Thu May 21 16:48:58 2020

At 4 o'clock AM, Day of Thunder, 3rd of the Month of the Ancient Darkness
on the Theran calendar Eybaen perished, never to return.

This post may or may not be long, but here goes.

First let me start off by saying I knew this would be a hard character to play and that everything I sought to do would be a challenge. I expected no less. I totally agree with how the redemption arc should follow going to Neutral first and then finally good. I perhaps would have liked to become Neutral at the 140 - 150 hour range instead of 180ish (I think that is right?). Since I took Late Bloomer (to reflect my time as an Imperial Shadow) that left my character with 350ish hours before Age Death (based on most humans was my guess). So waiting so long for the alignment change gave me a sort of dread of possibly not being good for long before I would kick the bucket (as a story however that would have been so poetic to obtain full salvation and die shortly after).

I also had a hard time figuring out exactly what was expected of me. I tried to play Eybaen as person who grew and changed, early I was vengeful, full of rage and seeking to make sure the Empire felt my wrath, but as he grew older and saw the world as it was, he would grow more compassionate, more understanding, more empathetic to the struggles of everyday people. I really hope I was able to show this change through my RP.

Next, which is something I really want to touch on with the Immortals. While I can sit down and agree on what GOOD really should be, what it should really reflect, and how it should conduct itself, I still keep in mind this is a game. When I killed the Darien Captain (he's neutral) for gear I got a finger wag. Sure, all in all, that was not a good action, but basically losing the ability to fight neutral mobs really put a restriction on the character that I felt was too harsh. CF was not designed and has not been changed via areas/mobs to restrict good players from killing neutral mobs for gear. There has to be some suspense of RP for the sake of Game Play. I was pretty much left with only being able to kill Evil mobs for gear and a lot of their gear is Evil Aura. So I was in a big bind, especially since I was uncaballed leaving me with little options for gear and exploration in some cases. I think it is bad for the game when everyone has to be held to Paladin statures (and a lot of that is in the Fort too).

I've always been a proponent for free roleplay. There has to be a point where force roleplay perspective and restrictive definitions have to take a back seat to see where a player is going to go with their character and their take on a particular alignment/ethos. For the most part, if they aren't driving a different direction, its ok to let them grey a little for the sake of fun and gameplay.

Not getting into Outlander: Man, this was pretty rough and I understand some of it. First, I was asked to learn about Thar-Eris. I did IC (though I already knew a bunch and RPed out to give other players a chance to share their thoughts). Next I had to get five recommendations. This seemed hard as folks weren't willing to speak with me for a long while. Hell, I don't even know if I got five. Then I had to get my wilderness time up (it was really good until I had to pretty much solo my 40's in a civilized area). This was were I thought I was stuck. I spent a lot of time just chilling in the wilds doing nothing to get this up. I did not realize, Ergush was waiting on me to become Good aligned. Had I known that, I would be less frustrated especially since I had Outlander murder monkeys (this is the term I coined for non-rping reavers who just want cheap PKs and delete under 50 hours) trying to or killing me (one death came from being attacked as soon as I had disengaged the Warmaster...). I would love to have gotten into Outlander, especially as an Orderly character. Never worried about the powers (all you PGamers crying go Chaotic for Windwalk).

Then there was all the Imperials who quit playing because things got tough. I lost a lot of fun dodging players, fighting Imperials, dying and killing them. Kudos to you folks who stuck it out (Angaph, Deklast, Vantiglia, and Inaj). Also, I think I was attacked in town twice, despite Imperial Law over riding Trib Law. I think in fact I attacked Imperials more so in town, even got flagged once. But losing a whole set of enemies from band wagon jumpers sucked, but it was it is.

The other cabals. There seemed to be a lot of confusion on who I was, what I was about, who were my allies. This confusion really helped me keep daggers out of my back. Tribunal believed/knew I was with Outlander so was unsure if they should warrant me when I came to help retrieve the fetish, especially since I would defend against them in Promisy.

Scions and Empire generally thought I was going Fortress, though I think Narra was even trying to perhaps gain me as a Scion ally, and I know at least one Scion(or at least candiate) saw me as an ally to fight the Empire so never fought me. My "defending" of the Fortress wasn't so much defending it as striking against the Empire. I would even solo raid the Empire to get the Codex and depending on who was on would give it to Outlander or Fortress.

Fortress for a long time did not trust me. Some would attack me despite me telling them I was seeking redemption. Some even told me they shouldn't bother with me because everyone fails. Well, the reason people fail is often lack of support, especially from a group that should be seeking to redeem evil first and slaughter it second. Even Shokai once told me the Marans sought to redeem the darkness through prayer first, then fire second. So I would like to say, Fortress players who go there just to a murderer in a gold aura, you are missing a whole avenue of RP.

All in all though, I really enjoyed the character. I got slammed with a ton of hours for work before I deleted as we were taking measures to get the restaurant I work at prepared for reopening to the public, coupled with my house flooding my hot water eater going kuplutz, not having hot water for a week, and getting all that straight just caused me to lose my vibe. I really wanted to Age Die, especially since it would probably been 350ish hours, but not having a cabal to interact with makes it really hard.

On a final note, I just want to thank everyone, Imms and Morts who made Eybaen fun.

Beroxxus

I have to be honest, I had many doubts in Eybaen at the
initial stage, but subsequently I tell myself that this guy
may really, truly want to do a redemption role. Which is when
I started to believe. So that is how well done the RP of the
character was being carried out. 

An excellent job, pity it was deleted before the highlight
happen. GLWYN.

I’ll start by saying sorry. I heard that you had defected and kept trying to catch you for a chat but just didn’t line up all that well. Having been a part of a few different cabal switching in the past, I wanted to help facilitate yours but rl happened and I just lost time to devote to the character. I’m glad you had some fun but sorry I wasn’t around to help you pull it off.

Rock something else soon.

I really liked Eybaen, and I am very sorry that you lost steam toward the end. For what it is worth, I think you already had the five recommendations, and I was expecting to see you inducted a long time ago. I think it would have been even a better story to have Eybaen inducted as a Reaver and then become a Sentinel and then a Warden. But I also don't have the slightest idea what is the 'standard' on how alignment and cabal changes are done up in Immland.

Our play times didn't mesh as frequently as I had liked, but I just want to put it out there that I would have inducted you long before if it was up to the mortal leadership. Maybe another imm was running your alignment change and so several people had to align and this is where the long waiting comes from? I don't know.

In a game world where we all play characters with largely predetermined character destinations, conversion/redemption arcs should be hard, sure, but they should be hard for the average player and doable for the veteran RPers. Characters like this give a richness to the world that would be a shame if it was lost. It provides for a vector of RP where preaching cabal dogma actually has an effect, and it is not just the kill all enemies approach.

Thank you for Eybaen. I hope you roll something as interesting again soon.

Was hoping you'd age die. I've done the align change route several times. It is always rough as hell. Hopefully you get everything sorted out and come back.

I would like to say you were well RPed and were fun to give a hard time to. Beyond that I just have a personal distaste for the love redeeming all arc. I hate it in books and I hate it in game...but that is my own personal bias.

PS. The Fortress is almost always a hive mind which is incredibly lame (it wasn't always this way). Since you and Chetush are gone. It was Chetush OOC trying to say I was powergaming fighting you. The Fortress should have conflict between acolytes and maran. There just isn't anymore. It's mostly just acolytes and acolrans. This has put Fortress as my second least favorite cabal next to Empire.

GLWYN

I was the only one who wagged a finger here. It was because we had a talk, and Einoh saw himself as trying to help you in your path. To redeem yourself requires extreme care and concern for each act you do.

But after we talked, you killed that captain instead. Other imms could be more kin to that, but if Einoh is patron to your conversion then that isn't going to be seen in a good light.

I'm so, so disappointed to see Eybaen go. This was one of my favorite active characters even though we had only interacted from afar for a lot of the beginning.

C expected the worst from you(we talked about it), which is why she took so long to warm up to you. But as time progressed, player and character both really started pulling for you. Towards the end, we had a really cool thing going on and starting to grow.

For IC reasons I'll leave alone, we would have ended up best friends.

Anyway, awesome job. I love an outside the box character.

GLWYN

And mostly left you alone since you were uncaballed and going for redemption. I have deep respect for hard char arcs and rooted for you to succeed. Too bad it didn't happen. Glwyn!

Generally liked what I saw, you're a madman for aiming for that alignment change - but someone has to try it! Folks seemed to enjoy interacting with you, so that's a big thumbs up in my book .

From Apex: " Oi! I liked Eybaen. Too bad, I was cheering for him."
From ForsoothAnon: "Oh I liked Eybaen. Did he ever get full redemption?"
From CaseyJ: "great work with Eybaen, always struck me as someone who roleplays WITH people not AT people. plus too many people just go for the power combos, i love it when people walk the hard road"
From Xyfa: "Eybaen seemed cool from what I saw."
From Ergush: "sorry for not being more attentive on the Outlander thing. I really wanted to see the redemption arc before bringing eybaen in to the tree. I was ready to start an induct quest for you the moment you became good. GLWYN"
From Jento: "Well Done Eybaen! Sorry to see you go."
From Amora: "Great job"
From HC-Omo: "Eybaen is a classic, well done and pity he is gone now"


Always good to preserve some of the good vibes!

-Ish

f

and another did everything right and got aftermath
"You was cool! Sorry bla-bla-bla"

Align changes are not meant to be like flipping a switch, or everyone would do one. It takes time, including at least several hours of playing at a severe disadvantage, to accomplish. If the player is dedicated and the character is high quality, it'll happen. If not, it won't. I'm ok with that.

Eybaen was high quality and was on track to get a complete align change. He made it from evil to neutral, and then he deleted shortly thereafter. I would have loved to see him succeed, but I won't know for certain why he didn't stick it out until I hear from him. Whatever the case, congrats on a well roleplayed character!