Tue Oct 26 03:20:36 2010

At 11 o'clock AM, Day of Freedom, 11th of the Month of the Long Shadows
on the Theran calendar Elloril perished, never to return.

We should meet. Read your PMs on Dio's!

It was nice fighting Elloril, though champion paladins do seem underpowered. I reckon nearly any Paladin would be underpowered against Charine though, because of despoil/ABS/resist positive and devils. But we know how shield deds and two handers are...

I'll PM you and we can sort something out.

As far as champions go, they are underpowered in most situations. However, there are niche situations where they are nice, even in solo pk. For example, when I was raiding scion and some rhino came to help the scions, I was able to stand north of the archmage and knock the rhino into the archmage, which probably did more damage to the archmage than I would have been doing myself, not to mention hurting the rhino.

Had to go awol because of work, but the main reason I didn't attempt to keep this character live, despite liking him, was some of what I had to put up with.

Not from my enemies, who were generally pretty cool. A certain felar warrior did piss me off a bit, when I had to log off and returned to pick up some gear he said he'd left, only to find him waiting for me, whereupon he finished me off as I was injured and had no sanc. I only went whilst this vulnerable because I had to log off. Ah well. At least he was an imperial so I should expect to be screwed over.

What I didn't expect was to see the same negative side of fort as an ally that I saw as an enemy. That is to say, people who talk a good game but don't actually live up to it. For example, specific events I can remember are:

- Me + another paladin attempting to retrieve a couple of times against nasty odds, failing, deciding to head off to Trothon to explore before retrieving later. A shifter in the 40s logs on, bitches at us for not trying to retrieve, and says he will. Then after a while, I ask why he's not retrieved, and it turns out he has one enemy, so isn't trying, even after admonishing us when we did attempt it. Then he logs off, and me + other paladin retrieve, admittedly against weak opposition (or none, I forget).

- A duergar scion warrior attempting to retrieve from us. Two acolytes on + me. I'm rushing to defend andthe acolytes say not to bother, as they are exploring and will help take the scepter back later. I continue running to try to defend, but don't get there in time. No matter. After all, we're going to try to take it again, right? Wrong. They have time to explore another area if I want to come, but not to take the scepter (despite saying that they would). Anyway, I eventually chivvy them into coming, but the one duergar warrior (admittedly tough) scared them into giving up, even though he can only bash one of us, at which point the other can heal the guy being bashed, or both paladins can heal the conjie. (We were 2 x paladin + 1 x conjie.) Other paladin decides it is too dangerous after one attempt where he was targetted, and both the other fort back out. Not wonderful.

- It gets better though. The scion, clearly encouraged by this, then comes and starts smacking the maran at the fort. I say to the other paladin to head out to defend it, and he doesn't want to (presumably because this is also dangerous). However, when I said I was going anyway, he redeemed himself by coming too, and actually saved my life (which is what should be happening anyway).

Basically, there was far too much talk of self-sacrifice, and far too little self sacrifice.

There were equally plenty of cool people in the fort, but I just got fed up with the others. It seemed like people stepping it up for induction etc. and then not bothering at other times in some cases.

Generally I liked the fort warriors best (Pernth was my favorite), and Mazura was ok to hang out with too (although I did get a faint sense of powergameyness that I couldn't put my finger on -- might be misplaced). I did die like a chump when I told Mazura I didn't want her pills when I was scourged, and just died to it. Turned out she was offering me speckled pills, but I thought she was offering brown dust. I'd fallen asleep at the crucial moment so seen her getting dust out after mentioning pills, and then I wibbled on until it was too late. Doh!

I also liked many of the villagers, whether they were friendly or hostile (and sometimes we were both).

Champions felt... mixed. I think my main issues with them were:
- your defense stinks until you fend, but if you are getting lagged you can't fend.
- You need to know when your fend effect wears off on different people. As it is, they get the echo about recovering their footing and you don't.
- too many skills are foiled by a dirt kick.
- mana cost is a bit too high given the failure rate on marshal rally, imho. Other marshal skills are ok.

Some champion skills rocked though. Maneuver was probably my favorite. Charine didn't know how close she came to death when she tried to tesseract to me when I was next to Certain Death. (I had transportation sensitivity, which rocks.) Unfortunately her tesseract failed, so I didn't get to use maneuver to knock her into it.

Also, the secondary effects of bat were nice. Like the extra attack in the next round.

I second what Torak said about noremove weaponry. Champions are gimped in this respect. I got the staff of justice once when a scion out of my pk was killing the ranger guildguard (probably to get the executioners axe for an orc who had dropped one in the fort). If I could have avoided being disarmed, I think a champion would have been much more viable in solo pk. The anti-disarm skill was very nice, but really it's only a matter of time before someone succeeds.

I did enjoy my fights with Charine, and anyone who thinks maneuver is unreliable should have seen them. Most of the time I could repeatedly knock her out of the room before her pets arrived. When I didn't, however, I got beaten down crazily quickly by her pets (partly because the devil dispelled rather often). That said, I don't think she ever quite got me, despite coming very close on several occasions. She saved an orc I had convulsing one of those times too. Boo.

Nnaeshuk... you were very cool. The level of attention you give the fortress through good times and bad is impressive, and really makes a difference. Rewards are nice, but just having your efforts recognised with a comment makes a huge difference (particularly when you are feeling frustrated).

To whomever the imm (or imms?) was who took the part of my gods, thanks so much. I really liked this religion, and if it were not for my getting annoyed with some of my fellow fortress members, I would have loved to carry it through. Essentially I hoped to develop each aspect of my religion in turn. Starting with trying to inspire, then trying to kill the wicked, then to enlighten myself and others.

So, a lot of negativity here, even though in practice 80% of my experience was positive. Unfortunately, as a paladin, and a squire, I had to just suck up everything I didn't like, because it would be disrespectful to my fellow guildmates to tell them what I thought etc.. Unfortunately, whilst I thought I was generally a good paladin, I know my frustration sometimes made me overly aggressive to some of my allies when I spoke. As a paladin, I apologise. As a player, I wish I could have really let rip.

A parting comment to some of the imperials who whined or mocked me. There were about 4 of you that I ONLY managed to catch and kill because you were so busy mouthing off to me that you didn't see me approaching to finish you off. Had you held your tongues, you would probably have seen me coming and not been caught.

Not sure if I'll play again any time soon. I do have one role in mind, but suspect I won't have the time to really do a character justice.

High point of this character:
- going to defend against 4 imperials when I was certain I would die, managing to drive them all off, then Mazura turning up and us turning the tide.

Low point:
- giving the shield of light to a paladin who said others were more deserving of it, and me suggesting that if he felt that others were more deserving, he could give defiance to a paladin who (a) couldn't cure themselves of plague etc using a virtue, and (b) concentrated on weaponry. Said paladin appeared to decide that actually they did deserve shiny gear after all, and kept both defiance and the shield. Which confirmed my initial fears that said paladin talked a good game only to gain rewards (like the shield I gave them). It's a shame, because the spoken rp of the paladin was really high quality. I hasted to add that I said I would not take defiance for myself.

Umm, yeah. Probably the nastiest battlefield farewell I've ever made. Sorry.

I liked what I saw from this character. I'm sorry you had all the negative stuff you mentioned happen and let it ruin the character for ya. We do watch out for this stuff. I'm sorry I didn't see it happen or I would have had to crack some skulls.

Nae-nae

The Fortress is not necessarily about self-sacrifice. Dead cabalmembers are useless cabalmembers, so why should you be eager to be dead?

By which I don't mean to say that cowardice should be encouraged. You should at least try, when you have even but the slighest chance of actually pulling it off.

But there is no need to die for it. If you want to force that on yourself through role, be my guest, ofcourse.


PS: I did not know the character, just thought this was an interesting read.

I rarely threw my life away.

The point is not so much whether you fight, as whether you SAY you are going to do something and then don't do it.

I liked you, and sorry to see we lost you.

We only worked together a little, mainly with me raiding with you some and helping when you were fighting in case you got lagged, but I was looking forward to getting to work with you a lot more.

Good luck with the next.

Because thats how you spend your time does not neccesarily mean that is how your cabal mates choose to spend their time. Also because they choose to explore/rank today over raiding/retrieving doesn't mean they will do so every day.

Just saying you should be aware that people having different priorities then you in a given login isn't the end of the world. I am sure they were thinking, can't this dude realize we spent the last 3 hours attempting to retrieve and just let us do our thing?

Now the lowbie calling you out is really weak I will give you that. In the duergar situation if you step up and show your allies there is not much to fear (succesfully) then not only will they show more courage but you might get rewarded for it.

They told me

not to defend

and that they would

take the scepter back with me after finishing exploring.

Then they tried to say they didn't have time, even though they did have time to explore a new place with me (and I went to most places with others).

Then they said it was too dangerous (when it wasn't).

If they want to explore, why:
- tell me not to defend because they would help me to take it back right after they finished their exploring.

Why tell me this at all if they weren't going to live up to it? That's nothing to do with how you want to spend your time. If you want to spend your time doing something else, DON'T SAY not to defend because you will help take the scepter back.

Get it? Don't say it. Simple.

My gripe was about people TALKING a good game and then NOT living up to their words.