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Topics - OneST8
1
« on: June 03, 2010, 02:26:05 am »
Astronomers estimate that there are 200 to 400 billion stars in our galactic neighborhood, the Milky Way. I guess that someone tried to count them in this fully-zoomable, ultra-high-definition 800,000-image mosaic and got tired around 296,351,284,702. (Gizmodo) WOW! The mosaic is simply brilliant.
2
« on: May 18, 2010, 07:42:57 pm »
Please note that the forums will be shutdown sometime late tonight (EST).
We don't know when exactly or for how long but we will communicate via IRC, Twitter and our Facebook page as necessary during the downtime.
Please also note that the following shouldn't experience any disruptions of service: IRC, NwN Server(s) and Email (for those with Layonara accounts).
There will be another announcement a few minutes before we take the forums down so as to give at least a little warning.
We do apologize for the inconvenience this downtime may be causing.
Respectfully,
The Management
3
« on: May 17, 2010, 07:25:57 pm »
Hi Everyone, I've been hunting for some good space-type movies to watch and sadly I haven't found anything I haven't seen already. Basically, my idle brain cycles are craving some good space-ship based movies to consume and I'm coming to you fine folks for your recommendations. To give you an idea, the following are all "A" list movies in my space-books. I'm assuming that I'll have seen just about everything everyone suggests but I've got to ask anyways just in case there's that one gem I've been missing out on that will satisfy my craving. Also, some background into the sci-fi-ness of the question, I've been consumed with all things Cosmos related these days and for anyone interested in learning about our universe I would highly recommend all of the following documentaries (in no particular order): You know what, while we're at it, suggest documentaries too! I love to learn about the deep-end of physics and I think one of the things I like about space-based movies is that I get to pick out all the "hollywood physics" and I've got to admit that the latest Star Trek held true to a lot of things that they ignored in the prior installments in the series. As an example, due to the vacuum of space, there is no sound nor is there really any chance for fire and in the prior films they'd have huge explosions with lots of real flame and noise but in the latest Star Trek there's a deafening lack of sound as the camera follows a crew-person that's sucked out a gaping hole in the ship and all the external "fires" are rendered at least fairly close to what would be expected of explosions sucked out into space. Anyways, I appreciate all feedback! Thanks! ~OneST8
4
« on: December 03, 2009, 08:47:52 am »
Greetings everyone!
After a bit of a struggle and a bad power supply, everything is back up and running across the entire Layonara domain. This includes LORE (which is doing a character update as I type this).
So, thank you to everyone for your patience and understanding during this time. It's sincerely appreciated.
-- The Management
5
« on: November 28, 2009, 01:25:38 am »
Greetings everyone, There is a hardware issue with one of the Layonara servers and at this time. In order to mitigate the random downtime of the forums; we're disabling the LORE character updates for a few days. As well, at some time during the next two/three days the entire layonara.com domain will be taken offline for general maintenance reasons. This downtime will last anywhere from a few hours to possibly more and there's no way to forecast this accurately. These things have nothing to do with the MMO development and there are no hidden announcements here. About the only thing that's related to the MMO with all of this is that we've been so busy working on the MMO that we haven't had the time to do the needed housecleaning that's now in a state we cannot ignore. Nothing "bad", just need to make things "right" again. So, just to clarify, the following services will be completely offline at some point in the next few days and you should all rest assured we're going to try and minimize the downtime as best we can. - The World of Layonara
- forums.layonara.com
- irc.layonara.com
- devlog.layonara.com
- lore.layonara.com
- NwN Server (xora.layonara.com)
- and any other service layonara.com provides that I've failed to mention in the above...
Currently the only planned means of official communication regarding status updates during the outage is via twitter. Please stay tuned.
6
« on: November 27, 2009, 09:28:37 am »
Hello everyone!
Over the past few days the forums have been seeing a little more stress than normal and as such there have been intermittent issues and outages. This is not necessarily due to anything we can or can't talk about publicly at this time.
We do sincerely apologize for any inconvenience these problems may be causing and we would like to reassure you all that we're doing our best to balance the workloads and keep things running at status quo.
Layonara is going through some rather interesting growth over the next few months and so we can only ask for everyone to please bear with us as we all traverse these new waters.
Thank you for your patience and understanding.
-- The Management.
7
« on: April 21, 2009, 01:19:38 pm »
Hello everyone,
I just wanted to speak my mind a little regarding the recent volume of NwN updates.
Everyone gets excited with new features, bugfixes and enhancements however this is because it's publicly broadcasted and readily playable. Of course, this is in the case of Layonara's NwN development.
With respect to the MMO, the dev team cranks out just as much work as what we've publicly done with NwN however the intimate details are not shared and as such, it's hard for the public to get as excited.
Basically, I just want to let everyone know that while the MMO's development may seem mysterious and vague on it's public face; please rest assured that significant progress is being made and I want you all to know that the level of work you've seen from the NwN side of things is exactly the level of work you don't see on the MMO side of things.
At some point in the future Layonara will get much more relaxed and transparent with the MMO's development but until that time comes everyone will have to trust that the lack of attention to NwN is being translated directly to progress made on the MMO.
Whether publicly or behind the scenes; Layonara dev's are working just as hard with every opportunity we have to spare.
Cheers & Enjoy the recent NwN updates!
-OneST8
8
« on: February 16, 2009, 12:45:11 am »
Insanity or dedication? You tell me.  I got this tattoo yesterday (Valentine's Day) at the same time as my fiancée got the following one:  Sharing the experience of getting tattoos; how's that for a Valentine's gift?
9
« on: February 04, 2009, 03:45:06 pm »
Just a quick FYI, the machine that the IRC service is currently being hosted on is having a slew of issues. We are working on the problem. For now, the #nwn channel is the only one that's functional. We're looking at migrating the service to a different machine to help reduce the load.
I'll post updates on this thread as things change.
Sorry for the inconvenience.
10
« on: January 29, 2009, 06:12:18 am »
LORE will finally send out registration emails and password requests.
Yay that I finally got this stuff working.
Sorry for things like this lagging for so long in a non-functional state.
11
« on: January 29, 2009, 04:23:16 am »
While working on some web server backup maintenance, with the help of orth we made some changes to LORE. The two most notable differences are: - Character pages are now updating again
- The antiquated header logo has been changed
Enjoy!
13
« on: May 06, 2008, 06:00:53 pm »
My fiancee was browsing Firefox add-ons today and she discovered this very cool parental controls add-on for Firefox called Glubble. For anyone with a family-shared computer who uses Firefox (on any platform), Glubble will make browsing the net for the yungsters safe and sane. Seriously, this is an awesome thing for any family computing environment. So, without further delay... check out GLUBBLE! Cheers!
14
« on: April 18, 2008, 12:42:36 pm »
Wizards of the Coast has announced plans for a brand-new system license for the fourth edition of Dungeons and Dragons. As with the d20 STL for Third Edition, this is a royalty-free license that will allow third parties to publish products using the rules developed by WotC. The new system reference document will be made available early in June (just after the release of the new edition). That license only covers fantasy gaming, but a second license (the d20 GSL) will be released allowing for any type of gaming product to be developed. For analysis and follow-up on the announcement, the ENWorld boards have full details. -- Entire quote taken straight from the Slashdot article.
15
« on: April 03, 2008, 01:14:33 pm »
The Register is reporting that 17 of the 37 anti-virus packages tested have failed VB100 certification. McAfee VirusScan, Trend Micro Internet Security and Sophos Anti-Virus overlooked threats known to be in circulation. I figured since there are a number of Vista users in our community that they may be interested in knowing if their A/V software is actually doing a good job of locking things down and catching known threats.
16
« on: March 29, 2008, 08:00:14 pm »
Google has darkened their main page in an effort to spread awareness about Earth Hour. As of like a minute from now, I'm shutting down for the hour! Cheers folks! See you all in an hour! PS: Yes I realize I should have mentioned this earlier for folks  heh
17
« on: March 28, 2008, 01:46:01 pm »
hehe ok ok totally misleading and flame-bait ready thread subject there  Here's the article that inspired this thread: Microsoft brand in decline! With that said, I'd just like to share a brief reminder to all who are interested in MS alternatives... Ubuntu is totally free and has a relatively painless install with a dual-boot option for those unwilling or unable to take the full plunge by stripping their systems of MS completely. hehe! Enjoy!
18
« on: March 01, 2008, 12:21:34 pm »
Check out this wired article First Look: New D&D Stats Leak Onto Web... then... check out this comment (which I've copied below) posted by a slashdotter in this thread. ( WARNING, SOME ITEMS IN THIS LIST MAY NOT BE SAFE FOR CHILDREN.) New rules in the 4th edition
1. Cannot base characters off the Ash from the Evil Dead movies.
2. A one man band is not an appropriate bard instrument.
3. There is no Dwarven god of heavy artillery.
4. My 7th Sea character Boudreaux is not the 'Southern' Montaigne.
5. Not allowed to blow all my skill points on 1pt professional skills.
6. Synchronized panicking is not a proper battle plan.
7. Nor is "Kill them all and let God sort them out"
8. Not allowed to use psychic powers to do the dishes.
9. How to serve Dragons is not a cookbook.
10. My monk's lips must be in sync.
11. Just because my character and I can speak German, doesn't mean the GM can.
13. Not allowed to berserk for the hell of it, especially during royal masquerades.
13. Must learn at least one offensive or defensive spell if I'm the sorcerer.
14. Must not murder canon NPCs in their sleep, no matter how cliche they are.
15. Ogres are not kosher.
16. Plan B is not automatically twice as much explosives as Plan A.
17. I will not beat Tomb of Horrors in less than 10 minutes from memory.
18. Collateral Damage Man is not an appropriate name for a super hero.
19. When surrendering I am to hand the sword over HILT first.
20. Drow are not good eating.
21. Polka is not appropriate marching music.
22. No longer allowed to recreate the Death Star Trench Run out of genre.
23. There is no such thing as a Gnomish Pygmy War Rhino.
24. Any character who has a sensitivity training center named after him will be taken away.
25. Even if the rules allow it, I am not allowed to summon 50,000 Blue Whales.
26. The green elf does not need food badly.
27. Valley speak has no place in a fantasy setting. Especially if you're the paladin.
28. I am not to shoot every corpse in the head to make sure they aren't a zombie in Twilight 2000.
29. The Goddess' of Marriage chosen weapon is not the whip.
30. I cannot have any gun that requires me to continue the damage code on back.
31. I am not to kill off all the vampires in the LARP, even if they are terminally stupid.
32. The backup trap handler is not whoever has the most HP at the time.
33. I cannot buy any animal in groups of 100 or over.
34. There is no such skill as 'improvised cooking'
35. I am not allowed to base any Droid off any character played by Joe Pesci.
36. I am not allowed to convince the entire party to play R2 units.
37. I am not allowed to convince the entire party to sit on the same side of the table.
38. They do not make black market illegal cyberweapons for rodents.
39. When investigating evil cultists not allowed to just torch the decrepit mansion from the outside.
40. Dwarves do not have the racial ability 'can lick their eyebrows'
41. Dwarves do not have the racial ability to hold their breath for 10 minutes.
42. Dwarves do not have the racial ability 'impromptu kickstand'
43. Having a big nose adds nothing to my seduction check.
44. No longer allowed to set nazi propaganda music to a snappy disco beat.
45. Not allowed to spend all 100 character points on 100 1pt skills.
46. My character names are not allowed to be double entendres.
47. Sliver rhymes with silver because the computer frelling says so.
48. They do not make Nair in wookie sizes.
49. The elf is restricted to decaf for the rest of the adventure.
50. Not allowed to blow up the Death Star before that snotty farm kid gets his shot.
51. Not allowed to use thermodynamic science to asphyxiate the orcs' cave instead of exploring it first.
52. No longer allowed to use the time machine for booty calls.
53. My bard does not know how to play Inna Godda Davida on marachas.
54. Not allowed to start a drow character weighing more than a quarter ton.
55. Cannot pimp out other party members.
56. Before facing the dragon, not allowed to glaze the elf.
57. No matter how well I roll, a squirrel cannot carry a horse and rider at full sprint.
58. In the middle of a black op I cannot ask a guard to validate parking.
59. Expended ammunition is not a business expense.
60. Not allowed to pose the Netrunner in embarrassing positions when he's on a run.
61. Not allowed to short sheet the bedroll of impotent dieties.
62. Can only taunt the ranger about his lack of swimming after my USCG E8 saves him.
63. I am not allowed to do anything I saw Han Solo do once.
64. No, I cannot buy 10,000 marbles even if I say please.
65. My paladin's battle cry is not "Good for the Good God"
66. There is no Summon Bimbo spell.
67. Not allowed to start a character that speaks every language except ones the party speaks.
68. There is no Kung Fu manuever "McGuire Swings For Bleachers"
69. Bring him back intact includes redundant organs.
70. There is more to wizardry than magic missile. Even if I can do 200 damage automatic with no save.
71. Not allowed to cook up nerve gas in the sink even if the target number is 5.
72. There is no 'annoy' setting on a phaser
73. Not allowed to start a character who is over 100 years old unless he's an elf or dwarf. Humans are right out.
74. Not allowed to name my cudgel Ceremonial Whoopass Stick.
75. My thief's battle cry is not "Run And Live"
76. Nor is it "You take care of the orcs, I take care of the traps"
77. I am not allowed any artistic license while translating.
78. I did not get my super powers from James T. Kirk.
79. Not allowed to commission a pistol that costs more than a sedan.
80. I am not liquid metal.
81. When accepting a challenge for a duel, I must allow the other guy time to find a pistol.
82. A picture of my ex-wife is not an acceptable backup weapon.
83. Victory laps after killing the dragon with my 1d2 bow is considered in poor taste.
84. My gnome does not like big butts and he cannot lie.
85. Not allowed to talk my fellow inquisitors into buying a 220lb pull crossbow.
86. Not allowed to talk my fellow inquisitors into buying an industrial strength flamethrower.
87. Not allowed to make a superhero with a 99% chance of dodging even after the -10 penalty for a successful called shot.
88. There is no such thing as a dwarven katana.
89. My bard does not get a bonus to perform if she is obviously not wearing anything under her tabard.
90. The elf's name is not Legolam.
91. My swashbuckling fop cannot take the flaw Dark Secret: Not Gay
92. A wet towel does not constitute an improvised weapon.
93. The name of the weapon shop is not "Bloodbath and Beyond"
94. I am to remind my DM that he must never, ever give my paladin a dire boar for a mount again.
95. I cannot base my ancient kung fu master on neither Gene Simmons or Bluto Blutarski.
96. I must not put the Thunder God on the spot again.
97. No making up polearms.
98. My one wish cannot be 'I wish everything on this piece of paper was true'
99. There is no such thing as Speed Polka.
100. Not allowed to see if Jedi can parry a shotgun blast with their lightsaber.
101. When any character from a d20 sourcebook is allowed, that doesn't include System Lords.
102. I am not allowed to pave ANYTHING.
103. I am not authorized to start any civil engineering project on the taxpayer's dime.
104. There is no such thing as a Club +3 of Cup Checks
105. Nor is there a +1 Longsword, +5 against party members.
106. I am not allowed to polymorph anyone into Abe Vigoda.
107. I do not have weapon profiency in cat.
108. There is no such game as Wereshark the Buffet.
109. No, I do not get XP for every single crewman on that Star Destroyer.
110. Not allowed to kill a vampire with any part from a DC-10 larger than my car.
111. Not allowed to serenade the party even if my character has an internal tape deck.
112. I did not pick the garrote skill last week from my grandmother.
113. If the gun can't fit through the x-ray machine, it doesn't go on the plane.
114. My Droid is not allowed to paraphrase any Jack Nicholson soliloquy.
115. The Demilich only falls for getting stuffed in the bag of holding once.
116. My musical instrument does not double as a personal flotation device.
117. Not allowed to take a coffee break during the final super villain showdown.
118. I am restricted to memorizing Floating Disc only once per day.
119. I will pick a more traditional paladin weapon instead of a sledgehammer.
120. My character's names cannot be anagrams of playboy playmates.
121. Not allowed to kill another party member with a boomerang again.
122. I am not a contractor for Dragon Cave Cleaning Services Inc.
123. The paladin's alignment is not Lawful Anal.
124. Not allowed to forget to mention traps when the powergamer has point.
125. I cannot insert the words "Kill Phil, Sorry Phil" into any list of instructions.
126. Lingerie can only snap coincidentally so many times per day.
127. Dwarves do not count as burrowing animals.
128. Not allowed to download Widows 3.5 on the Arasaka mainframe.
129. Polka Gnomes exist only in my mind.
130. Not allowed to name my ship The Antidisestablishmentarianism.
131. Gun Fu is not a martial arts discipline.
132. Not allowed to bet how many times the lich bounces.
133. There is no such feat called "Death Blossom"
134. My acrobat cannot balance on the warlord's head for more than one round.
135. The King's Guards official name is not "The Royal Order of the Red Shirt"
136. I cannot demand payment in electrum, backrubs or bubblewrap.
137. I cannot start the 7th Sea campaign with 3 confirmed Drachen kills.
138. I do not have a scorching case of lycanthropy.
139. If the mere thought of it costs the others sanity, I'm forbidden from doing it.
140. My bard is required to take levels in the perform skill and cannot 'just play by ear'
141. The Dutch language does not exist in the Forgotten Realms.
142. My maid does not know kung fu.
143. Not allowed to give a 4 year old a sugar rush just to jack up the CR later.
144. Not allowed to buy a holy symbol for every god just in case one of them is right.
145. There is no such thing as pleather armor.
146. I cannot go back in time to cut in line at the Declaration of Independence so everybody now is asked for their Terrence E. Woczinski when signing documents.
147. Not allowed to play an Australian in any game set before 1600.
148. Hobbits are not allowed to have Norse ancestry.
149. There is no Gnomish Deathgrip, and even if there was, it wouldn't involve tongs.
150. Looting the unguarded baggage train is not considered a glorious victory.
151. Not allowed to create recreational drugs in suppository format.
152. Halflings do not have a racial proficiency with the flamethrower.
153. When the guy is at -9 HP is not the best time for my cleric to convert him.
154. I will not propose to every noblewoman at the royal ball until I crit my charisma check.
155. I am not allowed to rub the monk's head for luck.
156. I am not allowed to rub any part of the elf chick for any reason.
157. When one person forgets to buy rations eating the half-elf is not our first option.
158. Any capital scale weapon is not 'my little friend'.
159. I will not declare myself a god just so I can grant myself spells.
160. Airlocks do not double as trash disposals.
161. I will not load any gatling weapon with nothing but paint rounds.
162. I will not nail every single female party member except for the elf chick played by that creepy guy.
163. What ever monster we just killed is not to be tonight's dinner.
164. Not allowed to try and make a dire version of any dog of the toy breeds.
165. I am not to tattle to the halfling assassin's mom about his career choice.
166. I am forbidden from replacing anything with folger's crystals to see if they notice.
167. Not allowed to bribe the enemy commander into withdrawing with a stolen Elvis LP collection.
168. I was not recruited by Star League for any reason.
169. I was also not recruited by 12 dwarves and a wizard to rob a dragon.
170. I am neither the pagan god nor goddess of fertility.
171. I cannot name my character Xagyg or any anagram thereof.
172. My character's dying words are not allowed to be "Hastur, Hastur, Hastur"
173. At no point can I justify spending force points on a seduction check.
174. I am not allowed to recreate Veers' March of the AT-ATs on Zhentil Keep.
175. There is no use of Shatner's spoken word album that doesn't require a humanity check.
176. I am not directly descended from either Huey Lewis or any member of the News.
177. I cannot make called shots to the plectrum, anvil, stirrup, hammer or Isle of Langerhans.
178. Stinking cloud is a privilege, not a right.
179. There are no profanities in Celestial.
180. Chummer means he is my friend, not that sharks find him tasty.
181. I have neither the touch nor the power.
182. I cannot quote Shakespeare in Crinos.
183. No figuring out the plot and killing the actual villain five minutes into the adventure.
184. There are no rules for cooking corn dogs in any d20 supplement.
185. A starting character has no need for 100gp worth of hemp rope.
186. My bard does not need roadies for a dungeon crawl.
187. No cutting line to be a god.
188. I cannot gain more than three drama die per session for making the GM pee.
189. I cannot play a elf with a scottish accent, nor a cajun dwarf.
190. Tourretes is not a flaw, it is a reason to kill the character at creation.
191. Duels wielding small animals are strictly forbidden.
192. My character is not related in anyway to Boba Fett. This goes double for Star Wars characters.
193. If the gun is best fired using the artillery skill, my character is not allowed to have it.
194. Not allowed to kill vampires with seismic charges.
195. When the other guy picks swords for the choice of weapons, that does not leave me pistols.
196. I cannot use a silent feat enambled power word stun and blame it on the dog.
197. I cannot name a character anything that I can't say politely in another country.
198. My epic level character cannot take on the minor goblin menace to his country just to stay sharp.
199. Not allowed to steal my own soul.
200. My third wish cannot be 'I wish you wouldn't grant this wish'
201. I cannot name my character cliche canon characters from other systems.
202. My thief is prohibited from speaking solely in Cant.
203. Character descriptions cannot contain two of the following words: Slavic, Tonedeaf, Karaoke, Musician.
204. My superhero's strength is not classified as snazzy, neato or bodacious.
205. I am not too sexy for the elf, too sexy for the elf, so sexy myself.
206. My 3rd ed. Red Wizard is not allowed to start a business named Thay Co.
207. I cannot forge a +1 sword of Brad's Min/Maxed Paladin/Monk Slaying.
208. The following weapons are not legal choices in a duel: Steamroller, Nerve Gas, Landmine, Midget.
209. I cannot whine about the crappy selection of magical bec de corbins.
210. My Paladin's heraldry is not a smiley face.
211. My Antipaladin's heraldry is not Mr. Yuk.
212. If at any point if my dwarf takes on the mannerisms of Macho Man Randy Savage, he dies.
212. If the party always starts the adventure in a tavern, I cannot opt to start in a brothel.
213. I am not the patron saint of common sense.
214. There is no prestige class Drizzt Slayer.
215. They do not make heavy weapons in pump action.
216. There is an upper limit to the number of Bozo boostergangers I can get in a Volkswagon.
217. If the weapon is capable of staking vampires hiding behind engine blocks, I can't have it.
218. No matter my alignment, organizing halfling pit fights is a violation.
219. In formal introductions to royalty, I must not introduce my companions as just "The Other Guys".
220. I am not the master of the low blow or the gang up.
221. If I get that Yugo up to 120mph again, that's gonna create some paradox.
222. Druids are not against my religion.
223. I cannot convince the Solo he has a cortex bomb when he really doesn't.
224. I cannot insinuate elf chicks are all easy, even though you never hear about a half gnome do you?
225. I am forbidden from monologuing.
226. Troll bubblegum...bad idea.
227. My last wish cannot be "I wish we were playing another game."
228. I cannot use my time machine to hire Hitler a hooker in 1920, thus avoiding WW2.
229. Not allowed to spontaniously check if the elf can take a punch.
230. There is no such thing as monofilament tooth floss.
231. I am not allowed to do anything that would make a Sith Lord cry.
232. Paul Watson and I are never allowed to create characters together unsupervised.
233. If I am the medtech it is generally assumed I am going to have skill in medicine.
234. My character does not get d34 HP a level.
235. My Samedi is required to have dots in obfuscate. Plural, as in more than one, two more than none.
236. My character has no need for 24,000 cartons of cigarettes, especially in his neighbor's garage.
237. Not allowed to use more than 3 words per game that the GM has to look up the definition.
238. My bard cannot play or has ever heard of the theremin, didgeridoo or glass armonica.
239. My rockerboy cannot play or has ever heard of the theremin, didgeridoo or glass armonica.
240. Any character with more than three skills specializing in chainsaw is vetoed.
241. Cannot use the jedi mind trick to get out of a speeding ticket.
242. Not allowed to give quicklings Mountain Dew.
243. Cannot cast haste on the king during a long winded speech to get him to hurry the hell up.
244. Not allowed to taunt the rest of the party in 8 different languages because they forgot to take any.
245. Not allowed to attend any opera whose name the GM confuses with a strip joint.
246. I cannot keep selling that creepy guy's always naked elf chick to nomads every chance I get.
247. If the king rewards me with a forest, I am to assume he intends for me to keep it a forest.
248. There is no Dwarven God of groin shots.
249. If a black op requires me to impersonate an employee, I cannot bill the target for overtime.
250. Superfluous Man is not a viable superhero concept.
19
« on: February 26, 2008, 12:12:09 pm »
I've always thought of Layonara as a never ending movie where we the players get to puppeteer the stars, but what does puppeteer really mean? Well, I believe that when one plays a character, regardless of how much effort is put in, we are exhibiting characteristics of our own mind, personality and soul. There is so much depth to every single one of us that is often left completely undiscovered. Some people prefer to not explore themselves and so we only get to witness a sliver of their true self but the ones that do explore are often the ones that pour themselves into their RP and do so over the course of more than one character.
While we all tend to act differently in RL than our characters IG, even in RL we are playing the role of our real lives with real stakes at hand. This is why RL Always Comes First.
While Layonara is Just a Game there is none-the-less a bond that's seeded, nurtured and grown through the life we breathe into our characters. I like to think of this bond being represented by the 10 Soul Strands. When a character is first created, the bond is fresh, new and full. As we explore the world through the shoes of the character we're able to learn about ourselves in ways not available to RL. We are given the opportunity to explore the truth and consequences of our actions in a setting where when it really boils down to it, there's absolutely nothing to loose and everything to gain because it really is Just a Game.
As the strands wilt over time [be it short or long] we are all hit personally with that pang in the chest and burning of the heart. We are tangibly loosing a slice of that bond between our heart and our alternate self; the character. Having that bond broken by a permanent death will inevitably impact the RL self to some degree. Sometimes the break can be so extreme as to bring one to the point of rejecting the mere thought of allowing one's self to grow another bond. This is natural, we are only human and our hearts can bleed in more ways than one.
However, we must always remember that with each and every permanent death; a void is born in the world and a new chapter in the history of Layonara is waiting to be opened. Regardless of how big or small the chapter is, there is a new slice of your self just waiting to be given the chance to see the first light of a new Layonaran day. Rejoice in the accomplishments of the past slices, learn from their mistakes... where there was an avenue blocked from your exploration due to alignment or other RP restrictions, perhaps now that avenue can be explored through a new slice of life in Layonara.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with maintaining the characteristics of a past slice in the new personality. In fact, I'd highly encourage it. Take the best aspects of every character you've ever played and imbue them into a new one. Inevitably this will cause a new mix of experiences which bring out new traits you'd never even thought of before.
Now, don't get me wrong, I'm speaking for myself and I'm not trying to hype Layonara up or push anyone to continue playing when they in fact do not wish to do so. All that I want to do with this posting is to share with you all how I feel about the inherent impermanence within the realm of Layonara. It forces us to come to terms with emotional transitions in-game that mimic similar emotional cycles and transitions found in real life but in such a way that allows us to adapt [and / or harden] ourselves to the realities of real life in a positive and relatively risk-free environment. I've always loved D&D of old for this and in our modern day D&D has given way to learning opportunities on a massive scale with the advent of multiplayer RP games.
Hoping this made sense to someone out there,
OneST8
20
« on: February 19, 2008, 12:15:09 pm »
Check out this Slashdot article for the questions [submitted by slashdot readers] and the answers [from the D&D designers].
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