Thu Nov 17 03:21:00 2016

At 4 o'clock PM, Day of the Great Gods, 12th of the Month of the Long Shadows
on the Theran calendar Brondalorm perished, never to return.

1) CF still has amazing roleplayers and PKers. No one broke RP ever (though I had to quit out to keep it together a couple times), most people were relatively classy in all aspects, etc etc

2a) My goal was to get the playerbase excited about CF, and to try and break the "Team Evil" bandwagon that has existed the last 2 years +. Hence, posting a ton of logs and not quitting out when dealing with #### odds. I'd like to think I succeeded somewhat in that effort.

2b) Always been a proponent of not logging out when range is bad because it promotes fair-weather habits, not to mention it can become "a snowball rolling down the hill" affect. If you stay logged on who else might be like "#### self, I got one ally...let's see how this goes and stay logged on" and next thing you know that 7 on 1 became a 6 on 4 and you can accomplish things.

3) I was somewhat in-between jobs, so I put a ton of time in. Most of these 168 hours were in what, 17 days? Not my normal playstyle. Probably had more to do with the burnout than anything else to be honest.

4a) I don't feel like enough people challenge themselves. ####, I'm a great example of this. Roleplaying a dwarf warrior is pretty easy for me. I watch some Scottish films, I think "What if you were a foot shorter with a longer beard" and I try to act like a slightly racist hero That said, dwarf warrior has/is/will never be a power combo.

4b) Dwarf warriors are incredibly interesting to play, because the only thing they do well is take up damage and dish out damage (and the second one only if you gear correctly). I stand by my comment that they are a worse tank than an orc, because between elf/dwarf blood + slave, they have so many more options to regain health/tank. I don't know the solution, really. But 25 CON does not make up for the low int/wis/dex and relatively low str.

5) Edge point nerf makes sense in a vacuum, unfortunately I noticed a lot of my "peers" were relatively long-lived characters, so I felt a lot like I was dropped into a situation where I was already slightly behind the eight-ball. When you can only choose 3 edges and someone you're fighting has 13, you're always going to be fighting an uphill battle. Not sure what the solution is to that, because obviously you don't want to take something a character has already rightfully earned.

6) I feel like a lot of players take the path of least resistance, which makes sense but often leaves a sour taste in my mouth. That being said, I've always been the type to say "Do what makes you happy", so I don't know the solution to this problem.

7) I feel like lower player count numbers has allowed certain class/race/cabal combos to basically "have their run of the place", and I'm not sure what the solution is. To be honest, I've been beating the "Assassins are OP" drum for years. I played a lowbie one a while back and the thing that really shocked me was how many places they can hide. Basically all non-desert/non-water areas. I think that's their greatest attribute. Because choosing the terms of an engagement is probably the most powerful PK indicator IMHO. I disagree with other things, but I feel like that's the simplest solution, nerf their hiding ability in places like Mountains/Hills/etc.

8) I made a lot of PK mistakes due to not having a targetting system/aliases etc. I feel like I'm playing a different game when I misspell cranial etc, not that that is necessarily a bad thing. Technology is the future, I'm just a lazy dinosaur

9) End of the Age quest: Love the idea, love that Scarab gives a #### enough to quest mob/interact/etc, hated how it actually played out. That ring was straight #### The "coming end" meant that a seemingly coordinated login strategy by certain characters left me consistently outgunned and over-matched. It wasn't that they had odds, it was the fact they were decked to the #### synergistic classes that could cover 99% of the ways I had a chance against them. It becomes frustrating OOC to deal with that. I enjoy fighting 50/50 battles, I even get my adrenaline from 20/80 battles, but 1/99 are just brutal and soul-crushing to try and deal with. That's mostly on me though.

10a) Tried to spend 99% of my time "doing things" and I mostly succeeded, I believe I created a lot of "PK Chaos" simply by being on and banging my head on the brick wall as Ignolmeer said. However, I spent waaaaay too much time prepping/gathering gold and preps for my liking. It's the same complaint that ended my last 3 warrior deaththreads, that the never-ending prep/gold grind just gets old. On one hand, I don't need to do it (I don't), and on the other hand it raises a character's survivability and deathfulness considerable, so you'd be stupid NOT to do it.

10b) Lot of new stuff I did not know about that I discovered with this character (and I'm not just talking about learning how to get the mark, which I did too). Lot of characters willing to share IC CF knowledge. Of course, most of the time I was sharing something back, but still. That's a good sign.

11) Tried to gear up and "make time for" as many lowbies as I could. "Kids are the future" and all that. Bron liked to say "Kent expec' dem ter succeed if'n dey nah 'ave tha' right tools"...and I believe that. It doesn't necessarily mean the Fort Gear-Train needs to be in action at all times (you'd need numbers for that too heh), just means that hey, that mob you killed for gold might have something a lowbie pledge might need.

All in all, a very fun and very frustrating experience in the end. I likely would not have deleted had I just relaxed for a week or so, played shorter logins/less hours in the day, etc. But hell, I rolled the character to be a presence, so if I'm not going to be a presence what the #### am I doing and why I am playing?

And I'm sad to these this happen. Thanks for all that sweet gear, and I'll try and be that fort presence you wanted to badly to be.

Glad I was able to have met you... but seeing that you were lowbie and then hero within a couple of days, I figured you were the type to be a quick burst of excitement and then fizzle out.

Loved your logs. Hated how you died in a lot of them. Wish I could have helped more.

Hope you enjoyed.

It's always nice to have a well played inspirational drunken Scotsm... err, dwarf as an ally. I imagine you were good as an enemy too with all the fighting you got into, basically a great net positive for the whole game. Too bad it got so frustrating that you called it quits. But hopefully we'll see more characters like this from you in the future!

I liked your character and his stubborn dwarven determination in the face of adversity. Sometimes the wall of evil is too tough even for a dwarf. Despite that you still said, "hold my ale, I'm going put another crack in it." That to me was far more worthy of Maran than the 40+EPK'r who could won't muster more than a flimsy LFG via tell or Cabal.

I liked your logs as well, and I kept my opinion of the OOC comments/frustratuons out of the IC world. We all get frustrated by RNG and circumstances. My thoughts are that each character will be measured by their actions IC.

GLWYN when ever that is.

Also, thanks for those 2? talks we had, made me think that all my effort wasn't being ignored.

OOC bitches are just that, I never changed the way I played or my IC opinions/actions because of them (well, I kinda stopped trying to fight Venara when she had that ring, but yeah).

I find for me, personally, I probably shouldn't have posted some of the logs so quickly, as many of the bitter comments kinda "washed away" once I talked to a player or two OOC about stuff that was bothering me. That being said, current logs are the best, and I personally like when people comment in their logs because it gives you an idea what they were thinking at the time (which is always somewhat of a mystery unless you know the person OOC).

I feel like CF is best played when everyone is in a social mood. And talking about current CF helps with that.

Things are just starting to turn up for the fort. I wish you could have held out a bit longer. Sorry it got to you and GLWYN!

You definitely seemed to experience the same (Bad odds/#### luck) things I did, and seemed to take those things a lot better than I did.

I still can't believe I didn't find you more gear, but Fort Chars kinda have it slightly tougher than evils on that aspect.

A decent Storm Sword Maran can turn the tide in a lot of fights.

Keep at it, hope to see logs of you Phoenix Branding people soon

...promise broken.

Seriously, though what can I say, man? Awesome character. I get the frustration, but I would still have preferred you to stick it out. I think with a couple things that happened to me recently we could have been a force...maybe just died less fast but still. We're Fort, bro. It's what we do. Can't wait to see you in the fields with your next.

You were non-stop trying at all times, and I appreciate that more than you could ever know.

I totally went to Ysaloerye's shrine and tried to start #### because of IC events. I looked at you like a brother, a little brother specifically (because of your lack of beard, obviously hahaha), and Bron always wanted to make sure you got "back on your feet".

OOC, I felt terrible the times I was a #### group leader and led to you dying. OOC I felt terrible that you had a chosen an IMM that left the CF Pantheon, and were experiencing frustrations with non-empowerment and some other things. That being said, you're one of the reasons I played so much though haha. I'd have an hour or two of free time and be like "Man, I should log on just so Kleiran isn't getting ganged 5 to 1"

Keep doing good work, don't let yourself get frustrated and impulsive like me, and this will be a character people talk about for years. Great job.