This is from the immortal/god etc. helpfile.

Immortals (IMM): Immortals are beings who wield the influence of the
spheres. Most have priests and other followers through which they seek to influence the mortal planes more directly to further their philosophies and goals. The most favored of these mortals are tattooed with the mark of their patron deity. Immortals are far beyond the abilities of mortals, and only the most foolish would even think to approach one with anything less than awe and reverence. Immortals may take any form, or instead remain unseen by mortal eyes.

Neltouda IS an immortal. Meaning, you should approach her with awe and reverence. Awe and reverence does not include random hugs, tickles, belly rubs or even sitting on her head. I think this applies with all immortals. If an immortal wants you to approach them in some way that is more intimate than standing and talking the role play would be very clear that you have permission to do this. If it is not very clear to you that you have permission to touch immortals then don't do it. Definitely don't touch Neltouda.

Unless it's consensual.

Isn't it better to RP someone like "older brother" or at least "father/mother" instead of "actual God"?

I really think this depends on the persona of the god. For me, I like to think I play Rayihn as "fun older sister", open affectionate, doesn't mind being hugged and wants to be close to people. Baer is the opposite.

And needs a hug.

Well, I hope this cuts down on your unwanted interactions.

Ow! My ovaries!

Kinda like those level 30 battle warriors who talk trash to opposing hero leader characters.

Imms should have a command that puts a mouthy lowbie in hero pk range and gives a 10 second warning before teleporting him to the guy he's talking smack to

Honestly I swear there have been a string over the years that have actively encouraged this kind of silly behavior.

I agree mortals shouldn't be tickling gods but I also disagree with the assertion that in Thera mortals should be in awe of the gods. They are just walking around a fair bit and have very personal relationships with a lot of people. They are not so much gods as they are CEO's someone with a fair amount of authority and depending on your station you should modify how you interact with them but more of an in charge person then an all powerful being whose presence would be an honor to simply be in.

I agree with you. On an expected awe-scale from Astein to Grummorum, Neltouda is saying she wants to be more on the Astein side. Most gods probably fall much closer to Astein than Grummorum, in fact. Probably Neltouda gets more touchy feely stuff partly because it's a female character, which is sexist bs, but probably also because the religion is more happy-go-lucky and herald-y, which gives people a wrong impression of the expectation.

But certainly there are more physically approachable gods than others.

I think the key here is they have encouraged it within their own religion/shrine whatever. Acting like you can treat all characters the same is within the line of thought that rp doesn't really matter. If another imm is actively demonstrating via roleplay that a particular sort of behavior is allowed then by all means participate... I am simply saying that due to immortal status alone a mortal should not assume they can treat an immortal so. There have been immortals that want you to kneel and never look at them. Should you assume you should kneel and never look at all immortals? Probably not, those were special cases. On the same note if there is an immortal that requires that sort of behavior it would be 100% within the realm of what it means to be immortal. I think seeing an immortal as a CEO is still pretty off. No, they aren't the one creator of all that rules all... but they also are not just the guys with the fattest wallets.

Not from someone who hugs and tickles Neltouda.

There seems like there is a disconnect for me IC. IC I know gods are powerful, but IC I also know they can be killed. OOC I view them more like greek gods and less like supreme all-powerful beings. It also matches much better what Immortals are capable (and willing) to do IC. After all, you don't see an Imm randomly turning people into pillars of salt, but making them a toad or something as punishment.

In my, I'm not that humble, opinion, you are missing an opportunity here. If you want people to treat your Imm char like the uber-powerful (but not all powerful) being that it is... Throw around some smiting action. Do some crippling/ass-kicking (preferably with limited duration, but long enough to get the point across). Instead of your Imm char thinking, I could destroy this puny creature with a thought, think more I can destroy this creature, but what would the reprisal be? Is there a chance, any chance, that he would find my Achilles's Heel (for lack of a better term) and kill me, a god?*

I'm not saying play with the kid gloves on. What I am saying is play your character, but know who your actual character is. This only applies to IC interactions. OOC of course Imms should be treated with the respect they deserve as deeply devoted administrators of a game we all love to play.

Immortal on CF is not Alpha and Omega.
Immortal on CF is not omnipresent and omniscient.
Immortal on CF is not truly all-powerful.

Immortal on CF is nearly impossible to kill, but possible.
Immortal on CF is ageless, but hasn't existed for all time.
Immortal on CF is extremely powerful compared to joe schmoe mortal, but since powerful(ish) mortals can become immortal, seems like the difference perhaps isn't as great as it might look.

Just some thoughts. If you don't want to be hugged, perhaps ripping their arms off is in order... Or maybe you can put them on a marooned ship at sea that is crawling with starving rats and there are vultures circling overhead.... Or some other, even more creative because Imms are way better at this stuff than me, punishment that fits your ImmChar's IC persona.

And, of course, if they don't react IC the way they probably should, it might mean this is actually an OOC issue (not RPing essentially) that needs to be addressed.

Tac

* Unless you are Twist of course, then you can be returned through the power of DANCE!

Smite the crap out of them. Or have someone code a smite-like ability for you. I think Twist had a cool/unique smite echo. (Or maybe that was just for the twist going crazy/returning event).

Especially if it takes half their hp/mana/mv it shows them that they are not a powerful as they *Think* they are. It is a warning after all. Like certain imms would probably impale/cranial/pincer/punt you if they tried that. For lower level people a warning smite might be needed. I really think mortals should fear immortals (especially how powerful battle imms or evil imms).

Of course, serious rules errors are handled the way they should. But that is OOC so yeah.

Again, this is just my opinion. And I like Tac's ideas for punishments.

but its getting pelted with hail. I think it should actually do damage. I also think the over floofication of Imms isn't helping, buuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuut what can you do.

It takes off 50% of hp/mana/move.
It just doesn't show as Neltouda's Hailstorm does UNSPEAKABLE things to you.

nt

Headbutt a person? Sure. Punt them? Sure. Impale them and plague them and trans them to the SoS. All good things. Knock off 50% hp mana mv without an accompanying damage echo... boring. Even if your smite is smoove, I'd rather see something actually dangerous (potentially lethal). Part of this is the OOC knowledge that smite can't kill, and the other part is also a bit OOC in that something that doesn't do DAMAGE NOUN doesn't get my attention like UNSPEAKABLE THINGS does.

One man's opinion... That is, of course, objective truth.

I am moving around and after a while realize I am not in perfect health and have to scroll back up. Most of the smite echos don't POP well unless you just happen to be standing around.

Even if it were to just say the Unspeaks in red without doing unspeaks. It would grab peoples attention more. Which is a good thing. Every time that I was smited (which was twice by twist durring his awakening event), I thought it would be much better to see a big damage message. All the sudden I was low hp/mana/moves and I was like "What happened? I didn't see a damage message."

The smite could also produce a damage string. So it would look like this

A cloud of darkness emerges from the shadows and engulfs you
EvilGod's smiting DOES UNSPEAKABLE THINGS

And the damage string would just be based on how much HP is removed.

Even if you don't see the damage, you've done something to upset a very powerful being. I've seen people shrug and chuckle after being smited by gods. The only thing I would suggest to remedy this is for the gods to be even crueler in the face of such disrespect. I once saw Scarabaeus rip someone's tongue out, I think the character was permanently muted. But with a lot of attitudes of the characters that shrug and chuckle at smites, I bet that sort of thing would just lead to deletes.

Just to put some things into perspective, I have killed people, smited them, harassed them with damage at times that are bad for them, essentially nerfed their character, given titles, plague, flaws blah blah blah Yet, the message does not get across. It is not ok to act like a mortal and an immortal are on the same level.

Immortal on CF is not Alpha and Omega.
- An immortal is alpha on many levels when compared to a mortal.
Immortal on CF is not omnipresent and omniscient.
- No they aren't, but they sure as heck know a lot more than you do.
Immortal on CF is not truly all-powerful.
- Also they aren't. This has to do with a shared power thing that is easily demonstrated by the sphere system. Like you said similar to the greek gods. That isn't at all something that is ooc, it is something that is very much ic.
Immortal on CF is nearly impossible to kill, but possible.
- It is not possible for a mortal to kill an immortal. Immortal to immortal well... also a lot of gods that people say are dead is ICly pretty false. If it wasn't ICly provided that a god is dead well that power is out there somewhere.
Immortal on CF is ageless, but hasn't existed for all time.
- Also true.
Immortal on CF is extremely powerful compared to joe schmoe mortal, but since powerful(ish) mortals can become immortal, seems like the difference perhaps isn't as great as it might look.
- I think the difference here is a lot of people confuse an OOC immortal with an IC immortal. OOC immortals, we're just people like you. IC, if you brush it off and think you can you use slanderous names or other inappropriate things you are going to get reprimanded in some way. Period. IC immortals give you divine power! It should be a big deal. If you think it's not, I would suggest you reevaluate your roleplay.

"Immortal on CF is nearly impossible to kill, but possible.
- It is not possible for a mortal to kill an immortal. Immortal to immortal well... also a lot of gods that people say are dead is ICly pretty false. If it wasn't ICly provided that a god is dead well that power is out there somewhere."

In a properly role played environment, all things are possible, even if infinitesimally unlikely.

I can't find a good listing of when it has happened in real mythology, but I'm sure the Hind's blood existed specifically for this purpose (gods have something to fear).

I'm thinking of it like this. As a child, adults (especially parents) seem all powerful. From a child's perspective they can do whatever they want to you and you are powerless to stop them, but that is mostly because as a child you just don't understand the nature of their "power". Sometimes a child will realize, even before they are no longer a child that whatever hold a parent has over them is directly derived from the power the child gives them. An adult cannot force a child to do something any more than they can force another adult, unless the child essentially lets them.

How would you react, IC if a mortal enemy of yours that you have no trouble dispatching in fights suddenly becomes a hero-imm. Are you now trembling in fear when yesterday you stood over his lifeless corpse and mocked his ideals? That seems like an awful big swing to make for most of the (mostly) uncompromising extremist types that CF generates.

Yesterday I'm Emperor of Thera and you are a piss-ant Fort Thief that I bash to death for fun. Today you are Immortal and I'm supposed to fear and revere you? Maybe, but few of my characters would probably make that mental adjustment well, or at all.

>and I'm supposed to fear and revere you? Maybe, but few of my
>characters would probably make that mental adjustment well, or
>at all.

But this means few of your characters are very bright. IC, you have to take it something like that the other gods of their general persuasion have seen fit to imbue them with divine power. They have become an avatar, that is an embodiement divinity. It doesn't matter if they were pushovers the day before. A garden slug turned into an avatar is a powerful being.

If an enemy who you've bullied around becomes an avatar you should be thinking "holy #### he's gained godlike power, I really hope he doesn't go columbine on my ass."

That doesn't mean you have to revere them. It's fine to hate gods antithetical to your beliefs, but you should be a little afraid of them in that case.

But perhaps a priest of Slurm the warrior slug is in order.

To be perfectly honest, I've never had a good grasp of the IC relationship between mortals and Imms, which is why I suspect my empowerment attempts generally feel so bleh. This could just be my issue, but I can't think of a single character I've played that would have legitimate (not based on belief/faith) reason to fear any god, let alone a newly made one.

I fear a "mortal" lich because they can kill me, will kill me, and few things and few people are going to do a whole lot to stop them. An Immortal isn't that level of scary to your ordinary non-empowered PC char. They are like the POTUS or a Senator or something. Sure, they could make your life miserable if they wanted, but chances are they aren't going to bother and if they did, someone else (rival Senator) might step up and smack them back. And at the end of the day I can vote them all out of office.

nt

I understand the comparison. It is valid. There are issues with the viewpoint I've outlined and it isn't one all my characters share.

Something I run into, fairly often, is the mage who says "Wait till I hero, then I'll kill you easily". I get this even from some well played and otherwise good characters. Sometimes it is true. More times than not the character I was killing at 25 and 35 and 40 is still a character I'm killing at 51. Now they are 52 and I'm afraid?

Editted to add: I do understand the frustration that Neltouda is expressing. I run into it on a fairly regular basis (even more often than the situation above) where mid-ranked cabal enemy mouths off and implies they are going to easily dispatch my hero when they become one. Then they do, are killed, and continue spouting off at the mouth while a ghost. I am expected to handle this matter IC. I don't see why an Imm is any different in this regard (but with a vastly superior skillset). I get the frustration, I really do, and there are some people with enough "Internet Tough Guy Syndrome" baked into them that no amount of IC punishment or prodding will get them to wise up. I think at that point it becomes a rules violation. They aren't RPing a character. They are RPing an anonymous ITG.

If they really are rping their role, well... Roles don't protect you from the consequences of following them.

"Wait until I hero, then I'll kill you." It just screams game mechanics to me and takes me out of the setting a little. They may as well be saying, "I could beat you up if you weren't tougher than me."

It's a sentiment that should be born out of frustration, not arrogance. They don't have to pay an enemy hero respect to get the message across. I'd infinitely prefer "One day I'll kill you, I swear it!"

> Now they are 52 and I'm afraid?

Levels don't mean the same thing after 51. A new immortal doesn't simply advance a level past the end of mortal, they become an enormously more powerful being imbued with divine power. It's a huge transformation, not just another incremental step. That's why the level is now "AVA" and not 52. Yes, in a file on a piece of electronic hardware in reality they are level 52. IC they are something else entirely.