Tue Jul 21 15:26:41 2009

At 6 o'clock PM, Day of the Moon, 35th of the Month of the Dark Shades
on the Theran calendar Tellik perished, never to return.

I've never managed to get more than 2% increase with high int races.

gr

It involves lots of pain, lots of healing, and lots of time.

ps. this is also how I raked in a pretty good portion of my commerce xp to get trade connections (i.e. healing).

Klaak

Great spirits have always met violent opposition from mediocre minds.
-Einstein

WARNING: THIS IS A LONG POST

Well, this wasn't the way I had planned on going out. I was going to let Tellik age die, but after Flaire died, followed by Egrelam deleting, things just started getting boring for me. When I saw Empire without a Shadow Lord, I decided to make a run for that. Things were pretty exciting for a while, and I started losing interest in Tellik more and more. Then the Shadow Lord thing got screwed up by a bug in the thief guild voting system that made it take over a month for a vote to successfully go through and in the meantime, I had to avoid getting blackballed by the reigning guild leader. Consequently, I ended up testing a few other character builds and found a few that were really fun, and got TOTALLY COMPLETELY bored with Tellik. There were a number of things I still wanted to accomplish with him, such as getting to the 6th layer of Hell (made it to the gates. So close, yet so far away!) and also getting Neltouda's tat. But after being away from the char for so long, I figured the second was pretty much shot, and the hell thing was pretty slim (as well as a couple other explore areas) since I would have to rebuild a new explore combo like Egrelam, Flaire, and I had done so long ago. Overall, the effort just wouldn't be worth it when combined with the general despondency for the character.

In spite of all of that, I would still consider this a highly successful character. Interestingly, when I rolled Tellik, he was intended PURELY for testing out thief skill combinations, particularly the mystic path which I had only learned about just BEFORE the last thief mini-revamp (before it was an officially recognised path). The plan was to powerrank, gain the skills, stick around long enough to do a thorough test of their usefulness (as well as a few other skills I had little knowledge of), then delete and roll up a new thief with a power combo of skills for serious play. Then toss in a chance encounter with Neltouda when I waylaid and robbed a rager right in front of her while she was interviewing one of her followers, and suddenly she was inviting me to join her crew. I didn't know the first thing about her religion, but the fact that an Imm was offering to a mortal instead of visa versa intrigued me. So I just rolled with it and suddenly found myself in an impromptu discussion of her religion. It didn't take long for me to get the gist of it, and it just happened to fit PERFECTLY for the way I had been roleplaying Tellik all along. A day or two later, I was a Stowaway and the rest is history.

I had a lot of fun with this character. In the beginning he was hell-bent on waylaying and robbing everyone who came by. I wasn't worried about making friends for the most part (at least not at first) because I had planned on deleting anyway. Tellik made a lot of enemies fast, but a few people earned his respect quickly by not flying into a fit of rage and threats after being robbed. Most of Tellik's personality was pretty lighthearted jovial, although if he felt betrayed by someone, he would hold a grudge for a long time until he had vengeance, or until the person proved to be beyond reach of revenge. Once the betrayal was repaid, he considered them to be even and was willing to be cordial again. Although being the near-kleptomaniac that he was, "cordial" didn't necessarily prohibit robbing them again if they should wander by with a particularly shiny treasure. Bald-faced lies were also a major part of his bag of thief tricks. Consequently, he was only flagged twice in his entire life. Once early on, and then finally shortly before deleting. He took pride in the knowledge that he had committed probably multiple hundreds of crimes and (for the vast majority of his life) was only ever caught once. The flag near the end was kinda gay in my opinion. I saw some outlanders going in and out of galadon without ever going near the city exits and realized they were raiding trib. So I went to rob the outlanders, and got flagged for stepping into the spire. At the time, I had a seriously sweet set of gear that I wanted to pass on to some IC friends who had spent a lot of time traveling with Tellik, so rather than take a chance of dying to tribs and losing everything, especially ring of regeneration, and Scepter of the Ancients, I just suicided and passed on my things (I guess I had already passed on several items by that time, come to think of it). Some of Telliks proudest thefts include robbing Iktul while he was provost, on duty, after I had overthrown him for Kingpin and blackballed him from the guild, robbing the mummy while he was on duty as provost, Nidblot while he was on duty (maybe my memory is faulty, but I think he was Provost at the time too), robbing Kasir quite a few times, robbing Kjrorh several times, even long before hostilities broke out between them, and then, of course, there was robbing Tiamat! Thanks to that little caper, Daev realized he forgot to implement a piece of ancient dragon coding and very very promptly fixed it. LOL!

Goodbyes:

Egrelam and Flaire - You two rocked! Out of my 517 hours, I probably spent at least 300 hanging around with you two. Flaire, I was so disappointed that you couldn't get past that part of hell. If you had been able to come with us, we probably could have made it into Dis and beyond. We lost a lot when you were forced from the group. I think I know some of your subsequent characters, and have interacted with them as well, but they just couldn't quite live up to Flaire's mark. And Egrelam, what a rotten way to go. I think I spotted one of your subsequent characters as well. If I'm right about you and Flaire's follow up chars, then we had the trio back together again for a while at one point. Not sure if either of you noticed or not (if I'm right about who you both played, obviously you knew I was, but I don't know if you recognized each other or not). I hope someday we three can join up again in other incarnations and do some serious damage to the minions of hell. I would love to get down to the 9th. Also, I've heard that we did not penetrate the deepest recesses of Yzekon, either, that there is actually much much more to the place than where we got to. So hopefully we can find each other again and conquer that place as well. See you in the Fields!

Tribs: Tellik hated tribs on principle. He didn't hate the people themselves, but hated what the cabal stands for. Even though he hated what the cabal stands for, he was still willing to use various tribunals to serve his own goals, like exploring. When they weren't serving his goals, he spent a lot of time subtly trying to undermine the tribs without letting them know his intents and maintaining the trust of some of them. In his old age, he stopped caring quite so much about the latter. The only "law" Tellik was ever interested in upholding or enforcing was the Thief code. He was very strict about that, which is why even after getting Devious Versatility a second time and taking the pickpocket skills, he never robbed Iktul until after blackballing him.

Iktul - Tellik's hatred of tribs was considerably more minor until you cheated him out of the promised reward for an amulet of mourdillar early in his career. That little incident not only sealed your fate as Kingpin, but also drastically intensified his hatred of the trib cabal. As a follower of Neltouda, Tellik saw his rise to Kingpin and your overthrow as one of his finest achievements of inspiring emotion in others. The sheer number of threats and insults you breathed out against Tellik and his supporters as well as the intensity of arrogance you displayed during the voting process was probably the most emotion he inspired in anyone (at least from my limited player's perspective).

Jedidiah - this was the primary reason for you being blackballed. There was indeed a rumor about someone wanting to overthrow Tellik, though the one who first mentioned it is still active, so I'll keep that quiet. Your name was mentioned by a couple others as a good suspect as well. Whether or not it was true didn't really matter. Someone was plotting, you were a suspect, and you were a trib which Tellik hated. The very idea of a tribunal using the Galadon thief guild to uphold the law really really irritated him. You would have had to do a pretty good job of talking to change his mind about blackballing you. From a player's standpoint, I really hated doing it, because I'm big softy, which was part of the reason why Tellik took such a loose hand in his leadership of the guild as far as the conduct of members. But unfortunately for you, the experience with Iktul had pretty much sealed your fate. As soon as Tellik saw you were a trib, he was just itching for a good excuse to blackball you, simply to get the law out of his guild. And when your name came up as a possible suspect, that was it.

Nidblot - As a player, I always got a chuckle out of the way you reminded Tellik of his betrayal of you when ranking on elves in the past. That act was probably the only one he ever did that was totally in opposition to the beliefs that Tellik held for most of his life. In justification, though, that was long before Neltouda came on the scene, long before I had even attempted to develop a code of ethics for Tellik (twisted though it may have been once I did), and was not even Tellik's idea. The transmuter we were ranking with had someone else he wanted, who would have been a better tank, and he wanted your shiny set of gear too. Since I was intent on powerranking Tellik as quickly as possible in order to test out thief skills and then delete, I decided to go along with it, with the idea in mind that Tellik was neutral, not good, and ambitious forward movement was one of the two driving forces in his life from the time I rolled him (material gain was the other one). The fact that you held the grudge right to the very end, though, Tellik understood perfectly, being a grudge holder himself. Though he understood it, he always hoped he could somehow convince you he wasn't the same any more. By that time, I had developed a code of ethics for him which included not robbing anyone he was currently traveling with, and people he traveled with frequently would probably not having anything to worry about ever, unless he was with them at their request, so that they could acquire something (defiance anyone?) Speaking of which...

Fortress - You guys really lucked out with Tellik. For most of his highly active life, Kasir was in the fort to keep eyes open for Tellik lurking at the maran to waylay and rob all those shinies you people were carrying. By the time Kasir died, I was already starting to get bored with Tellik, and many of you didn't have anymore shinies worth stealing any more. As for Defiance, Tellik found it absolutely hilarious and amazing that paladins, with their paladin code would go so batty for one sword, albeit a very good one. As soon as one or two paladins found out Tellik was a locksmith thief, it seemed like ALL the paladins were banging at his door to go help them get it. On quite a few occasions, the trip resulted in the death of the whole group of lightwalkers, with Tellik being the only one to survive. I distinctly remember a couple times of getting it where everyone involved was killed twice except me, and the paladin who was going for it would swear, "I'm never trying for this sword again." But the moment they lost it against the empire or someone else, they were asking for assistance in getting it again. After I wrote the poem about Trothon and performed it at the Inn, the next one I was going to do was about Defiance and all the lightwalkers it has brought to the grave. If it were usable by any other class, I could see the item being treated this way, but given that it's only usable by paladins, it seems pretty sad roleplay that someone who has such high moral and ethical standards would cause the death of so many innocents just for a magical weapon. Tellik himself didn't have a problem with it, being neutral, but even he was amazed at the irony of the situation. From his own roleplay perspective as a follower of Neltouda, though, it was a powerful testament to the inspirational power of Greed, which was the only reason he kept agreeing to go there, even though most of the paladins who asked for it never paid him his asking price.

Outlanders - Some of you Tellik was friends with, some took it upon themself to treat him as a mortal enemy as the result of a single robbery. Generally speaking, whenever he robbed someone, if they decided to declare personal war on him, he made it a point to rob them every chance he had, even if it meant just taking bread and other things he had no personal use for, purely to inspire them on to greater and greater heights of emotion. People who didn't react so strongly often won his respect and he tended to leave them alone after that, unless he saw an especially tempting item in their inventory.

Scions and Empire - Tellik pretty much steered clear of both cabals most of the time. Scions usually hunted him, so I made it a point of carrying lots of orbs of travel in case an air shifter happened to swoop in on him.

Messervy - You got lucky that I was planning on deleting anyway. Aside from Jedidiah, you were the other suspect that people mentioned as someone who might be trying to overthrow him. Fortunately, by the time we had our talked, I was planning to be dead soon, and you did a pretty good job of convincing Tellik that you knew you "didn't stand a chance of deposing him so why bother?". The way you treated Tellik most of the time was very reminiscent of the way Tellik treated Iktul all the while planning his overthrow. This more than anything else made me very suspicious and distrustful of you. I worked hard to keep veil of secrecy active anytime I was around you. A couple times it slipped my notice until I would see you gasp suddenly, and realize you'd just gotten a peek at my inventory. I hope you enjoy all that chest full of stuff I gave you at the end. I just wish I had taken out the pile of blessed obuluses and thistle seeds which I had planned on giving to Astomel.

Mizheng - You were one of Tellik's favorite people to hassle. It was always so easy to provoke you to fits of rage and frustration. Most of the time I had the upper hand, although you did manage to snare me a few times, and actually dropped me twice. After that, every time I saw you in a civilized area, I made it a point to go after you. But it seemed like you started working hard to avoid those places as much as you could whenever Tellik was logged on. I don't think I ever managed to rob you again after the second time you dropped me. You sure made me nervous about leaving through the north gate of Seantryn, though. After a couple times of being snared there, I started heading out the northwest gate and staying in civilized and water places when leaving Seantryn. I didn't even realize you were a scion until just before you deleted, when I managed to catch a glimpse of a nightwalker leaving a room, when you and I were the only two in the area.

Battle - You guys usually made sweet pickpocket victims (Although Maelstrom really made me wish I had the acrobatics skill!!!). Tellik saw Battle in much the same light as he saw Tribunal. Having taken the entire mystic path, except for arcane vision, and being sphere magic, he was about as diametrically opposed to Battle philosophy as one can be without being an actual magic user or from an enemy cabal. He would still tolerate ragers occasionally as he did Tribs when it would serve his own purposes. In the cases where he seemed to be offering his assistance with this or that, he always had an ulterior motive.

Woldrun - You were the first victim Tellik ever waylaid and robbed who didn't start spitting fire and threatening to bash him into the ground every chance he got unless the item(s) was returned. Personally I always thought that was a dumb and pointless threat to begin with (after all, why bother stealing it in the first place if a simple threat is going to intimidate you into returning it), and I was SO glad that you seemed to feel the same way. When I mentioned how surprised I was, you said something like, "I figure thieves will be thieves. Not much I can do to change that. But I would like my sword back if there's anything I can offer you in exchange." Those weren't your exact words, but that was the basic gist of it. After that, even though I did still rob you occasionally, I left you alone far more often, even sometimes when you had a really shiny sword or something. Now that I know who was playing Woldrun, it all makes perfect sense. All your other mortal chars whom I've interacted with have had similar views about such things. It won't be long and I'm going to start being able to pick out your mortals whenever I meet them. You were the only rager I can think of who actually ranked with Tellik and yet stayed alive and active for most of his life.

Heralds - I joined Herald for two reasons. First, I know that I have a talent IRL for creative writing (stores, poetry, and other things highly descriptive), and had considered joining Herald with a previous character to be a storyteller when Celenai (spelling?) was High Herald, but never got around to it. Second after becoming a follower of Neltouda, I saw the Heralds as an avenue for inspiration of others. Unfortunately, I could never find the "inspiration" in myself IRL to spend the time working on stories and poetry for use with my char. This actually had nothing at all to do with the game, but was entirely rooted in things going on with me IRL that drained me of much of my creative juices. The one poem that I DID write and perform, about Trothon, took me a long time to finish because so many things IRL kept distracting my thoughts every time I sat down to work on it. In spite of that, I was very pleased with the end result, and it seemed that everyone who saw the performance enjoyed it as well. The other thing that seriously detracted from my involvement with the Inn is my own personal sense of adventure, which was brought out VERY strongly in Tellik after hooking up with Egrelam and Flaire, and later Zakke and a couple others. They enabled me to go explore places I had never had a chance to explore for myself before (I've been down to the 6th circle years ago, and down to the 4th a few times, but never was able to explore the place to learn it for myself), or to which I had never been before (like Yzekon). Consequently, most of the time that I was logged on was spent exploring, rather than hanging out at the Inn. I wish I'd had more time to plan events and such. It didn't help that most of Tellik's active life there weren't very many people in Herald at all, so when I DID decide to go hang out at the Inn, it got very boring with no one there to talk to. I might be there for an hour or more, and only one or two people would happen by, and not be interested in much conversation at all, despite my best efforts. Then they would leave a short while later.

Celenai - I really enjoyed hanging out with you at the Inn in the beginning. You were always fun to talk to. I was sad to see you go.

Fyeereth - It was kinda funny having you as the High Herald while I was in the process of overthrowing your husband as Kingpin. Then blackballing my own cabal leader from my guild was just awkward. When I told Neltouda about my plan to overthrow Iktul, she found the irony very amusing. Even before I started enacting my plan to overthrow Iktul, though, Tellik and Fy never really seemed to click much anyway. I really did respect you for keeping guild politics and cabal politics separate, though.

Edika - I feel I owe you somewhat of an apology. You were always probing me for information on this or that, and usually I had the answer. And while I personally enjoy teaching people new things, Tellik's personality was not one of patience. He was always very impatient from the first moment I rolled him, and I tried to stay consistent in that. In spite of that, my own personality shown through quite a bit, and I did take time to teach you some things, if I wasn't already engaged in something else. Most of the time when you asked for my help on something, I was in the middle of some explore area with Egrelam and Flaire, or later with a few other people; OR I was in the middle of three conversations and didn't have the time to to add a fourth conversation. I really admire the way you've stuck with your character though, and have achieved some notoriety with her. It's taken me 11 years (wow, I can't believe it's been that long!) to gather the game knowledge I have. Pay close attention to detail, think creatively and analytically, and you'll discover more secrets than you knew were there. So keep up the effort, and it will pay off in the end. Maybe two of our other characters will meet someday and you can pick my brain for knowledge again.

Neltouda - I really loved the way you brought me in to your religion, and all the interactions. I tried really hard for your tat, but I just couldn't figure out what I was missing that was preventing it, other than not taking full advantage of being a Herald. I sometimes wonder if I could have earned the tat more easily if I had never joined Herald. In spite of that, I love how active you are with your followers. It's really nice to know that whenever I wanted to know where I stood with you, I could always count on an audience without having to wait for days IRL. Now that Tellik's gone, it would be nice to hear some additional feedback about what things I could have done better/differently, and your overall evaluation of this character.


Wow, that was a really long goodbye post. I think that just about covers it all, though. So I'll see you all in the fields.

p.s. I would really love to see the PBF for this character, but unfortunately, I'm still just as broke as ever, so if someone's feeling charitable and wants to buy it, I would be deeply appreciative. Thanks

Klaak

Great spirits have always met violent opposition from mediocre minds.
-Einstein

I had a vague dislike for Tellik. And that was *before* I found you robbed me. Actually it mostly stemmed from an encounter I had with you in Arial City when I was playing my failed rager wannabe (Angale). I came at your group and happened to walk into the room just as you said "idiot", presumably in reference to me. It just had such an air of arrogance that it soured me on the character, even when I deleted Angale and started playing Kasir.

Did Tellik actually try to kill people? Or just rob them? Seemed like the latter. It was basically, "How much pimp gear can I acquire and hold indefinitely while not doing much with it besides explore and grief people by stealing their newbie breadz."

I mean...I guess that's a valid way to play. And it's not like you griefed people *too* badly. It's just...sort of annoying. It probably shouldn't be too surprising that you got bored of it after a while.

Maybe it's not what you intended, but Tellik really came off to me as a guy who was just a Herald so he had someplace safe-ish to hide until he could quit after pissing someone off who could actually kill him.

I just didn't see anything Heraldy from him, ever. Just lots of stealing (which I generally think is cool if there's some kind of point to it) sometimes followed by, let's get behind some bouncers.

The PBF generally reflects that as well.

On the rare occasion events were held, super, but it almost seemed
like a - I'm doing this to get Iunna off my back - move. Which I guess
worked because I never did kick him out like I'd hoped.

You're full of ####. Lets see the log of your proudest moment. =)

gr

However, I stole first one periapt (emerald I think) and then promptly high tailed it out of galadon and to Neltouda's shrine before the theft was discovered. With veil of secrecy, I knew that it couldn't be located on me, so there was no solid proof I had done it at the time unless one of the Galadon thieves on at the time reported me bragging about it on guild channel. But I had JUST been standing next to Iktul, so if the periapt was noticed missing right after I had been present, it would have been pretty obvious who took it. Anyway, quite some time went by, and nothing happened, so I got bold, went back and stole the other periapt, then hot footed away again. I did the same thing much later in Tellik's life when I stole white diadem of an order lord from the mummy while he was on duty at Market Square. And I forget what I stole from Nidblot. It wasn't anything exceptional. That was more of a "I can do it so I will" theft. I think Jazan, and possibly Beib were around at the time when I robbed Iktul. It's been so long I can't remember who all I was bragging to on the channel, but if one of the galadon thieves would like to chime in here and confirm, feel free.

Klaak

Great spirits have always met violent opposition from mediocre minds.
-Einstein

It didn't actually happen though. I was looking for any and every reason to flag Tellik and always knew when you were near me. Plus I'd have noticed periapts being stolen. If you had said something about counterfeiting it might have worked.

That wasn't the only time I robbed you either, but it was the first, which is why I remember it so well. You may have been watching for any and every reason to flag me, but you were not so attentive to details as you might think. I did A LOT of run-by thefts. Basically, I would see someone who could see me sitting stationary in one room, then I would run in, peek and go right on by without hardly stopping (discerning gaze ftw). Then I would go someplace like the bank, or a shop, etc... so it looked like I was just going about my business. While sitting in that legitimate location, I would scroll back through my screen buffer and decide what it was I wanted to steal. Once I decided that, I would enter a string of commands to take me the exact number of steps back into the room, steal the item, and then move away. In this manner, I robbed duergar, assassins, other thieves, and on-duty tribunals just as easily as someone who couldn't see me. In one instance, I stole Deluge from an assassin and then high tailed it out of there, expecting him to notice. But time went on and he never did. About 4 days later, I stole long titanium spear from him, and something else that I forget. About 15 minutes later, he sends me a tell something along the lines of, "You'll pay for that with your life." I acted like I didn't know what he was talking about. He said something like, "You robbed me, and you'll pay for it." I asked him something like, "What is it I supposedly stole from you?" He was like, "my dagger, Deluge." At this I started laughing IRL cause it had been 4 days since I'd stolen that from him and he was only just now noticing. Finally I said something like, "Well, you're right about one thing. I did steal something from you, but that wasn't it." He said, "Hmm.. I don't see anything else missing." Finally I said, "Well, that wasn't it at all. So since the item I took doesn't seem to be important enough for you to notice that it was taken, I'm not going to bother enlightening you, and I guess you won't really miss it that much."

After pulling off several capers against people who could see me, I began to realize that people just don't pay enough attention to their inventories when thieves are around, and I began getting more bold about robbing people who could see me. Every time, I always dreaded that 1 in 200 chance (or whatever it is) that I would fail the steal even with 100% in steal, deft touch, and warning skill. This was ESPECIALLY true when robbing on-duty tribunals.

I know it's difficult for you to admit, but you were indeed robbed by Tellik, and on more than one occasion. Don't feel bad, you weren't the only one who failed to notice. Daevryn's comment comes to mind:

Mon May 4 16:43:10 2009 by 'Daevryn' at level 51 (439 hrs):
On the good side, as a thief, he steals valuable stuff from a lot of people. Of course, I also wouldn't question anyone's RP for murdering him because he's probably stolen something good from almost everyone.

I don't know how the auto-logging works up in Imm-land and if EVERYTHING is logged or not. If so and if an Imm feels like taking the time to check, then maybe one of them can verify this, though frankly it seems like a waste of time to me. It wouldn't surprise me if I got some of the details mixed up a little, since it's been so long since it happened. But that was the general gist of how the caper went down. Afterward, I think I gave the periapts to Flaire, since some other thief had stolen his (I think it was one of my elites, actually)


Klaak

Great spirits have always met violent opposition from mediocre minds.
-Einstein

and Tellik mentioned it to me. I didn't actually see it happen but he claimed it did and he had both periapts if if recall correctly. Iktul did kill me though so I'm happy to believe it happened.

Well, contrary to appearances I guess, I never joined Herald with the intent of using it as a place to hide. I did step in there for safety from time to time, but no more so (and probably less, actually) than I would have with any other character who was not a Herald. Generally speaking, if I wanted someplace safe to hide, it was Neltouda's shrine, since no one at all could touch me there unless they too were a follower. And I was on very good terms with all of them. I tried to not do things that would bring trouble to the Inn, so I didn't like going there to hide, and I don't recall ever quitting out to ditch someone who might be hunting me. There were a few times when I had to quit in order to go to the bathroom or was called away from the computer to take care of something, but as soon as that was done, most of the time I was right back on again. Usually if someone was trying to kill me, I would use scrolls of return to put distance between me and that person fast, and then run to a place they weren't likely to find me or couldn't get to (like Neltouda's shrine).

As far as Iunna, I rarely even thought of her. The only times I did was when I jumped into the fight against her duergar rager follower when he was fighting some outlanders in Galadon, and struck the village giant once because I didn't know it was forbidden, then accidentally stumbled into the Empire inners when I was trying to peek at Satebos without getting killed while he was inside the Palace. In all three cases, I got yelled at for it. With the duergar, it was a personal grudge against him for killing me long before. He soundly whooped me, though, and I barely managed to escape alive so I decided to give up on that grudge, deciding that revenge in this case was too far out of reach and not worth the cost. The village giant was a mistake of ignorance, since I had never played a Herald before and had no idea they were forbidden from such. The empire thing was purely accidental when my enter key stuck for a moment and I went up twice instead of just once. As I mentioned in my goodbyes, I really wanted to host more events than I did. I talked about some of the difficulties I was having to Neltouda. Hmmm, now that I think of it, I guess you were getting on me about hosting an event before I hosted the first one. Although I did mention to you at the time that I was having writer's block, and that much was true. That goes back to what I was saying in my goodbyes about a bunch of RL stuff keeping me distracted so that I felt drained of creative juices. What finally broke the writer's block for me was the sudden realization that I didn't have to try writing a story about something as I had been thinking, but a poem about something would do. And I'm MUCH better at poems than stories. The second event I hosted no one was hounding me at all. I was trying to think of ways to inspire LOTS of people to go adventuring, and I remembered Lyristeon's quests, so I modified the idea slightly, then set out to find items for people to look for. Most of the time I was playing this character, my primary thoughts were on how to earn Neltouda's tat. As Tellik was approaching old age, I just couldn't think of what I was not getting right, and when the tattoo seemed out of reach, I started getting bored and ideas for other thief skill combinations started forming. But almost everything he did was an attempt to inspire various emotions in people.

Isildur - Yeah, I didn't try to pk very much. For the most part, Tellik preferred to avoid combat (except for NPCs). There were a few people he was eager to engage in battle, though, and he did get a few PKs. Most were when he was defending his group, or his group was attacked, but I think there might have been one or two where he specifically sought a fight with someone. As far as being annoying to people about stealing, that was exactly the point. When Neltouda first invited Tellik to join her crew, it was after a theft. At the time, I had mostly very basic stuff (might even have been wearing some fine leathers still at the time), and Iegob (whom I had waylaid and robbed before) saw me visible at the temple of the moon. I noticed him on WHERE making a beeline for me and typed HIDE just a moment before he entered the room. He walked out, back in, and then I waylaid him, right in front of Neltouda while she was talking to Boldinrok. Since he was clearly coming to kill me, I felt justified in robbing him of some things I would otherwise not have worried about, including several hands full of coins, then let him go. After talking about her religion a little bit and deciding to go for it, I wrote up a quick role to define Tellik's history (most of it was invented on the fly while talking to Neltouda) and then sought her shrine. When she next spoke to me, she asked me what my method for inspiring people would be. I knew already that I wanted to do lots of exploring with Tellik (as a test character, I wanted to test out some thief edges, and for that, I needed edge points) so that was an obvious choice, but it didn't seem to be enough to me. Since I had been playing him with little regard as to who he pissed off (thinking I was just going to delete him anyway so didn't bother considering who I was testing things on), and since it was a robbery that had gained Neltouda's attention in the first place (her invitation was something like, "Ah could be use'n someone on mah crew ta do some piracy, yar!"), I decided I would inspire people by robbing them so they would have to go have more adventures to replace what I took. Afterward, as I came to understand that inspiring ANY emotion in people was considered inspiration, I realized that robbing people also inspired quite a number of emotions, depending on the character being robbed. The most common being rage and frustration. Many times as I waylaid someone and lifted a really nice legendary item or two from them, I could almost see the player sitting at their screen, pulling out their hair as they waited for the waylay to wear off so they could either run away or kill me. More often than not that emotion seemed to bleed through into the character being robbed, so I figured the desired effect had been achieved. Sometimes someone DID manage to kill me for it, but from Tellik's point of view, he got his just reward. Served him right for getting caught, and he knew he'd given the person ample reason to strike him. What irritated him a little was when someone vowed they would kill him until his body gave out as the result of a single theft. From one perspective, it irritated him because it it seemed considerable overkill for one offense. But from the perspective of a Neltouda worshipper, he delighted in those responses because he knew he had inspired a really strong emotion in someone, which was the whole point in the first place. As far as all the gear he had, that went hand in hand with being a thief, and also being a follower of Neltouda, the acquisition of treasure and all. But he did give away a lot of stuff too, both nice gear and coins, using them as additional means to inspire people. Sometimes he would give someone an item in exchange for them going on an adventure and sending a note about it. Sometimes he would give away something really nice, just for the delighted reaction from the person (delight being an emotion as well).

As far as the "idiot" comment, I don't have the foggiest recollection of that encounter. However, it's quite feasible that Tellik was referring to your character, if he knew you were seeking the village. As I mentioned, he had an incredibly strong dislike for Battle, since he was sphere magic and also a full path mystic thief (minus one skill). He often referred to the villagers as "village idiots" seeing them as idiots because they rejected something so powerful and useful as the magic that he loved. Given that they sought to eradicate something from Thera that he valued so much, he had much reason to dislike them.

Klaak

Great spirits have always met violent opposition from mediocre minds.
-Einstein

>out to find items for people to look for. Most of the time I
>was playing this character, my primary thoughts were on how to
>earn Neltouda's tat. As Tellik was approaching old age, I just
>couldn't think of what I was not getting right, and when the

I'm not Nelly but I'll hazard a guess and say it had a lot to do with
you being sphere magic rather than any of her actual spheres.

Reading through her comments, it seems that when I was talking to her at one point, I misunderstood something she had said, or I wouldn't even have even bothered trying for the tat. I seem to have understood her exactly opposite from what she had actually said. Sometimes I swear I'm dyslexic!

Reading through the comments, I'm not too surprised by any of them. When one of my RL friends who also plays CF would ask about Tellik's Imm interactions, I told him I had a feeling you hated him, but that Neltouda seemed to really like him.

Just as a clarification to Daev's comment about all my limited gear, I did have use for most of the stuff I carried. I guess I don't know what I was carrying unused at the time the comment was made. I know there was a point when I had quite a few very rare items that I either couldn't use, or was not interested in using. At that point, I was hanging on to them purely for bartering purposes. Eventually I got rid of all those things. After Kjrorh killed me and almost completely fulled me, Flaire was helping me regear and ended up age-dying in the middle of it. As a result, he passed on most of his stuff to me, hence the massive damroll I ended up with. All that stuff served me well while exploring, even though I didn't use it in pk situations much. There were a number of rare items I kept in my inventory after that point as well. Things that I didn't use often, but I DID use them for certain situations, just not often. Just saying this in case Daev ever wondered the reason. There were a few choice items right near the end of Tellik's life that he was keeping to give to people he knew, but never got the chance and ended up giving them away to random people before deleting (hummingbird pendant, katana named 'Bal'Talon', white diadem of an order lord (that one actually got nailed by anti-horde code before he could give it to the one he'd intended it for), and one or two other items I can't recall any more).


Klaak

Great spirits have always met violent opposition from mediocre minds.
-Einstein

First off, muchas gracias to whomever bought the PBF. I really appreciate it!


Reading through it, I can see my memory on a couple things was slightly off. For one, I guess I only died once to Mizheng, instead of twice like I thought. It also looks as though I didn't manage to seal a single kill the few times I actually sought out a fight with someone. The only killing blow I landed was when someone tried to stop me ranking with my group in darsylon and he died trying.

And I'd also like to clarify that those massive gank-squad-looking pk assists were not hunting parties. They were exploring parties.

Apr 7, 2009 |Lv 51|The Dark Wood|Woldrun vs 5: Tellik (8%), Dorath (15%, KB), Prumethus (25%), Barboissak (7%), Linden (41%

That was a hell trip just getting started and it looked like Woldrun was planning to wade into us, so Linden decided to strike first.

Apr 16, 2009|Lv 51|Galadon|Bedekleae vs 6: Yinichi (13%), Bedigink (16%), Soerd (21%), Tellik (11%), Edika (20%, KB), Dorath (17%)

I forget what it was we were planning on doing with this group, but I'm pretty sure Bedekleae went after the nexuns he could see there, not realizing that Edika and I were grouped with them but hiding in the shadows. We were just passing through galadon when he ran in and struck, so Edika and I joined in to defend our group.



Klaak

Great spirits have always met violent opposition from mediocre minds.
-Einstein

I remember rolling a char just to see what was happening in Thera and noticed you were kingpin and Fyeereth was bandit queen and just thinking, "Cool! What happened?" Glad your plans to overthrow Iktul were eventually enacted. I remember you telling Celenai your plot to do so and I was eager to see it put into motion.

Well done with the character. I liked Tellik a lot.

Awww, you were an awesome Kingpin! I figured once you died off I would lose most of my interest to play, since you actually made the guild fun to play. Oh well. I liked you though, you showed me a lot of interesting things and a few quests I didn't know about, but I bet you could have shown me a lot more if I could have ever ranked up near your level. Dammit. Oh well.

Good luck with your next, Tellik

Did you ever steal anything from me? Did you ever steal anything from any of the Heralds? I always kept my invetory to the bare minimum, so if anything goes missing, I would know.

Aside from the fact that I would steal from allies if I wanted to examine or borrow something, and then return it (which I did A LOT), I don't THINK I ever stole anything from you. If I ever did, it would have been very early on, back in the days when Tellik was much more reckless and far less considerate. Generally speaking, I didn't try stealing from anyone who could see me until after I had devious versatility twice, and with the extra thief points purchased all my pickpocket skills. But by that time, Edika and Tellik had already traveled together quite a bit. I wasn't able to take devious versatility the second time until sometime after our expedition into Yzekon. So chances are, I probably never stole anything that I didn't return right away.

As for other Heralds, I think I actually robbed Celenai a few times before I ever sent in my application. Ha! It was pretty tough to resist stealing whenever I saw that (Legendary) flag on an item in someone's inventory. After I joined Herald, I don't think I ever stole something from any of them that I didn't return immediately.


Klaak

Great spirits have always met violent opposition from mediocre minds.
-Einstein

That's what I get for never keeping my shield of flames up.

Damnit Tellik. I thought you gonna age die. After getting the note from you, I knew you deleted. I hate you cause you were knowledgeable about everything. I know you got bored with this character once you got Kingpin.

Thanks for so many experiences and fun. I wish I could have done more exploring with you.

You made things interesting in the guild. Glad I backed the right horse in the vote. Thanks for all the good times/coins/gear and GLWYN.