-flag someone you should. Etc.

Working with Empire as a Scion or Scion app is in this category. I mean, hell, your character is evil. There may be every RP reason for him to team up with Empire. He may do this and not get caught, or he may do this and be able to lie about what happened or justify it and get away with it.

But, like the would-be Battle app who walks a mage groupmate to a locked room and starts bashing, you always kind of know, probably even in-character, that you're taking a calculated risk. You're doing something that your chosen cabal, if they had all the facts, would not approve of. You pay your money, as the saying goes, and you take your chances.

And this goes for everyone who talks to me as an applicant. I say this because you were probably the biggest offender of all these things:

1: If you try to give me the "I've been a scion before" cheat code, I'm much less likely to be interested in you.

2: Rindros hates arrogance and presumption. He worked hard for his position/reputation, and if you pretend you don't have to, you'll only get scorn.

3: As I've said before, I'm significantly less interested in pk ability than your rp, and if you only try to impress me via pk, you shouldn't expect much.


Rindros doesn't much care if you've traveled with imperials before, but having known that since the Advisor mentioned it during one of the times we talked about you, you would likely be given a task related to them. However, you simply were not interesting to either of us, though the Advisor said something that I can no longer recall specifically that kept the door open, rather than having me ignore you.

Also I think it is ironic that Rindros the mortal Chancellor doesn't care about something that the Immortal patron Reksah said was a disqualifying event.

Im done in this thread.

But Danntruso had no reason to suspect you at all, so I was not about to turn down haste/spiderhands/fly/etc from what Danntruso's dumb ass thought was just a random drow transmuter. In my CF experience I've seen many many scion apps lie to other cabals before while either learning and/or raiding and I noticed they still got into Scion. However, there could have been contributing factors that I wasn't aware of. Also, there was just a little bit of palling around that maybe a Scion leader or Imm would not have liked. Oh well, Danntruso saw you as an ally at the time, and would have continued as such until the day he saw a nightwalker tailing you... Heh. GLWYN and take care.

>In my CF experience I've seen many many scion apps
>lie to other cabals before while either learning and/or
>raiding and I noticed they still got into Scion.

Thanks for giving me some reinforcement that I am not crazy as to the past. I think its pretty obvious a dark-elf transmuter who is not Outlander has only one cabal option right now. I enjoyed my interactions with both you and Yarglen a lot. You guys have a lot of balls. Wish there was a way it could have all worked out but yet again I find myself far too frustrated as a player. I need to step away from cabals and probably CF for a bit to cool off.

Looks like Battlefield 3 for a bit for me.

Four cabals rather!

I'm sad to see you go. For what it's worth, I tried looking for you a couple of times to group but our times/intentions did not always match up. I liked your RP - I'm a sucker for suave evils - and wish I could help you more. GLWYN.

Quite frankly I suspect this will be my last caballed character ever. Jolfyr is deleted because the RP has no place to go that doesn't involve me as a player being already more frustrated than I am. There is already enough frustration fighting the 10 maran or the 10 villagers or the 10 outlanders every day who gang me.

I was unaware Scion policy for applicants had been updated since I had my last Scions. Had I been aware of this nuance, obviously I would have played the character differently. After 120 hours I got an echo that Reksah had rejected my pledge, and a follow up snarky tell that he didn't want my pledge to interfere with taking orders from Imperials.

I probably saw or travelled with scions or apps four times? It wasn't for lack of effort. There simply aren't any. I rp'ed by myself and travelled by myself mostly, tried to fight by myself, but CF is a game, and after all that solo play you want to fight someone and that day there were about 7 villagers on and 4 Imperials.

After all that time mostly rping by myself in the dark, of course I'm going to raid and at least try and have some fun, especially when I had no indication doing so would waste all the effort I had put into the character's RP. CF is supposed to be fun. If I can't see the light at the end of the tunnel after 120 hours, then I think the staff needs to ask itself what you think is a reasonable time commitment for a character on a text based game.

I had a detailed role, which I tried to always maintain, and I don't think I ever broke role. I sent notes to cabal, numerous tells, offers of help etc etc. Lied to any I came across that Jolfyr was a Tribunal app because really I had enough enemies already. Remember, even Mharlndarn, the most successful pk drow transmuter ever, was 2-3 in PK pre-hero and had rage deleted once before he heroed.

Last note for Reksah would be that as irony would have it, my barrier rod was on a Scion mob. I am curious if you would have rejected my application once you saw me killing a Scion mob for a barrier wand.

It seems pretty standard practice to me that you wouldn't group with, level with, or help people who take your cabal's item get theirs back. This has come up repeatedly and I know in my opinion, it's not ok.

Or Outlander, or Fortress. Because conceivably every one of those cabals could raid any of the other ones and yet they all still group together.

So do Nexus/Empire. They were in the raid with me at the time so pardon me if I think that argument is completely invalid.

It doesn't really matter in the end. Opinion means nothing, there is only that you the staff believe it to not be acceptable and I was unaware of said policy.

I was unknowingly doomed from the beginning of my character by engaging in behavior that previously was acceptable and now is not, even though there isn't a single mention of this in the helpfiles for the cabal or anywhere else.

If Scion has a treaty with Empire, an alliance is fine. But no such thing exists. Fortress never takes Outlanders item, or vice versa except maybe in an extreme situation and even those are pretty dicey. Scion, when they can, will always take Empire's item and vice versa. I again believe it is not a policy, it is standard cabal politics.

If you were an evil or neutral battle app or inductee would you get levels with Empire and help them get their item back from Outlander? Run down eastern road to give them patches if you were a defender? I don't think so. Why should Scion be different? I do not understand this perception that Scion is different and that these general rules don't apply.

In Jolfyr's life I was in a group with an Imperial, a follower of Scarab and me. That Imperial has immortal rewards, and the Scarab as well. Why is my character the only one who receives a negative repercussion for who I group with in this story? It seems to me that the rules are being subjectively applied.

Nexus raided Battle with Empire yesterday. Per Imperial ####ing law Nexus item should be in the Empire at all times! So Empire is absolutely at war with Nexus! So in a raid full of caballed people who by your theory are enemies, no one got even a slap on the wrist for who they were with, only the Scion applicant, who wasn't even in a ####ing cabal yet. ####, me the applicant never even got word 1 about Scion in 120 hours! The entire situation just seems so subjective and yet again I am on the #### end of that subjectivity while it seems that other players yet again get the benefit of subjectivity in almost identical situations.

This situation in CF regarding cabal allegiances/enemies, and especially this argument specifically regarding who can and can't group together as applicants is just making me even more frustrated and I need to step away.

Dude, don't be deliberately obtuse. You aren't empire and you aren't scarab so, you know, you're not judged by empire or scarab standards. You're judged by scion standards. Just because someone in a different cabal can do something doesn't mean you can. What they may or may not do has nothing to do with what you may or may not do, and nobody in the whole world thinks scions have ever believed they should help the empire under anything but extraordinary circumstances. You were stupid this time. Now you know better. Make another and do it right.

>I was unknowingly doomed from the beginning of my character by
>engaging in behavior that previously was acceptable and now is
>not, even though there isn't a single mention of this in the
>helpfiles for the cabal or anywhere else.

Uh, when was it acceptable?

As long as both Empire and Scion have existed concurrently Scions and Scion apps have gotten busted for helping Empire out. I'm 100% positive of this.

The only part of that that's flucuated depending on who's running the show is the degree to which you might be able to make a case for "I'm getting a much better deal out of our arrangement than they are" and get away with it. Empire healer and empire arial sword who don't know you're a Scion are helping your sad double-water shifter level? Sometimes you could sell that to the Scion imms and get away with it, but you always knew that you were taking a calculated risk and there was a chance it would cost you more than it was worth. Even still you might have had to figure out a way to betray and kill them to salvage your spot in Scion.

There's almost no way to successfully make this case when helping Empire get their item back (unless you're also getting Scion's back in the process, maybe) and I've seen a good dozen people make that exact mistake and pay for it over the last decade.

So, yeah it sucks to be on the business end of that, but you're incorrect that it's something new. It's as old as it possibly can be.

>The only part of that that's flucuated depending on who's
>running the show is the degree to which you might be
>able to make a case for "I'm getting a much better deal out of
>our arrangement than they are" and get away with it.

Pity I didn't even get a chance to explain myself before I got the echo that my pledge had been rejected. I assumed the fact that I was Sphere Concealment and had it in role that Jolfyr was lying to others until I got my place would explain his intentions adequately. I was obviously incorrect.

>but you always knew that you were taking a calculated
>risk and there was a chance it would cost you more than it was
>worth. Even still you might have had to figure out a way to
>betray and kill them to salvage your spot in Scion.

I'm 120 hours into a support character and I haven't even heroed because I've been pretty particular with who I grouped with in addition to the fact there are a ridiculous amount of enemies for Scions right now. Its a shame that in that time I couldn't even get a response to my note to cabal or any RP from Scions at all other than Zynzyn asking for help with his lich quest. Meanwhile I am on every day and ready to help the cabal which absolutely never has its item. So yes maybe it is my fault that I got bored after all this time without a word from Scion and said #### it Ill go raid Battle.

>There's almost no way to successfully make this case when
>helping Empire get their item back (unless you're also getting
>Scion's back in the process, maybe) and I've seen a good dozen
>people make that exact mistake and pay for it over the last
>decade.

I didn't even realize at the time Empire didn't have their item. They asked for spells to raid with, not for help retrieving. I went with them in hopes of killing some Battle. There was an orc with us, a gang of Nexus, a bunch of Empire, against a bunch of Battle. What happens in the end is one guy, Scion applicant, now can't join the cabal because of who he grouped with but everyone else is welcome to ####ing group with me and let alone everyone else? You can see how it seems like that, and as a player how that seems to be complete ####?

>So, yeah it sucks to be on the business end of that, but
>you're incorrect that it's something new. It's as old as it
>possibly can be.

Ill admit it is obvious I am/was incorrect. I'll again state that it seems lame that the only person in this whole story who is punished for who they group with is the Scion applicant and not any of the caballed characters in question who grouped with me.

>
>Ill admit it is obvious I am/was incorrect. I'll again state
>that it seems lame that the only person in this whole story
>who is punished for who they group with is the Scion applicant
>and not any of the caballed characters in question who grouped
>with me.

Your would be cabal has an "unwritten rule" about grouping with Empire and/or helping Empire.

Empire and Nexus have no similar rules that it sounds like your groupmates could have broken, at least not knowingly. One could argue the Empire guy could have been focusing more on taking the key, but then again it's a lot easier to play the "I'm only using them" card in Empire than it is in Scion.

PS: I've always felt like the whole sphere concealment "use my enemies for my own purposes until I don't need them anymore" Scion approach is kind of a cop out. I'm not a Scion IMM, but if I were, I'd want to see someone really shine if they took this approach so as to prove to me they're not just trying to take a handicap.

I understand Jolfyr is done responding here (and that is fine) but I'm going to follow up for clarification for others reading the thread regarding Scion.

He did retrieve Scion's item in the process of being grouped with Empire, which was the reason I didn't interfere during it. While not something I would encourage an applicant to do, as Daevryn said, at least a case can be made for a legitimate benefit to your own cabal while aiding your enemies. For style points, you could have killed one of them after you got the Scepter back or something. Continuing to stay grouped with them and go gang people down/explore areas is not acceptable.

Helpfiles don't need to be updated for something that should be common sense. During the past few years that I've been in charge of Scion I have never seen an applicant or member "use" Empire for their own advantage in a way that impressed me. While it's usually not something I'll disqualify an otherwise good pledge for (indeed, Jolfyr could have still gotten inducted either by myself or a mortal leader), it is also something that is easy for me to check for and won't be considered a feather in your cap.

gr

Sometimes it feels like much longer than that. Most of the leaders have been fairly long lived so it seems shorter at times too.

NT

I saw you with Krunk, you had struck for the Scepter before (not killing, but just weakening the giant), then I saw you grouped/hasting/spelling up the Imperials, I thought it was just to help get the Scepter back, then you kept grouping with them after they gathered the Head... that is when I knew something was up.

I know characters have done this in the past, where they group with Imperials, only to become Scions later, but I honestly can't recall anything of them doing it at hero range. Most of them did it at low levels, then concocted some crazy scheme and either killed a few of them, or led them all into death.

That being said, take a break, I think it would be helpful if you played in a cabal that isn't so difficult to exist in.

Good luck.