Thu May 3 19:17:49 2012

At 3 o'clock PM, Day of Freedom, 25th of the Month of the Frost Giant
on the Theran calendar Caitlyan perished, never to return.

# of logouts without their cabal item 0


A+, sir, A+

That darn incarnadine wave messed my world up. Whenever we started a fight I could actually manage to land a couple good chomps, but then that wave would stack up so much I couldnt land a thing, then it involved me turning into komodo and just trying to pester you. Maybe if you would not have been able to cure all my plagues I might have had a chance, but I knew it was very slim. I think at one point after fighting you with komodo for so long the maladictations from the legacy actually had my affects like two and a half pages long with 0 hit and no dexterity to speak of.

Was literally not much I could do against your build with my forms no matter what I tried, didn't stop me from trying when I was feeling feisty, but generally Im off in some back woods somewhere doinking around so I managed to avoid you a lot of the time.

Good show though you were a true thorn in my clawed footsies.

Well I hated and loved you, I always felt like you had the high ground and one mistake by me and WAM. But you obviously kickass so I'm glad I could have at the very least annoyed you. There were times near the end where you seemed upset I didn't come and defend but really it takes me a minute to prep and you torn through inners with the commander in amazing speed. You were fun to and our banter was fun.

...but dude you had 4 Nexuns and it was just me and Salyeris raiding. And after you guys came at us one-at-a-time-Bruce-Lee-villain-style and fled, you went to hit the giant instead.

Which, sure, good tactics, but you don't think Caitlyan isn't going to call you a coward on that, do you?

Well, that was a fun run. Caitlyan was your prototype arial mace/dagger RBW, but I've never played that build. I've done the dwarfy-tank-with-your-face one, and of course the giant sword one, but never this one, so I thought I'd give it a shot.

My lack of experience with the build definitely showed early on, when I even got some tips from good ol' Jerrokrar (I can't remember which incarnation though, sorry) on what each of the hurl types did exactly. So thanks for that.

Before the goodbyes, I'm curious to my ol' pal Borkahd as to what he thought was shady of me. If you are referring to me killing Trib mages at the Tree, cry me a river. I tried killing Outlander mages whenever I saw them too, including trying to cranial Riethen at the Executioner (stupid malleability). I killed a hell of a lot more Trib mages than Outlander mages, but that's due to the skillsets of the cabals, not my hunting choices.

Imms:

Fjarn, thanks a bunch for the tattoo and for making me DM after Salyeris sent her note. You've got a cool religion going. I didn't pray/visit your shrine as religiously as I have with other gods, but that was more the RP of this char.

Odrallag, sorry I never got you that skull.

Thror, thanks for the immteraction as Hildebran and the cabal edge.

Enemies:

Those that post I'll try to comment directly on. These are more general goodbyes.

Nexus - most of you were pretty cool. Whenever you're exact-opposite-cabal with someone, it's tough over the course of 300+ hours to not start "hating that guy" but I tried not to.

Scion - again mostly pretty cool. Usually harder to kill than run-of-the-mill mages, but that's how it's supposed to be, right?

Mages in general - if you were a mage and I had you in range, I was almost always going to go after you. Up until about 3 weeks ago I *generally* avoided attacking in town if I knew you could just run away, but toward the end I was almost always WANTED anyways so...


Allies:

Liralindalum you were kind of interesting to talk to. Funny how Whiysdan interpreted my note as an endorsement when I specifically said you DON'T inspire me, but I guess it worked out for you.

Vozmuir you probably saved me a couple deaths when I died and eeevils were at the Village and I mentioned it to you so they had to worry about you and couldn't finish taking the Head before I could unghost. We had a good relationship.

There are others I'm sure but I'm needing to wrap this up.


Battle:

Salyeris thanks for the induct and all the grouping. I knew I had 3 deaths left when you took me aside for the talk about trying not to die. #### that. Your quest to get in was a bit daunting. Especially when I FINALLY finished it and you're like "Ok that was the first part." Gah!
However you ended up being Caitlyan's biggest fan, apparently largely because of that. It was awesome when the two of us would group, we could take down tons of foes generally. The raid of the two of us against 4 Nexuns who had just ganged each of us separately was pretty epic in comparison to many of the outlandish things some of my chars have done.
You're doing a great job as a Commander, generally taking the same tack on things as I did with Woldrun, which is why I said when we first talked that it was going to be a pleasure serving under you.

Hrue, thanks for the sendoff. Hopefully my drillmaster-ish-ness wasn't annoying. I tried to keep it tempered because I know that I personally don't really dig when someone tries to tell me how to run my own char. Keep trucking.

Djetmai, the ingredients I showed you are more powerful than the ones you are using. I didn't really know how to convey that to you IC when I showed them to you, but yeah. They'll work better. Esp. if you mix them together. It was fun grouping with you because you *generally* kept yourself safe enough that I didn't worry about taking you with if I was getting into semi-balls-out mode.

Xazzax I'm sorry if me getting DM crapped in your cereal. I found you quite well RP'd as a sarcastic dark-elf who thought (knew) he was better than everyone else. Others complained to me about your attitude, but most of them are long gone now. Good luck going forward.

I'm going to stop here because I've tried 4 or 5 times to write this and keep getting interrupted, so I'm sorry to those I didn't mention specifically. I especially didn't shout-out to many enemies, but almost all of you were class acts all the way.

*bowarial*

I'm glad you enjoyed our limited interactions. I enjoyed watching you and I'm glad you were able to explore your fate a little before you kicked the bucket. Caitlyan was everywhere all the time, it was fascinating to watch you in action.

This was a big surprise - not that you'd con died, I could see that coming - but that it was Twist behind the character. Kudos...and I can't wait to see some logs

I could tell you were going to be a badass from the first time I saw you in action. I was thrilled (and not surprised at all) to see you as Drillmistress. Running around with you and Salyeris was an inside glimpse into the masters in action, which was tons of fun to be a part of.

From everything I saw, you were a seriously aggressive hunter, always scouring the land for enemies and regularly going up against the odds. I could tell you were having a lot of fun with this one. Had I known you were this close to the end I would have tried to tag along with you even more often!

Thanks for the tips...and sorry for the occasional blunders on my part, (especially knifing knock-out Ghafler that time--doh!).

You will definitely be missed.

I as a player would prefer not to be such a gang whore, but man o man does this build take a certain amount of patience and finesse I lack. There was basically nothing I could do to you in a one v one fight.

You were a fantastic rager, as always. And I hope to see another great incarnation from you soon. Hopefully one of these days I will actually be on your side Twist, I HATE fighting your chars.

Oh come on, you know you hated me. I made things hard sometimes, and at least your character seemed to detest me for it sometimes. I was more scared of you than any character since Lohakhan. That should say something. Maces blow as a gnome healer, whether I have sanc or not. Well done on the character, great job.

But that didn't mean that I hated you ooc.

Other than the fact that you stopped showing steadily, you're a great Nexun and very competent healer, which makes any cabal way more tough, generally.

I had a ton of fun playing next to you. I enjoyed exploring the ship and the raids. I could tell you were pretty dangerous. I posted that log where you and I killed Cersee and Arigan without the head and then took it back on Dios. If you didn't see it I can repost it here. I just remember you saying to me that that battle was one of the best moments you had up to that point. It was part of the reason I did that painting of it as it was one of my favorite moments.

The way that ended up working out was definitely a high point. You were great to run with - fun and competent.

Definitely enjoyed our interactions. That note you sent was really cool and was more than sufficient for that one measly skull. I'm just sorry you never got a custom drinking chalice out of it. It'll be nice once I finish this area and am able to do more imm stuff and actually watch players and things like that, because I think you would have been fun to watch. As for now, as I've been reminded by a certain imm who shall remain nameless, "All I see are sentences you could be typing in notepad." So, back to area work for this guy. GLWYN and see you in the fields!

Actually it was jumping on people right after they were done fighting someone else and half dead. Maybe I just saw Cait at a few of her 'not the best' moments, it happens when adrenalin is pumping I guess. Sure it was annoying but I'm not sure why you would think I would comment about you hunting mages at the tree; go where you can find them.

Based on the 'cry me a river' comment, I'm sure my clarification won't go over very well even though it wasn't what you had assumed.

-----------------
"My view of Borkahd IC"
If you anger him, he'll rape you to death, eat your flesh, and sew your skin into his clothing. And if you're very, very lucky, he'll do it in that order. ~Twist

...at least not on purpose. If I jumped on someone who was half dead from fighting someone else, it was only ever on purpose if it had been someone who was outnumbered - i.e. if Dijur and Drident were at the Tree fighting Liralindalum, I'd go ahead and hit Drident even if he was hurt because it was a 2 v 1.

But I definitely have a log here somewhere of Cait's first mage PK, jumping on a 15% hp Mazikohl after watching him get slowly whittled down for several ticks in an extended fight vs svirf thief (also a rager app).

It was lame on my part, but the bottom line was I'd been chasing after that AP for quite a while but he kept going invis each time he saw me enter the area so once the thief engaged (but then had fled, seemingly for good) I decided to finish him.

I sorta worked it into the roleplay a bit, actually, and once I found out that the thief wasn't running I offered him my life as forfeit.

I was always curios why a guy would be inclined to play a female rOle. What prompted you to make that decision and how did you try to work femininity to your active role play?

But seriously, I play a female from time to time, usually depending on whether the role I've thought up fits a woman or a man better.

In this case, Caitlyan was (loosely) based on the character Machiko from the book Steel Rain (set in the ShadowRun universe).

Much of the impetus for what she believed in (honor, hating magic, embracing your destiny) stemmed from things in her early life in ways that just wouldn't really make sense for a male character (you can read the role if someone buys the PBF if you're really that interested, but I doubt anyone is. )

I do have to admit there is also one powergame-y advantage to playing female instead of male, especially as a Nexun/BattleRager, but it certainly isn't the sort of thing that would make the decision of male v. female for me.

And what is this advantage?

with magical items that are pretty good for shifting the Veil that you don't want to go try to kill as a male PC.

>>Liralindalum you were kind of interesting to talk to. Funny how >>Whiysdan interpreted my note as an endorsement when I specifically >>said you DON'T inspire me, but I guess it worked out for you.

Your wording about inspiration coming from within at the end
of your note probably is why. Even to me it sounds like you
were IC saying no one can inspire you but you were giving me
the nod. You brutish village folk, ya never know! I interpreted
it the same way. Thanks for writing back! FWIW, even if you didn't count, I had more than what was needed, but thanks a bunch for participating!

Liralindalum sure liked you, and Thirteen toasts for saying bye
on your way out bird lady!

Sorry to get so excited over your death, but you always seemed to be online during my prime play times. And when you were on, it was hard to enjoy Gup because I knew you would be raiding and I felt so useless against you.

I've got some logs of those raids i can post up later if you like. Otherwise a cool and very, very tough char. Glwym.

Also, any advice on what I could have done in those fights? Apart from get more +str. Even +26 wasnt enough as I found out during our last fight at the Galadon healer!

Carry two lightweight axes and a practice polearm.

When you get str-lossed enough that you can't wield and you aren't a HTH spec, you're screwed and need to run, unless you can switch to something you can wield even with 3 str. You can test that sort of thing via the pendants that I'm sure you know about, so there's no reason you can't have a couple spare weapons around.

Granted they'll almost surely be the sort of weapons that won't do much damage, but in a situation like at the Island, if you could have just kept me from being able to switch to you while fighting the inners, you'd have forced me to withdraw if nothing else.

I enter, you pincer, I spend 2 rounds fighting the inners getting disrupted/slowed/softened/decalcified/etc. while you're taking little or no damage. I switch to you and you take a round of damage and then you (try to) flee. Return, rinse, repeat.

Of course, as Salyeris just said yesterday, theoretical battles are always won.

I had seen you in action from the lower levels, I was hoping to get more chances at you. You were ballsy, and weren't afraid of any fights. You picked hard targets too, and mixed it up with the toughest mages just fine so I was pretty sure you saw a drow necro and said Oh ####, easy target. I could tell by the way crimson was landing your con was dangerously low, and pushed on that advantage in our fight. I think I wasted 3 black rods that spree of raids. You were tough as #### for sure. I'm not really a huge fan of people unghosting on the inners to get another shot at you after you just killed them, but I would have probably tried to finish me off too. No way you were getting a fair fight from me though. I mean come on, Drow necromancer is squishy


Come back to the dark side. The light doesn't want you.

Great job!

You were one of the truly dangerous villagers for a shifter or any mage to fight. I was impressed with how consistently you would throw yourself againt bad odds.

Damn, I went too easy on Twist, I should have demanded all mage types instead of just five different ones The induction quest was supposed to be daunting, and it really was supposed to be a personalized quest that would help the char in the long run. I thought about mandating a few specific items for the last part, but I think you had suffered enough at that point. And yes, because you did that route to get inducted you made a noticeable impression on her, so Salyeris became a personal chederleader for you in all things.

I never actually expect people to attempt that induction route anymore though since Battle is not as full as it was at the time. I don't offer it unless I really see a lot of potential in a person and I think they can actually achieve it, which usually means I think it's a fairly experienced player. I try to be harder on people who seem like veterans only because I think they might enjoy the challenge more where as a newer player might just get frustrated and give up. I feel like when people really have to work for something like induction, they are far more likely to stick out the character than just up and delete in 2 weeks.

Glad it worked out with Caitlyan and I didn't make you delete. If it was daunting to you, I'm not surprised nobody else I gave it to ever completed it to get a hut.

And yes, skilled berserker + village bard = good times, unless you're a mage in an enemy cabal.

Never had you pegged as an IMM character, but I thought you were a good guy, and worthy of DM.

Anyways, I'm glad some of you IMM's are still having fun with the game, playing morts, and kicking ass.

Keep up the good work.

It was fun traveling with you, too. Unfortunately the last few times we were logged in together, you lost a fair amount of gear to another minotaur. Two or three times, you were clearly frustrated (with good reason) and quit out (to avoid rage delete?) and moments later I'd end up getting him and not knowing which eq to grab back for you.

Great char, keep it up.

Really bittersweet on this one... I felt like I knew you as good as I did any of the nexuns lately. I really liked fighting you for the most part even though I knew going in my chances of winning were slim to none. Hated seeing you on when i would log in I knew the fight was on from there, and I would most likely be without the key for most of it. Fearless honorable & mean pretty much the perfect villager to me well done. GLWYN

Really respected you, especially with what happened the most recent time we interacted.

You were Twist? And I could defeat you in the arena all those times? I think I should reconsider my abilities!

I guess you were right... nearly though

I could never figure out a way to kill you, I think I only even managed to make you run off once, and even then you killed me when I finally found you again. You were relentless in your hunt, every time I saw you on I knew you were coming for me and tried to be as ready as possible. It was never enough. I seemed to really piss you off that I would fly away, but there is no way I am going to stick around when I you have a few scratches and I am gushing blood. As always a class act though.

PS: I was a bit annoyed you jumped in when I almost had killed Salyeris in the Spire, I was starting to think "I might get one of them!!" and then, nope. Don't get me wrong, I know why you did and was ok with it, I was just annoyed I did not get to atleast kill one of you!

Salyeris wasn't even going to come in the Spire when it was just you and me, but then Agekeh came and it was 2 v. 2, so she came in.

As for flying away, no it didn't piss me off at all, it was expected. But when I watched you fighting Salyeris outside the Chasm and was honorbound not to attack you, everyone and their dog knew you weren't going to succeed, so that's why I said "Isn't it about time for you to fly away now?"

I greatly admired (and still do) your willingness to go up against poor odds. Keep up the good work.

I REALLY wanted to revert and say "Ok, since you asked so nicely!" And then send myself home, but I can not type fast enough and knew I would just die. So I settled for just nodding.

Great character! I didn't have a clue as usual.

I found your fights to be highly entertaining, especially your scraps against the Orcs that were embittered BattleRager enemies. Another outstanding character T.

Especially one played by Twist. We had some awesome fights before I passed. I think you just came into range a few days before I died.

Ok Twist... either I don't mud enough... or you do way too much...

So far with this single character...

I was interviewed by your Acolyte Shifter,

I interviewed your Acolyte Paladin applicant,

I traveled with your Maran Thief,

I fought with your Outlander Fire Warrior,

and managed to survive your Drillmistress...

All class acts! Keep pumping them out, its good for the game!

You were really a horrible match-up for me in a solo-fight. If I were to pick the worst match-up for any type of shifter besides a lich it would be Arial Dagger/Mace Berserker with Incarnadine. So many ways for you to mess up everything that I could do.

It was really satisfying to get that kill on you near the Island after you absolutely rocked my world those two other times. I know you were hurt and wounded from the Inners, that was the whole purpose of me waiting until you were mid-way through a raid to come. I knew that was likely my only chance of killing you solo.

Then when you came and killed me AFK afterwards it kinda sucked, but those are the breaks when you play the game as casual as I tend to these days. I hope you know I only posted that log because I told you "My mind was gone" or something like that and you said something along the lines of "I had no way of knowing". I just wanted you to see that I was AFK and not some jake who was making excuses.

You got me after that incident I think once more when I had ABS and everything else up and I basically said to myself that I wasn't going to fight you solo until you were hurt.

And now, you're dead. As someone who has played a lot of villagers, you did a really good job. You should be proud of this effort.

When I said "I had no way of knowing", it wasn't me doubting you. I was trying to convey, IC, the following:

"Dude if you dropped link, you should know that the MUD didn't see it that way and you were still active."

Because that happens sometimes, and it sucks, and when I come back from dropping link to find myself dead sometimes I wonder what happened.

As for the log, it did seem like you snipped out some stuff to maybe make me look a little bad - specifically the fact that you and I were conversing right up to the point that I hit the outer (silently) and then suddenly you were afk.

I totally don't doubt it (in fact when I missed the first cranial and you didn't do anything, I briefly wondered), but there are so many things that could have been happening there - lag from zapping yourself, you typo-ing flee to fele, etc.

Anyways yeah the build was pretty perfect for fighting (most) shapeshifters. Lion with ABS and Despoil was rough since the direct damage just from rake would whittle me down even if it wasn't touching me with much else.

Good luck once you're back from your absence.

You were one of the 3 toughest fights for me currently. I am very curious to your build, as sometimes I seemed to have your number, and then the next day, you'd rape my face.

Good work on kicking ass, we didn't get to RP much, just a few briefer banterings which all seemed perfectly IC to me.

GLWYN

..water/offense seems to be working pretty well for you.

As for the build, it was kind of hit and miss.

I envisioned having such a dex disparity with everyone I fought that I'd be getting 6 attacks per round all the time. I also assumed (as others seem to think) that Incarnadine would give me unblockable hits. Tack both of those together and I envisioned getting a deathblow (that landed) every round at least or something equally sick.

However, it wasn't like that. First off, I learned about 50 hours post-hero that Incarnadine doesn't give you unblockable hits. Those are hits that would have landed normally, and then there's a chance that Incarnadine will fire on them. That's why you never see an Incarnadine shot getting parried/dodged/blocked in any way - if you parry an attack, the check for Incarnadine just doesn't happen.

Also Whirlwind very, very often added an extra attack (or two) against things like hamstrung cabal outers. It sometimes added attacks against PC's, but not nearly to the degree that it was obvious against mobs.

I liken it to an offense shifter, actually - when you're fighting a mob you're hitting it like ALLTHEDAMNTIME then you start fighting a PC and half your stuff is getting parried/dodged/distanced/spun and you're like WTFBBQROFLCOPTER!?

Still it was a good build, and I'll definitely be doing something that has cranial again at some point.

... since it's basically great against people who won't parry/dodge and have low dex.

And it certainly exaplains why I got hit by more than the double amount of DBs than against any other RBW.

Your build worked better than you're giving yourself credit for.

I think whirlwind + bloodthirst is like hitting nitro in the fast and the furious. There isn't much that can stand up to that. I miss it!

It's a shame to lose such a fine warrior, though at the same time, Xong sighs a breath of relief... Caitlyan is one of the toughest foe Xong faced and Xong had to retailored his build at hero ranks because of you! even though we are not the best of friends, Xong always appreciate a good fight... so glwyn, and woo to the village who lost its right hand man.. or woman to be exact.

...totally made me more cautious when going at you. Until that point it'd been all about keeping you from fleeing, but after that I really had to make sure I'd maledicted you as much as possible before going to the lagging moves.

Keep up the good work.

I told you what I thought of Caitlyan IC, and I maintain it, you were quite exceptional among most of the Battleragers I've seen. Maybe I had a soft spot for her because of how you earned your hut, but racking up that many kills as an applicant was impressive, and I knew you would end up being a strong force for the Village- which of course you were.

Caitlyan was a great ally to have, and a good Drillmaster. I saw that you tried to teach and help the others without coming across as overly harsh/critical of them when they screwed up, and you certainly had the ability to lead by example in terms of killing mages and fighting the enemies. If you'd asked any enemy who they would rather fight if they had to, Salyeris or Caitlyan, I'd wager 9.9 out of 10 would say Salyeris just because of how much tougher you were than me.

Village certainly took a hit losing you, and I have to say IC Salyeris is not going to be happy at all, since I really hoped that you would actually take Commander when I die.

Oh, and Krunk is clearly nuts, I'll just leave it at that.

...but just to reiterate I think you're doing a great job as Commander.

Akedeh Mark 2 sucked almost as much as the original. Not fun to fight, doubly so when you started using your leader weapon has mainhand dagger wield.

Pretty classy as a foe, and I enjoyed most of our banter, though I'm not sure how good a "Drillmaster" you were, but then I don't get to see what happens inside the village. I'd say you will be missed, but honestly, Krunk's life is just that much easier for your being gone.

Well done, standard plug for Clan, etc.

Orcs are OP!

Nevermind the fact that the orc *I* played pretty much sucked.

You're amazing, keep on trucking brotha.

From : Hrue
To : battle
Subject: Ode to the Drillmistress


Her wings stir no more the winds of war
To deserved rest her soul doth soar
The lads and lasses raise their glasses in respect
For she took her last breath
takin an accursed magi with her into death!

Though we all may be saddened by her passin
Let us not forget that war is ever pressing
So put down them glasses and raise yer weapons
And kill them nexun dogs so THEY remember her passin!

Hrue Ironhill
Little Drummer Dwarf



I'm a poet and just don't know it.

Heh.



Was great running with you. Wish I had been of more assistance in that fight, I feel bad about being a defender and unable to keep you alive a little bit longer. Anyways hope you had fun with this character, looked like you were and you sure were a good fighter. Dont think I ever got a chance to face you in the arena though. Oh well. GLWYN

...but I just wanted to say don't worry too much about not keeping me alive - I was generally always fighting so you couldn't bandage, and most of what did damage to me was direct attacks like pincer, so even doubleblock wouldn't have helped.