I read the arial helpfile recently and something in it makes no sense and should, I think, be redone.

The helpfile states that arials are too impatient and lack the dedication needed to be a paladin.

They can, however, be invokers.

Now I am not arguing whether arials should or should not be allowed to be paladins, but, once you've made that executive decision I think the helpfile should not pick as its excuse that arials are too impatient or lack dedication. Invokers are at the pinnacle of classes requiring patience and dedication. It takes far more time and effort to achieve guild mastery than any other class, and you've devised it that way on purpose.

Creative people such as yourselves are surely capable of coming up with a reason for the non-paladin rule that doesn't conflict with the very next line of the helpfile.

We could actually go further and find texts that support your argument:

Due to their short lifespans, arial society has divided itself into two paradigms. The first group (which arials see represented by Shokai) choose to devote themself fully to a cause and to the duty of that cause. These individuals tend to be very focused and steadfast in their goals and rarely waver from their tasks.

This quoted passage suggests that they DO have dedication of the sort that would make them ideal paladins. However, I do not think this is a grave concern.

All of the races are undergoing fluid change as the game develops. We've already had a discussion about possible inconsistencies within the duergar and svirfnebli helpfiles. Arial culture is developed enough that I doubt they'll touch upon it any time soon. There are probably other racial matters that call for more immediate attention.

Assuming this was a fatal inconsistency, what do you propose they do about it?

This comparison of how much dedication and patience is based completely upon the player's point of view, not the character's. Maybe the faith/conviction what have you needed for a paladin require far more than an invoker doing spells. You the player would not ever see this, because you dont need to spam, etc to be a paladin.

Anyways, what im saying here is that from a purely IC point of view, paladins require more patience and dedication than any other class. When was the last time you had fun praying? On the other hand, if you could shoot countless fireballs at kobolds in real life, I think you would enjoy it. Time flies when your having fun.*

*I would like to apoligize for this horrible pun but I couldn't help myself.

>This comparison of how much dedication and patience is based
>completely upon the player's point of view, not the
>character's. Maybe the faith/conviction what have you needed
>for a paladin require far more than an invoker doing spells.
>You the player would not ever see this, because you dont need
>to spam, etc to be a paladin.
>
>Anyways, what im saying here is that from a purely IC point of
>view, paladins require more patience and dedication than any
>other class. When was the last time you had fun praying? On
>the other hand, if you could shoot countless fireballs at
>kobolds in real life, I think you would enjoy it. Time flies
>when your having fun.*
>
>*I would like to apoligize for this horrible pun but I
>couldn't help myself.


I don't understand this. "Maybe the faith/conviction what yhave you needed for a paladin require far more than an invoker doing spells." What does that mean? Patience and dedication are a function of time. The helpfile is clear that the restriction is due to the arial short life span's affect on arial behavior and ability. Saying a paladin requires more faith than an invoker, sure, but that's got nothing to do with this. Forgive me but I don't see how you can claim that being a paladin requires more of a time investment, something which requires patience, than being an invoker. It requires many things, but that's not one of them.

I don't see how just saying "paladins require more patience and dedication than any other class" actually makes that true. For example, do paladin characters start out at older ages than other classes? In fact, your point about ic and ooc differences mitigate the other way, in my opinion. The problem is often that you can't find your god online at the times you are online. An ooc problem.

There are a million reasons an arial can't be a paladin - they could just say that the gods have willed it so, and leave it at that - but the one in the helpfile just doesn't make sense, given that arials can be the one class which requires the most patience and dedication to guild work.

What he's saying is that the deciation you are talking about as an invoker is essentially an OOC dedication, one on the part of the player, obviously this translates to some kind of IC dedication. However the didcation of a Paladin is one that doesn't translate across to the player. Essentialy a paladin's dedication doesn't have to be translated back across to the player, you as a player don't have to believe in what your character believes. The Paladin's dedication is a characters Role-Playing dedication to a cause, not a players game-mechanics dedication to spell mastering.

.

Ok, again, you guys are missing the point. We are not talking about depth of dedication as a matter of faith.

We are talking about it as a matter of time. It takes longer to become a master of the things your guild teaches you if your guild is the invoker guild than it does if your guild is the paladin guild.

That's all. The helpfile speaks to a lack of patience, a lack of a willingness to put in the time.

Because of that, it makes no sense to say arials can be invokers but not paladins.

Now, if you wanted to say that it requires a level of dedication to faith or goodness or whatever, fine. Though that of course would pose at least something of a problem for arials being shamen, but that's a different topic.

As an aside, if you are trying to say that because it takes a significantly greater amount of time to go through the spells as an invoker but that ic no such time investment is present, I think that's just silly. Obviously it's ic as much if not more than ooc. As the easy and obvious example, the invoker guild is the only one which has virtually all spells being taught only when predicate spells are mastered or near mastered. The Paladin guild will let you speed level to hero and get all the guild sups no matter how long you've been a paladin, and what mastery you have in any set of supplications or skills (obviously shield mastery is the one exception, but that's just that, an exception).

Invokers spend more time, ic, learning to be an invoker, than any other guild requires to be its profession. By far. To be an invoker requires enormous patience and dedication of time. Arials can be invokers. But arials, according the helpfile, cannot be paladins because they are unwilling and/or unable to dedicate that amount of patience and time. These are mutually exclusive, and so the helpfile should be changed.

Dont focus so much on the time things take, try to focus more on the word "patience".
What they mean could probably be that being impatient, you wont make for a good paladin, it could cause some conflict with the paladin code. The gods might find you unworthy and thus no empowerment. But as an invoker you can be as impatient as you like, you can still eventually get your spells.