Tue Jul 20 12:15:27 2004

At 1 o'clock PM, Day of the Sun, 27th of the Month of the Shadows
on the Theran calendar Brordaran perished, never to return.

This was one of the very few characters I did not take any time to practice. I wanted to see how the new practice/skill improvement system worked with a low int race. I don't think even once did I go out and work on weapons or defenses or sups or anything. Not even word of recall.

Having done that, I'll say that I disagree with the general staff position that things will go up and you'll be all set. I noticed significant failure rates with a lot of the sups and skills, and they didn't go up unless they were really regularly used, i.e. flank, angel's wing, wrath, etc.

I'm not saying it's worse now, but I don't think it's quite as rosy as some have said. I did die a few times because of things failing, and while that's just how things are, I am not sure this way is significantly better than the old. Just my .02 as they say.

I have said as much to one (or two) wizi-imms but it bears repeating, and as I am evidently no longer welcome on Dios, I will post it here.

I did not intend to post the information complained about in my logs. I didn't read them, they were intended to just be 30 or so logs of entire sessions, and I frankly didn't consider that there might be secret stuff in them. I apologize for the mistake.

Luckily, my new character is quite young and I won't have new logs for a while so no need to fear....

Is just that. You'll be allowed back in a few days. Any questions, then simply email one of us.

I did that, using the link on the page for dioxide. No response. I don't have any of you other people's addresses, though it doesn't really matter. It's absurd. Don't feel obligated to reply.

Because we've corresponded something like 10 emails of you arguing over something trite with me. Whether you deleted those replies or not sure beats me. I'll see about having you unbanned by now, since it has been a while.


dallevian@yahoo.com

Sorry to see you go. I didn't get to interact too much with you, but you were definitly memorable. Hope you enjoy your next.

-Yeth

Thanks. I felt badly during that retrieval where you died, before you were part of the fortress. You were always ready to join a scrap and I had a lot of respect for that.

To answer what I’m sure many of you wondered, I thought of this character as....

Roy Rogers. Think singing cowboy. With a big fat hammer or sword to beat the crap outta people. A good hearted nice guy who does what needs to be done but always likes to make sure people are smiling around him. That’s what I was thinking when I rolled him up. I liked the role, I actually agree with a lot of what I had this character say insofar as the role of a goodly person and what “the Light” would want of its crusaders. As usual I came up with a few hooks to the character so that I would have touchstones to keep me in role and in the character’s frame of mind. For this guy it was the cowboy talk and the love of chocolate. And thanks, Elstratuviel, I did indeed read the note you sent on my behalf a few days before I deleted, and several people came and gave me chocolate things. It was great. I also was grateful to everyone for letting me call them “little fella” or “little lady” or “missy”, especially people senior to me like Vahletharien and Celebrimbor and Audriel and, of course, calling gods ‘big fella” and the like. (Except you, Khaso, of course. That was a very enjoyable interaction. I wish there was more of it, all the time. What makes playing special and most enjoyable.) I also watched a few old westerns to get a few good words like reckon and heap and “mighty” this or “awful” that and a few other tidbits. I hope it at least created an atmosphere for anyone I was interacting with.

As for the songs, I did both originals and covers. I tried to change those covers where suitable to make it more Theran, i.e. changing names to Thera city names or people, items like blue suede shoes to blue dragonscale shoes, etc. I hope people enjoyed that, I know I did. I especially liked when people would jump on my roleplaying bandwagon and start humming along or singing with me. Thanks for that to each of you who did.

I did most of what I wanted with Brordaran. I wanted to try out all those cool virtues that I’ve fought against; to be that two virtued maran paladin that people always complain about. To be a real force and try and kick a lot of ass while being true to the code and roleplay well. And, I wanted to try out Arvam’s religion more seriously than I had before, and get his tat. AT the end though I hadn’t heard from Arvam in several weeks, despite praying pretty much every day, sending notes, going to the shrine, etc., so after a while I figured he just didn’t want to interact with me anymore. Unfortunately, from his post here I guess that was not the case, but after the three or four weeks without any response to the notes or prays it was losing interest for me, and a priest class character needs some immteraction, at least I think so. Not a criticism of you, Arvam, just unfortunate how it worked out. Given your comment below I’d like to think you would have tat’d Bror next time you saw him. If not, c’est la vie.

So what happens? The first virtue I get is the one virtue I’ve had before, Faith. And then after a while I get that second virtue... Hope. Now don’t get me wrong, they are both very useful and both can be powerful in certain situations, but of course I had been hoping for two of the three real fighting virtues, temperance, fortitude and retribution. Virtues a shield paladin needs, I think, to be deathful, and which pretty much every other paladin (mostly two handed these days) seems to get but I never do. I was a bit annoyed, I will admit, but so be it. Like I said Faith and Hope can be very useful in the right situations, Faith against those healers and shamen, and obviously Hope in particular let me make all those I was with much stronger. Especially in conjunction with the replacement supplications for sanctuary and word of recall. It made having to retrieve much easier because I could bring along any warrior/mage/assassin friends and protect them with sanctuary. But it didn’t really help me in my goal of being a real maran killing machine. Which was my mistake, because....

In the end I came to the realization that a shield dedicated paladin isn’t the best type of character for me, fun-wise. I enjoy the roleplay part of the game very much (and I think I did a pretty good job coming up with and sticking to a somewhat different character than has been seen before - call me mr. humble) but I also very much like the feeling that I can pk without needing lots of help. See, for example, Aemelius, a string of villagers, and so on. A shield dedicated paladin just is not a particularly deathful character on his own. Sure, when I had some good sets - Defiance and some progged gear, good hps and the like - I could do pretty well, but that’s getting a relatively uber set of clothes for the class, and then finding people alone, etc. For the most part, the class (shield dedicant) isn’t set up to be real threat, alone.

Of course the amusing thing is that people just assumed I had the fighting virtues. People would say “Oh, I’ll fight you, just come here so you aren’t in champion’s stand” and things like that. I would roll my eyes, walk over to them and just start wrathing.

A few comments and questions to the staff regarding the virtue supplications. The mana costs for paladin sups in general are pretty high, but for these virtues they are exorbitantly so, especially given the (not so much) bang for the buck in some cases. A few examples:

Call to Arms. This supplication gave a 4/4 hit damn bonus. That’s it. And it was for one tick. Sometimes not even a full tick, it would only be for the rest of the tick after you commune it. So maybe just a few rounds of combat. And it costs 50 or so mana. (I’m at the office and don’t have logs here, but it’s a lot of mana) For a bonus of four hit and four damn for a portion of one tick or one full tick and a portion of a second.

Steadfast heart. This supplication gave the group a small morale bonus and myself a bit of resist mental. For five ticks only. It costs 100 mana. One hundred mana! And for that short a duration it means if I fail once (lose concentration) and then have to renew it I’m already down almost half of my mana. Holy word, which frenzies me and all my goodly fellows with an 8/8 hit damn benefit for 17 hours, blesses with a +6 hit and -12 svspell for 50+ hours, and wraths and possibly curses my enemy, costs the same. There was no way I could keep Steadfast heart up regularly.

Escape of the innocent. I’m curious why the paladin cannot commune it during combat. It’s already only given to few paladins, and it makes it a far less useful commune when the paladin cannot be fighting to use it. It still would not allow a paladin to recall people out of range, or those in range but not in group.

Also, and this is not a virtue commune obviously, but why does word of recall cost so much more for a paladin than for magi? As I recall it takes seven or ten mana for a mage to recall. It costs 40 for the priest. Is there rationale for that?

There were one or two others, but you get the idea. If nothing else, perhaps someone might take a look at the mana costs for the sups of these two virtues (especially Hope). Maybe nothing comes of it, but maybe something does. I recognize that one of the drawbacks to the class and particularly the storm version is the mana hit. I think it’s gone a bit too far though. In Brordaran’s words, I”ve got a heap of logs and I’ll be postin’ ‘em, sure as I’m typin’ here I will.

Oh, and Zulg, in the logs are examples of the phoenix brand being dispelled, both by divine intervention and by Defiance’s dispel prog. I’ll try and cull them out for you.

As for people, I obviously met a lot over the two months and 261 or whatever hours. I’ll let you post. Only two people really left bad impressions, and only one I’ll mention here. My final death was to a particular villager who I think should be uninducted, and I think would be if there was enough supervision. You attacked a priest, for no reason. There was no mage with me, no mage near me, and your pitifully lame excuse that I fought against you with a mage some other time is absurd. It wasn’t even the same session. And I didn’t jump you, I rescued the mage out, so it was always just a one on one fight. You were just bored because there were no mages to play and it’s been that way for a while with the empire and scion downturn. So you get bored and pick a fight with a paladin, and you being a neutral villager. Nice. What’s more, when you did it you saw I was not doing anything. I fled from you five times, and not once during the combat did I do anything. Even when you tried to shieldcleave three times. Not like you were lagging me in any way, so you knew I wasn’t able to do anything for other reasons. But you came after me and killed me after I fled five times, never recalling, never taking a single action. Saying I saved a mage from you weeks ago (game time) does not mean you go kill the priest. Villagers aren’t even allowed to go hunt someone who kills a villager. Not until the gods call them hunted. You went and killed someone who could not fight back, who was not with a mage, who had never once attacked you, and all because you were bored. You should have been uninducted right then and there.

Sorry for that rant. As I said, only this villager and one other person really left a bad taste. Everyone else, enemies and friends alike, were enjoyable to play the game with. Do feel free to post and I will reply.

Thanks all. And, of course, thanks to the staff for having the fun game in the first place.

So who am I going to go and get the Orb back with now, eh? This came as quite the surprise for me I have to say. From my point of view you were in there swinging pretty good, building up momentum.

I'm going to miss you for sure, as you said, the hope virtue was extremely useful for making the people around you all the more deathful and it allowed me to stay in fights much much longer than I normally would've been able to.

Hope you'll be back sometime soon, you were a great friend to have in the fort.

Toots.

Marelin

I'm still embarrassed by the time I killed you. It's the one drawback to the new targeting system with shortened names. We were hunting Mangar and I just had "sh ma" typed in and of course there you have it. You were very cool about it and didn't make me feel even worse, so thanks yet again.

You and Lekerjey both were great to have around, always knowing when to slow or haste, enlarge or strength, etc. Having a competent transmuter is one of the few things that will really tip the balance, and with me being able to sanctuary you as you said, we became a bit of a force. Good job and thanks for making my time more fun.

I liked you. You made my head hurt, you puzzled me at times, and you impressed me at all times. You were strong, smart, and willing to work with the younger squires. You did everything I expected of you and then some, and I was never once sorry to have you around.

Good luck on the next.

Thank you. I was always cognizant of my status as your first inductee and I never wanted to let the cap'n down. Thanks for coming and talking to Arvam with me (I'll be posting that as soon as I can figure out how) and for just making the time there fun. I thought you were a good captain, as many have said. Fun watching you deterioate with age.

>In the end I came to the realization that a shield dedicated
>paladin isn’t the best type of character for me, fun-wise. I
>enjoy the roleplay part of the game very much (and I think I
>did a pretty good job coming up with and sticking to a
>somewhat different character than has been seen before - call
>me mr. humble) but I also very much like the feeling that I
>can pk without needing lots of help. See, for example,
>Aemelius, a string of villagers, and so on. A shield
>dedicated paladin just is not a particularly deathful
>character on his own. Sure, when I had some good sets -
>Defiance and some progged gear, good hps and the like - I
>could do pretty well, but that’s getting a relatively uber set
>of clothes for the class, and then finding people alone, etc.
>For the most part, the class (shield dedicant) isn’t set up to
>be real threat, alone.

Um.... pretty good clue who played this character. See middle of the paragraph. I don't think it's speculation.

How should I describe you?
You were... odd. Odd for paladin. Not so odd for dwarf but still odd.

Plus this thing what happend between us and 'Big fela' (Khasotholas). You just would not let it go even when everybody pactically screamed at you.

Having said this, I should add Fortress feels empty now since you are gone.

I had faith virtue before and imho it is very very nice.
If you want to be a powerhouse - play giant rager berserker with axes.
Paladin is more about longivety in fight, rather kill-'em-on-the-spot.

Good luck with your next,

-Kelin

Not sure what you mean by odd. Actually I thought I made him very routine in the sense of following the code and always trying to be "good" both in deed as well as spirit. If you mean odd in the sense of different, well, sure, aren't we all?

As for the thing with Khaso, nobody ever came close to screaming at me, and only one person - that little scribe, I don't remember his name - gave you just unconditional acceptance. Which was silly. I think you haven't considered what really happened and how someone would behave if you were lied to, if you found that person in an evil god's shrine, and that person hid their location from you, etc. If anything you should be thankful I didn't do anything further.

Otherwise, thanks for the advice, though I've been around quite a long time and also had the faith virtue before, played giant rager berserkers and all that. We'll see what happens next.

Thanks for posting.

We never clashed, so maybe you never noticed me, but I noticed Brorodan and in my opinion he was one of the few decent paladins out there. There were paladins that basically sucked role wise, and paladins who were ok role wise but whined ooc, but Brorodan was fine all round.

You didn't like faith and hope virtues so much, but remember these are -on top of- normal paladin powers, which are very powerful on their own. In addition, remember that to buy a res mental prep costs 10g. So a few hr res mental is nothing to be sneered at.

Of course I noticed and remembered you. Thank you for the good words, I'm glad you saw that side of Brordaran. I steadfastly avoided fighting in town and did so only once or twice, and was lucky enough that those times had no tribunal's around. Had there been, I would have turned myself in, though probably not to a dark one like yourself, I'd have looked for at least a neutral if not a goodie. I thought you did an excellent job as a tribunal, at least from what I saw and heard from others.

As for the paladin powers, I know how strong they are, and I never said they were weak. They are, however, geared more to keeping the paladin alive and scaring away enemies, not to really killing them. Especially the shield dedicant. Virtues are what make them deathful. So I was hoping for those deathful virtues and instead got hope and faith. And again, I know and agree, those two are very strong. But not in the ways I was hoping for this character. Just one of those "Things don't turn out the way you expect" situations.

>Roy Rogers. Think singing cowboy. With a big fat hammer or
>sword to beat the crap outta people.

Please tell me that at some point you got hold of the Ancient Ranger Stetson.

We didn't get to interact much, but I liked what little I saw. Hope I didn't come across too bitchy when I had you explain that thing you said over cb. At least I think that was you.

Also, I feel your pain when it comes to the shield paladin thing. And I had combat virtues.

Keep 'em comin'.

Sadly, no, I never had the stetson. I would have loved it, but mostly I was a big fan of the helm of brilliance. And the Stetson is guarded by goodies so I couldn't break into the guild to get it. Ah well.

And yes, that was indeed me you had the conversation with, about laughing at death or something like that. Thank you for the good words. I wish I'd known you better as a mortal, you were very quiet as a heroimm so I didn't have much of a sense of you. But it was good to at least see you around and know someone was there should crazy #### go down...

Thanks and good luck with the imm stuff.

Hey man, I really liked Brordaran. I found myself laughing my ass off so many times...but you know I could never show it with Vahl
I'm sure I pissed you off a couple of times...and this time, unlike with a certain other character of yours, I felt bad about it. All in all though, you gotta admit I hooked you up with Arvam that one time.

You're a funny, funny man. I'm glad you enjoyed Bror, he certainly enjoyed having you around. You only pissed Bror off once, that whole Hipsin thing, but even then Bror wouldn't be _that_ angry, and would just put it behind you. I'll wait until you're dead to ask a few questions, but for now I'll say that I'm impressed with the fortitude and perseverence at getting those earth shields...

I've had two long lived elf acolytes, with you and vorondel before. Good stuff and well done.

The game is much more enjoyable with characters who can laugh anything off. You were always inspirational and helped others enjoy the Fort more. I enjoyed the conversations we had.

I also remember discussing Hope with you and laughing to myself. While it's probably not quite what I expected for Brordaran, you would be hard pressed to deny how powerful it is. In the end, it suits a paladin like Brordaran well.

My feeling is that the Hope virtue is really the big ticket item with neo-paladins. You might not have enjoyed it as an individual, but you can make much more of a gamewide impact with Hope than the other virtues. I am sure your groupmates enjoyed it a lot more than you did.

As far as the shortage of mana - well it's your fault for picking a storm giant! Of course Steadfast Heart is going to be expensive. If it does what I think it does, it is worth more than sanctuary in certain scenarios. Morale is probably underestimated, as well.

In retrospect, you have to laugh at how powerful Brordaran was. A storm shield paladin is tough enough on her own. Now, throw in Maran powers PLUS two virtues. One of these virtues can negate shaman, who normally eat up paladins. You had no inconvenient periods of unempowerment, and you received the second virtue more quickly than some paladins get their first virtue (if they get one at all). Comparatively speaking, Brordaran lived, fought, and died in style.

No, you're right, I didn't think that Hope was inappropriate. I just wanted something else. You're certainly right that for making a group more powerful, it's the virtue of choice. That just wasn't my personal goal. That's life though, eh?

Anyway, I liked Audriel a lot and was always impressed with your behavior and willingness to help out in virtually any situation. I also liked that touch of sending a note to the cabal introducing new scribes. In the end, I think you were just what an acolyte should be, making sure people were in the war with the right heart and mind, and speaking quietly but firmly when things looked down. Keep it up!

Well played char. Hope you enjoyed the interactions as much as I did. We beat some things up together.

Luck with the next.

We sure did. Congratz on getting back in and acolyte'ing. Deserved, surely.

Good luck and have fun!

Only fought you a couple times, I was pissed that one time you got me. You seemed well played and rp'ed well from what I could tell. Good luck with you next.

It was a good fight, taking a lot of time and place, not one of those quick three rounders.

I didn't get a good grasp on your character's concept, but from the short bits of talk you seemed at least like a character, not a person just playing one. I hope you understand what I'm trying to say.

Anyway, thanks for the kind words and good luck to you as well.

Never talked much, but you definatly seemed like a good maran with a role that went well beyond aura-slaying. Good job.

What did you think of Alarian IC? I also feel you on being a shield dec, seems like you almost a support class in some ways, especially when trying to fight neutral Outlanders.

You and Menon always bothered me with the Sir this and Lord that. But you played your role well and it's good to know that my attempt to be more than just "kill red aura" was evident.

I feel your pain, it must suck fighting the neutral outlanders. I tried to avoid it entirely from a role perspective, but the few times I was forced to were unpleasant....

Glad you enjoyed the interaction, I did as well. You handled it just the way you should have, I thought. I agree, I like to see that kind of interaction, and would like more of it. I have more vile and evil things planned. Of course, I always do.

Khas

Thank you again. I was a bit surprised to hear how some of the other mortals involved were so upset that I was not willing just to forget about it and assume Kelin was okeydokey. I'm glad you agree, and again, thanks for doing it, it's one of the things that makes playing fun.

I'm going to have to roll up a Khaso follower one of these days....

I won't go into details, since many involved in that affair are still alive... but I agree. They all looked the other way quite easily. That's all I'll say on the matter. Kinda disappointed me.

In the meantime, I would very much like to hear what the three main imms I dealt with thought, particularly Arvam...

I haven't really posted much about people, but since you asked...

I swear I put some things in your premium history, but I guess I forgot. Anyway, I thought you did really good. I heard about the Krelissa thing and that really impressed me. I kept meaning to reward you for that, but I never caught you. I liked your style and outlook on good, the paladin code, and the Arv religion style. It's a hard thing to work, but I think you pulled it off pretty good. You were a good balance to the Celebrimbor style paladin that seemed to dominate the Fort at the time. Anyway, you did a good job.

I appreciate your taking the time to respond, and your compliments. They are appreciated. And returned. It's been seven or eight years here now for me and some of our talks, both with those I would bring to the shrine or just the two of us, stand out as some of the best.

One question more: I used to just send up random prays thanking you, something like "Hello there yer lordship, just wantin to be thankin ya fer yer trust and standin by me and..." and things like that. Mostly when you weren't online. Did you actually get them?

Thanks again.

A shame you up and deleted. I had loads of fun with you as Remthael and the singing was just hilarious. I'm curious why you deleted though. Oh well, just so long as you have fun with whatever you roll up next!

See you around.

You dont stop playing because you grow old, you grow old because you stop playing.

I had lots of fun running around with you clear from about rank 15 or so. I shot up past you, but I knew you would hero before me. All those songs were fun. You were always willing to help out, when you could, and I appreciated that. Farewell, by Big Buddy, and I'll have one more adventure in Lord Arvam's name for Brordaran.

Hehe, I hate thieves. Absolutely hate them. But you were just too much fun to ignore and I'm glad you didn't just hide all the time. I liked having a pseudo-reprobate as a pal. I'm glad you enjoyed hangin' with the cowboy, I surely liked hangin' with you.

Take it easy, Kingpin!

Damn man, I liked you a lot, a whole damn lot.. you and your 'little lady' all the time.. It's really bad you deleted, every moment we had together I enjoyed very much. You know, I even talked to Vynmylak about you becoming the next captain, but I guess that won't be happening now. I hope you got to read the scroll I penned for you. I'll say it again, it's a shame you deleted. Any reason why?

You started singing that once while we were raiding Scion...and I nearly fell over at my keyboard(it didn't help that jaws was on) . You were a fun loving character Gaf could really joke around with and just generally have a good time around. I assume you deleted for RL reasons but if you didn't I'm going to strangle you good! Wait...I didn't delete for RL reasons...someone strangle me!*gurgle*

You are...evil, there is no other word for it...more evil than Krelissa ever was! The cursed language code keeps me from expressing my true anger but...Anyhow, thanks for catching onto the RP I threw at you pretty darn quick, made my job hella easier. You were quite fun. I really, really had plans that involved you too but oh well, now you don't get the joy of my company .

Aside from Marelin, you were my bane. Damn your virtues. Damn them straight to hell. A pox upon those who thought they were a good idea.

You were extremely well role played from what I saw. Stayin in character for 3 hour ranking sessions. Really impressive. I've played a paladin before and I know how hard it is to seal kills and I could tell you were frustrated.
Who's gonna keep Golron company now? Doesn't look good for the Fort.

I am very much looking forward to all the Fort members crying about being outnumbered all the time.

I didn't have any characters at your level and didn't interact with you much, so you seemed like the atypical Fort Paladin, from what I saw. Nevertheless, good job always showing up to heal the Maran when I tried to retrieve.

Good luck on your next.

Nivek

nt

.

nt