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Messages - SteveMaurer
1
« on: September 14, 2011, 02:44:05 am »
Upon opening the chests, people may be surprised to discover equipment which has mysteriously appeared, along with the following note:
To whom it may concern:
I have added these to your chests.
~ One Iron Rapier
~ One Mahogany Longbow
~ One Regular Flight of Fancy
~ One Greater Flight of Fancy
~ One Last Defense
~ One Crow Feather Necklace
~ One Enchanted Mithril Buckler
~ One Circle of Death Scroll
~ Two Mass Haste Scrolls
~ One Stone to Flesh Scroll
~ One Flesh to Stone Scroll
~ One Ball Lightning Scroll
~ One Undeath to Death Scroll
~ One Greater Stoneskin Scroll
~ One Etherial Visage Scroll
I find it almost unthinkable that I should ever be interested in anything from your fine barter establishment, but tell you now that if anything strikes my fancy, I shall simply take it.
~ Lady Z.
2
« on: September 14, 2011, 02:37:44 am »
Upon opening the chests, people may be surprised to discover equipment which has mysteriously appeared, along with the following note:
To whom it may concern:
I have added these to your chests.
~ One Iron Rapier
~ One Mahogany Longbow
~ One Regular Flight of Fancy
~ One Greater Flight of Fancy
~ One Last Defense
~ One Crow Feather Necklace
~ One Enchanted Mithril Buckler
~ One Circle of Death Scroll
~ Two Mass Haste Scrolls
~ One Stone to Flesh Scroll
~ One Flesh to Stone Scroll
~ One Ball Lightning Scroll
~ One Undeath to Death Scroll
~ One Greater Stoneskin Scroll
~ One Etherial Visage Scroll
I find it exceedingly unlikely that I shall ever need anything from your barter establishment, but if anything strikes my fancy, I will simply take it.
~ Lady Z.
3
« on: December 24, 2010, 03:19:51 am »
Long ago I promised myself never to risk my life for anything or anyone I did not truly care about. Along with all such promises, I seem to have a particular penchant for finding new and unique ways to break them. And while this time, it did not lead me to any untimely meeting with the Soul Mother, that this particular weakness is perhaps the one I find most annoying.
And yet, strangely, my weakness sometimes gives insights I would never otherwise have.
This happened not so long ago. I came to watch a ritual which in the city of my birth would have been so alien as to be incomprehensible. Even for surfacers, it would have been a strange sight, had it been public. (It was not.) Yet I've seen enough of these over the years that I feel it deserves a name. Call it, "The gulling of the stonebound".
It starts as thus: some group of utter political incompetents are about to have a very bad week almost entirely because they were stupid about a problem they had years to solve but did not. Squatting like fat deep-cows on their noble titles, they've suddenly come to the realization that someone else is going to harm their position. Naturally, they think this is a terrible thing, and so the call goes forth to the stonebound to "save" the "people", and by this, they mean the current government, from their well deserved fate.
The Stonebound arrive and mill about, iconoclasts all. A sob story is told, the enemy is identified, and inevitably there is an agreement to go off to commit acts of war, or what have you, until the perceived threat is entirely wiped out.
This is never mercenary. No one cares for reward. Stonebound typically have so much money from sacking and looting, they can never be actually motivated by such, although sometimes a pathetic amount made in offer is well received, because it allows them to look down their noses at those making the request, proverbially patting their patrons' heads like little children, telling them everything will be all right.
Instead, Stonebound typically are motivated by (often quite understandable) religious hatred, delusions of moral superiority, or actual belief in the sob story. I never fall to the latter, since I've never found one that stands up to scrutiny at its telling. And these are usually nobles and politicians who speak. They lie as a matter of course.
Yet Stonebound also lie, at least by omission, as to why they take up such tasks. The truth is too gauche to admit: racist bloodlust. Stonebound love nothing better than to travel far and wide to find tribes of creatures which do not look like them, often in the most inaccessible regions of the world where the intelligent beings could not possibly, by sheer distance, ever threaten anyone or anything, and engage in a orgy of genocidal bloodletting that makes Dark-Mother worshipers seem like mewling Az'attans in comparison. (This, I think, is one reason why I feel so at home among the Stonebound - they are almost exactly like my people, except even more loyal to their own and more hostile to everything else.)
I did not think there was a another reason. But I was wrong, and just discovered it. It is this: sheer boredom and morbid curiosity.
How else could one explain what happened in Lor? The council of Lor has been kissing up to Rael (a ruler I admire for his competence despite his enmity with my paramour), and discovered a plot against him. According to the story, a Green Dragon Cult spy had been trading suspicious oils into Prantz. This was some attempt to destroy Rael by some poisonous subterfuge. Yet we were told that despite providing this information to them, the Raelites did not care to follow up to at least examine the seriousness of the threat to their kingdom.
Clearly, elements of the story were lies. No one in their right mind imagines Rael, or anyone who works for him, to be so derelict in their duty as ignore any credible warning. So it seems obvious that the Lorites had not told Rael's army of this threat. I don't blame them - Rael is not beyond killing the messenger.
Various of the assembled Stonebound immediately launched into a set of quite reasonable complaints about the behavior of the council which led them to this state, which were brushed aside. There were also silly complaints about why Lor did not somehow take on both the Cult and Prantz themselves. (Only Stonebound are stupid enough to imagine that such sacrificial foolhardiness would be effective.)
But it was of no matter. The Lorite mayor, who did not even have the support of his own council, had his own orders - which the Stonebound were to follow, or leave. We were to quietly find out what was going on, and handle the situation.
I immediately launched into my information gathering mode. My plot was simple enough: given that it is widely known among those who care to know that Cultists are nearly impossible to interrogate, I arranged to ride with the wagon containing the spy. I was plotting to have many of the other Stonebound pretend to be a mercenary company willing to sell their services to the wagoner essentially for free (or perhaps a little food, just to seem realistic). And from there, we would learn all sorts of things.
Alas, the mayor had made a classic mistake of sending out an open call for all Stonebound. I returned from my success to find one of them, a dwarf whose enormous biceps were only matched by the tininess of his pea-sized brain, tackling the spy in about the most obvious manner possible. Apparently not screaming at the top of his lungs and slaughtering the entire city was his version of "quiet".
It had literally taken ten minutes for a few idiots to completely unravel the entire plot.
Oh yes, they took the spy into the sewers to interrogate him, but it was already a failure before it started. Every time I've ever met one, it's plain that Cultists just do not fear death. I'm not sure why - perhaps they have their own version of remote resurrection similar to what the stones provide - but there it is, regardless. Due to this, no one has ever successfully interrogated one. And certainly, given that the party had plenty of worshipers of the hypocritical gods, no one was ever going to be able to believably threaten the spy with a fate worse than death. At least, not without starting an argument that would never have been resolved.
So given the situation, I decided to try magic. I made a very careful magical analysis of the spy, and found absolutely no dweomer of any sort on him, around him, or in him. So I decided to cast a Domination spell, which I hoped might salvage the situation.
Instead, it accelerated it. The spy had a tattoo on him which was somehow entirely invisible to all magical analysis. It was triggered by my spell, and this caused it to explode after a few seconds of delay. I had enough time to get out of the blast, but I, and I alone, was struck by a secondary blast of magic, seemingly from nowhere, that nearly took my life.
Well, perhaps. I am, of course, Stonebound too.
We exited the sewer, I took a few hard glares in stride from some who clearly had no clue about the situation, and left. For a while, I thought I learned nothing.
And yet, as I think back on this entire sorry episode, I can't help but see all sorts of insights, each tinged with more than a little irony.
First, Strength can be Weak. The Stonebound have shown me why they are not, and never will be, a political force anywhere. Besides their insatiable bloodlust, they are also completely disorganized to the point of absurdity. Truly, the mayor, and his obedient, ear-muffed, guards, would have likely found more success in hiring a pack of raving orcs to accomplish his mission. You can at least threaten an orc with death to get it to temporarily not be stupid. Not so a Stonebound.
Second, Failure can lead to Success. If Lor ever tried to go mandible to mandible against any significant portion of either Rael's or Molvaren's forces, they would be crushed like a spiderling. Their only hope to remain free is to become the ignorable prize, laying low, and offering a path of least resistance through which the two pretenders to world conquest can battle for domination, hopefully weakening both enough to allow them to break free. So by sabotaging this absurd non-plot of the mayors, the dwarf may very well have done him the best favor he could have.
And Third, Silence is Telling. Why make tattoo's explosive? Isn't that a tad bit of an overreaction? Since apparently as soon as cultists succumb to any mind spell, they explode, I am already plotting the use of a "Mass Charm" spell against them. I figure that otherwise worthless spell should be able to detonate an entire tattooed army in its place. All I need is a spell mantle to shield me from the backlash.
So again, why the explosions? Why not simply do what most rulers do, and just not tell your spies anything, so they can't divulge what they do not know? The only explanation that seems to make sense is that there is some secret that they all must know, some great secret which if revealed, would do great damage to the cult.
In short, if ever someone does manage to "turn" a Cultist, I suspect that Molvaren will be very unhappy indeed.
4
« on: December 01, 2010, 05:19:31 pm »
.... I recall the days when level 14 was considered "high" level.... silly paradigm shifts.... :p It really is the disparity in level that drives people away. Being a level 9 in a sea of level 22s is a lonely place to be indeed. And all but the most hardcore gamers are going to ever get to a level where they can be considered a "peer", where ones PC efforts aren't considered paltry in comparison to the PCs of people who play obsessively. Most don't want to put in the effort, so they drop away. I have to say that things like the gnome quest are an excellent way to combat this tendency, but that is highly dependent on having a dedicated, talented, GM. Layo is one of the few servers that still reports relative power levels between players on a right-click. Other servers have code that disables this (which makes sizing up enemies a bit more hazardous as well).
5
« on: October 13, 2010, 05:15:02 pm »
I've turned these down before, but I think I have found a need for them, so I will take your Master Adventurer's Robes.
~ Lady Z.
6
« on: September 06, 2010, 09:51:31 pm »
Sir, you steal from me. But I am bound by my word. Therefore...
SOLD
~ Lady Z.
7
« on: July 02, 2010, 05:09:52 pm »
I think the best way to sum things up is as follows: the people who are responsible for Layonara are not going to change how they behave. They've shown no such inclination in the past, and there is no indication they intend to in the future. In fact, most indications point to the reverse.
So really, you just have to decide whether or not you like this server, and its culture, as it is.
It certainly has its charms: Technically, it's pretty well developed. (Sure - there are a few things Dorg hasn't been able to solve that other server teams have, like unlimited items and automated server transfer, but all in all he's done an amazing job - given that he's really the only one maintaining the code here. ) And some of the rules make for a different flavor than you see elsewhere (specifically, the no CvC rules and the perming rules make caution concerning risk taking much more realistic, IMHO). However, the general disinterest in GMing by the inner team, plus their general inability to hang onto "junior" GMs, make Layo one of the least RP-oriented of the RP servers out there.
I didn't realize how different things were until I went out and started a little throwaway PC on a different server, and within two weeks had had literally dozens of impromptus with various NPCs, just from walking around. From a little more investigation, I realized why: other leaderships value and foster people who want to "play as GMs" and "play as level/coder contractors", placing priority on maintaining communities rather than micromanagement and control, and therefore have a large number of part-time volunteers that they can delegate work to. That just isn't how it works here.
So I guess I return to my original statement. Layo is how Layo is. Play here, or don't. (Or play part-time, as I've chosen to.) It's still a good combat-oriented PvM server spiced up with an occasional GMed CDQ, and I have many good friends who enjoy playing here. But when I want more roleplaying interaction than friendly jibes among a party guild as we slaughter our way down to the emeralds, I go elsewhere.
Maybe you should too.
8
« on: June 23, 2010, 04:39:07 pm »
I spent yesterday crying. I try not to cry now.
Some say the most intense moments of your life come when some grand plot of yours is fulfilled, or perhaps when your enemies is fulfilled against you. I have to say that this is not true. Many changes happen during idle hours, completely by surprise, even though they are obvious in retrospect.
A year ago, I told a human woman that she was pregnant. She did not expect it because her newlywed husband had otherworld blood in him, and she expected Aerdin's injury prevented such crossbreeding from working. But he was more human than not, and the news I delivered could not have been more devastating to her. A life turned upside down by what, in retrospect, was inevitable. She just refused to see it.
For me the inevitable has come as well. Just a different sort.
I was resting in a private safe-house I rent at times. My mind was filled with the various plots of the day. My paramour Steel may not be very good at anticipating the full results of what he is doing, but I must say that few do better than he at moving a haphazard non-plot forward. So we do the bidding of the Dark Tower to obtain their temporary alliance with Fisterion against the Dragonstealers. This all will, of course, turn out for the best. He is certain of it.
(He is so cute when he's being foolish.)
In the midst of my meandering thoughts, I heard a scratch at the door. It was Vanorsh, my familiar. I almost did not answer it, but perhaps there was something to it that made me go anyway. She was acting uncharacteristically. Vanorsh is "silence" in the ancient high holy speech, and she has always been true to her name, except when I learned to disguise a voice-cast cantrip to shock people into thinking she was speaking.
When I opened the door, she was there. With a little dead spider. And kitten eyes.
"Vanorsh!" I told her angrily. She well knew my rules about presenting me with her little gifts, a habit she's had ever since I rescued her as a little mewling kitten from the animal pens in the arena. A spider was her first such gift. A spider! The holy animal of the Lord of Hate! That panther kitten, barely bigger than a housecat, had committed an act of sacrilege, and laid the evidence at my doorstep, literally. I could have been in such trouble.
Thinking back, it now seems like a clear omen of my path away from the Deep. But at the time, as angry I as I was, I remember being so pleased. She was mine. Though silent, she was clearly doing this as an act of love. And I enjoyed having such power over a wild creature, to possess it's affection. It... felt good. To be loved. Even by a little cat. No one else, not even animals, would ever admit such weakness to have that emotion. Not in Ti'thrara.
That feeling stayed my hand. I did not harm her for her dangerous gift. Instead, she became my little exotic pet, a stranger in the deep, and eventually I bound her as my familiar. She was my alter ego.
Vanorsh just stood there at the door. Normally she hates the indoors. It reminds her of the Deep, which she always hated. But now she was clearly asking in, so I stood aside.
She walked several trembling steps. Then collapsed.
"Vanorsh!"
I slammed the door shut, cursing myself for not being more careful. By habit I always take precautions against assassins via invisibility, teleport, greater sanctuary, but if they were outside... my blood surged, my mind raced. I cast spells I had prepared for such an eventuality. But the mechanics of self-defense were complicated by Vanorsh lying on the floor. If I were to take on these creatures who dare harm my own, I needed her. So I decided to take a calculated risk to see if I could diagnose the cause of her poisoning before going on the offensive.
Vanorsh. I pride myself on being a student of all my enemies, and potential ones, examining their every quirk. But for my own... they are too close for that. As I bent down, I realized... it had been.. what?... decades?... since I last examined her closely. She still had her characteristic smell, her lean muscle, almost too much so, her razor sharp claws. But it was only now that I saw something in the midnight black of her fur I had been blind to before: gray.
Her breathing was labored. I searched for the poison's entry: any sign of bite, or dart, froth from a dust. I knew she had not been fed anything. She never ate anything she did not kill herself, finicky princess of the beautiful hunt. But for all my skill, I just was not finding anything. I reached into the Al'Noth, looking for what had wounded her. Still nothing.
I ran my fingers through her fur. "What is wrong with you?" I spoke to her, breaking the first rule of Greater Sanctuary. But my frustration was mounting.
Empathic communication is a strange sort of thing, wordless yet powerful. Indeed any intent to bring words into it seem to lessen the bond. I found that at its most extreme, I could be Vanorsh, so long as I not try to speak as her, for she does not speak. Yet occasionally, emotions are so strong, that words seems to form in my mind for cat-like thoughts. And as I felt her tiredness, the pain of her arthritis, the gentleness of acceptance, these words formed clearly in my mind:
"There is nothing at all wrong with me, my mistress. I'm just...
...dying".
It hit me like a blow. How old was she? What was the life expectancy of panthers? But all these thoughts were overwhelmed by one emotion: rage.
"You can't die," I screamed at her in Deeptongue. "I've not given you permission."
She did not move, but only gave the accepting shrug of a slave who has been given contradictory orders by two different mistresses, in this case, myself and Katia. Cursing, I dispelled my Sanctuary and threw an Endurance spell upon her. This seemed to help, but only slightly.
"I will not let you," I told her through gritted teeth. "You are my familiar. Familiars do not die."
She accepted this with her usual feline insouciance, an air of affectionate mockery. Ever since I first rescued her from the cages she has acted this way. No matter how superior you are to a cat, they never acknowledge it. And in this case, I felt the cause of her amusement. I had just taken on the goal of opposing not just nature, but time itself. If cats could laugh, she would be doing so, at me.
And yet what else was I to do? The most common way to fail is to never try. My Endurance spell, though extended, would not last forever. I had a few days, at most, and that was it.
But what? All my researches had been pointed in other directions, by my own plots, not this one. Life extension. This is the last thing an elf of any stripe worries about, especially one of the Deep where death from violence always comes before age. Make her a lich? No. Even if she accepted, and she would not, that would not stave off death, just create unlife. Stone healing? Yes, the bindstones did somehow repair the injuries that nearly took your life, but there is nothing that indicates they have power against the withering aspects of age. The only thing I could think of that might possibly save her was to find a way for her to become divine before she died. My cat, a goddess. All that would entail is for her to kill a God.
Despair, like a dagger, struck me. I breathed deeply. Tears came unbidden. I had to admit the obvious. I could do nothing.
"Vanorsh," I told her. "You can't leave me. You're all I have left." My mother, lost. My father, dead. Now her.
She just breathed in and out, with acceptance. There was gratitude as well. My spell had made her dying less painful. When the end came, it would be quick. Her animal nature told her so. She was so tired. So she rested.
It is times like these that you really wonder what you are doing with your life. I had striven so hard to attain my mastery, convinced that by doing so I would save the world by shifting it away from impending chaos, for the gods themselves seemed unbalanced - not just with each other, but mentally unbalanced, psychotic and idiotic. Yet now as sit and contemplate, I see I failed to notice an equal, yet opposite effect: the unchanging frozen nature of existence.
Nothing changes upon the face of Layonara. Churches do not rise. Empires do not fall. How long has it been since I first received warning from Ferrit about the Dragonstealers? The bird lord's echo of that warning? Two, three, decades? And yet, what has come of it? For all the supposed power, what have they ever actually done? Who have they ever even mildly inconvenienced? It is as if the world itself is covered in invisible spiderwebs, preventing anything of actual consequence from occurring. Even if you pull at it, the web simply snaps back into shape again. So all threats are not really threats at all. The Gods may be crazy, but their insanity will never actually brings harm to the world, or at least any more than it already has.
This was the cause of my illusion of eternal youth. If one measures time by meaningful events, Layonara is eternally young, for it has almost none. There are only two agents of any true change in Layonara: the bindstones, which occasionally allow someone who touches them to live, and the Soul Mother, who takes one or two so bound, and dispatches them permanently, as Hedessa has recently fallen. But time still marches on, and now it made this death which was taking Vanorsh from me.
But those are all personal events. I need do nothing to help the world. It is frozen, mid-pratfall, a form of solidified trifling nonsense, and will remain so forever. I will only die of boredom, unless I am taken by the Soul Mother because I get careless in gathering materials, which I would do largely out of boredom looking for something meaningful to do.
I stroked Vanorsh's fur, and contemplated all the time I should have spent with her instead of rote practice of my spells upon tens of thousands of expendable targets. I take pride in my hard-won skills, but I wonder whether it was worth the cost.
She woke briefly, and put her head in my lap. I sat weeping as she slowly, gently, died.
In the end I told her I loved her. A terrible weakness on my part. But I knew it to be true.
This brought the barest flicker. "I know," she seemed to say, lovingly. "Live well, my angel."
9
« on: May 22, 2010, 09:35:08 pm »
Yes indeed, that deserves a hearty congratulations.
10
« on: April 26, 2010, 12:43:33 am »
You take my reply to an example you gave, do not mention that example and then state I said they'd Divine Relation everyone to make sure they're not an assassin. First off, Ed, if we're going to speak of mischaracterization, you just did so in this sentence. My actual words were: "You yourself suggested that one of the ways Az'attans know who is an assassin or not was by using Divine Relation." Please note. This did not include the phrase "they'd Divine Relation everyone", or any of the other non-factual strawmen you have decided to construct in debating me. In fact, your actual quote was this: Sure, they are hard to anticipate, but an Az'attan wouldn't be as naive to just heal anyone without attempting to check the divine relation. Any reasonable person would see that you were indeed saying that " one of the ways Az'attans know who is an assassin or not was by using Divine Relation", which is why I paraphrased you that way. And yet you insist that I am somehow misquoting you. It is inexplicable. You also appear determined to mischaracterize my observation. I never said that it was logical that an "alignment detection" type spell would be used on farmers or anyone else who was a well known local, but only on strangers, especially suspicious ones. And as you have already decided that Layonara is an intensely low population world, with a mere 8 million inhabitants scattered across all its continents, strangers coming into town must be, by logic, an incredibly unusual event. In the world that you have described, travel is long and arduous, and even meeting people on the road is likely to be rare. And so far you have not come up with a single reason why any of the many tiny fortified cities, like Hlint, would not use the spells they have available to check the handful of people coming in and out of their towns on a daily basis. Especially mysterious completely cloaked elves with apostrophes in their names, when worshipers of Ca'Duz and the Mother of Darkness are universally hated. I will grant you that in some cases the spell you outlined might not be as useful when the person being scanned worships no god. But again, "no god" is merely another religious category, and one which is hardly likely to engender trust. Layonara is, I hope you would agree, a fantasy medieval setting - and infidels did not always fare that well in our own medieval period. Now let me finally address your "off-topic" remark. In addition to being wrong about my mischaracterising your statement (as I have already shown above), you are also of the belief that my observations about AD&D Detect Evil and Detect Good, and my assertion that these types of spells (including, it fair to characterize, Divine Relation) "renders any form of surreptitiousness nearly impossible to pull off", means, perforce that this is "implying Layonara or its plots are screwed up in the process". And further that this "negative comment or label", "is not fair" to the "players", "writers", "LORE team", "programmers", "area builders", "forum admins", "scripters", "character approvers", and "GMs". (Incidentally I have used direct quotes here, so as not to be subject to any further strained argument on your part.) To which I respond this: if the President of the United States is expected to routinely receive questions that might imply that things aren't going quite as well as he would wish - and perhaps even that he might have made a mistake - without it being assumed that the questioner is "not being fair" to the People of the United States, Freedom, the World, and anyone else (including "players", "writers", "LORE team", "programmers", "area builders", "forum admins", "scripters", "character approvers", and "GMs" who reside within it), then maybe... just maybe, you might be able to summon enough humility to do likewise. Especially when the topic is about whether there might be some unanticipated side effects that you might not have fully considered in terms of play balancing a spell or two. p.s. If you persist in keeping things the way you are, which I'm sure you're going to, at least warn the GMs against plotting a "whodunnit" scenario with a disguised Corathite as the killer. Otherwise that session may end up being torpedoed by a PC before its even begun.
11
« on: April 23, 2010, 08:42:04 pm »
Second, regarding I did no such thing.
Sure, they are hard to anticipate, but an Az'attan wouldn't be as naive to just heal anyone without attempting to check the divine relation.
I didn't say anything about assassins and divine relations. I didn't say anything about assassins and divine relations.
That was directly as a refutation of what I was saying, in part: Corathites are hard to anticipate, because they don't wave a skull and crossbones from a mile away. Instead, members of Cortath's church are all disguised. They'll fake an injury and then plant the poison dagger in the Cleric who tries to heal them (or use any one of hundreds of other methods of killing the undefended Az'attan). Your response was pretty clearly intended to say that one way you an Az'attan avoids Corathite assassins (and thus manages to live another day), is by using Divine Relation. So I'm not exactly sure how you can say you "did no such thing". I'm not trying to beat you up here, Ed. I just don't understand why there are these distinctions made. To me, Divine Relation is in Layonara as an alternative to "Detect Evil" out of AD&D. But D.E. and D.G. was never thought through from a societal point of view, and like a lot of ill thought out D&D spells, screws up fantasy world plotting like crazy. It basically renders any form of surreptitiousness nearly impossible to pull off. Which is one reason why every subsequent fantasy game world dropped it like a hot potato (Tekumel, Runequest, etc.). But if you're going to have that kind of a spell that cheap, then expect it to be used. Az'attan priestesses use it on people they're going to heal to make sure it isn't a Corathite assassin they're healing. And every Rofie seeing anyone suspicious at the gate will use it as well.
12
« on: April 23, 2010, 02:10:01 pm »
That's quite an assumption to make, me being incensed. I've made my case before (thread reference below) and classifying me as being angry is not something I think you should be doing based on written forum posts. After further consideration, I agree that the word I used, "incensed", is too strong, and I withdraw it, with apologies. You did, however, characterize my plea that you be explicit about the vast limitations that you put on all PCs of the Az'attan faith into the LORE (as opposed to stating it in half a dozen scattered posts) as "derogatory", when it clearly wasn't. I'll leave it up to other readers to decide whether that characterization came from anger over my hard questions or not. Beyond that, yes, I agree. Az'atta is exactly as you say she is. So let's drop it. Which is why a dark elf claiming to be an az'attan better rpove real quick he's the real deal or he'll risk getting killed by a mob/guard/militiaman. I again agree, although there is nothing I can see the dark elf would need to do to "prove" anything. (Nobody would trust a Dark Elf's word anyway.) Instead, the local priest of just about any local church, a massively powerful Level 1 Cleric, would be called in to make the determination. And if you think about it, pretty soon this would be standard operating procedure. A non-human? Divine Relation him. A stranger? Divine Relation him. Something possibly stolen? Round up anyone you don't know, Divine Relation. You yourself suggested that one of the ways Az'attans know who is an assassin or not was by using Divine Relation. In such an environment, the color of your skin would mean nothing. But devotion to any of the less savory gods (including the Dark Elf gods of the Deep, but more commonly, Shadonites) would be the mark of death. I don't know if this is what you intended. But it is the natural result of the spells you put into the world.
13
« on: April 23, 2010, 11:42:13 am »
A dark elf trying to preach Az'atta's way would generally be greeted by something like this (particularly on Mistone), assuming he/she was captured instead of outright killed: "Look, boys. This dark elf's gone to the hen house, har! He's cookoo. Can't even figure out what he's supposed to be doing. Az'atta, har! All the more fun stringing him up tomorrow, yeeeee haw." Have a care about this, Milton. My assertion that the religion of Az'atta, was written up in such a way that almost all worshipers outside Audira would be quickly killed off (as they are hated by all sides and religiously bound to be almost completely defenseless along with carrying an easily identifiable mark), was something that Ed vociferously disagreed with. And in fact, became incensed that I dared to assert. So somehow Az'attans manage to avoid being strung up or stabbed in the back enough to survive and do their work. By world builder fiat. End of story. (It's never really been explained how, but maybe the goddess personally intervenes herself gently guides her flock out of danger all the time.) And regardless of whether they're dark elves themselves or not Az'attans worship a Dark Elf. Dark elves dominate their religious hierarchy. That is not something that would just be ignored, especially by the beneficiaries of the religion's charity. - - - Well, according to Ed, that last statement isn't true. Apparently the whole church of Az'atta has no appreciable effect on the perceptions of the world, even though a Level 0 clerical cantrip can tell the difference between a "good one" who will do whatever she can to save your life, and a "bad one" who will do whatever he can to end it. By worldbuilder fiat. End of story.
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« on: April 23, 2010, 02:17:43 am »
The fundamental problem with saying that Layonaran civilizations are all fundamentally racist is that it conflicts with its own cosmology. The whole idea of saying that "99.9999999% of dark elves will stab you in the back" is that it flat out isn't true. As I've seen multiple times in game, Az'attans are so dedicated to peace that they will allow themselves to be tortured to death rather than raise their hand against another, even in seeming self-defense. Given that Az'attans healer/pilgrims are, according to Ed, quite common, I see no reason why racial bigotry would be ever considered viable. Instead, we would much more likely have religious bigotry, which is just as typical a kind of response to low-intensity conflict, if not more so. And in this regard, I'm not at all certain whether the world team fully thought through just how world changing a spell like "Divine Relation" truly is - almost more so than cheap and easy healing. Just about anyone who comes under the slightest suspicion (the Layonaran equivalent of a traffic stop) would almost certainly be an immediate subject of the spell. The result would almost certainly reveal Shadonites, Corathites, etc., without much need for any investigative ability whatsoever. And why go further than that? Worshiping Pyrtechon would likely be a crime punishable by death. You don't need to catch them in the act. Certainly there is the Lucinda/Toran split, but if ever truth needs to be determined, the priests of almost any two different Gods can pinpoint just about any worshiper of any other God with almost perfect accuracy. A Dark Elf (or any elf who dresses like a bandit, covering their face), would naturally be questioned and Relationed. And the only cleric who wouldn't immediately be able to tell a Az'atta worshiper from a Mother of Darkness worshiper would be a Xeenite. [ But everyone knows Xeen goes both ways.  ] And that isn't even talking about the fame of PCdom. People who risk their lives touching the stones are rare. People who survive are rarer. If I were a noble with even a drop of sense and/or paranoia in my head, I'd go way out of my way to make a whos-who of every local survivor. These are people you want on your side, not your enemies. The Dragoncalled/Stonebound have, at bare minimum, one more life than a cat, and thus can gain skills taking on dangers that others would only dream of. I'd trade this knowledge with other rulers in other towns, and keep an eye on all of them. If a dark elf Az'attan like that even stepped a foot on my territory, I'd be having people all over it finding out her history, having clerics surreptitiously check her out, etc. In addition, there is no reason why the Dragoncalled/Stonebound themselves would not be naturally clubby. They have a searing shared experience, are often companions, and routinely depend on each other to save each other's lives. It's a regular Band of Brothers (and Sisters), which more than accounts for any "Enlightenment" about each others outward appearances. Now everything I've just said here is made with the following caveat: this isn't my world, so it doesn't have to make sense the way I would expect it to. (Heaven knows, it certainly hasn't in the past.) But until there is a definitive ruling, I think this is at least as reasonable an interpretation as the "hurr hurr kill all darkies" type of RP, which to me seems just profoundly stupid. Because while you're killing the Az'attan, the human Corathite would be slipping dragon poison into your wine.
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« on: April 16, 2010, 01:37:59 pm »
Real Name: Darthy Rottie Akul the Third Birthday: March 18, 1961 (alas, this is not a typo) Birthplace: San Francisco Current Location: Oregon Eye Color: Blue Hair Color: Strawberry blonde hair, red beard, with a few gray strands Height: 6 feet even Right Handed or Left Handed: Right Your Heritage: Pennsylvania Dutch Fave Movie: Too many good ones to choose from. I'm very fond of Anime (dishpan eyes!) Fave Book: Again, too many good choices. I've liked Steven Brust's Vlad Taltos series, but that's just one. Fave Fantasy Character: Whichever one I'm currently RPing Married, Kids: Just celebrated our 20th anniversary. Two kids, Kathryne, 19 and Mark, 12. Kathryne is in college, 4.06 GPA. The Shoes You Wore Today: Black Nike Airs. Running shoes that almost look professional Your Weakness: The computer. And gaming. Your Fears: Future environmental and overpopulation issues, and the world my children will inherit Your Porn Star Name (Pet name + Street Name): I have no pet, so I think I'll pass; besides, no non-Italian porn star has "Bellavista" as a last name. Your Perfect Pizza: I bake my own from self-made yeast risen dough. Favorites include: Spanish Chorizo and fresh cut hawaiian pineapple, Mixed wild mushroom and pesto, and Caramelized onion and blue cheese Goal You Would Like To Achieve This Year: Get the science fiction novelette I just wrote published. Maybe get a word in with President Obama when I meet him at the White House reception next month. Your Most Overused Phrase On an instant messenger: "the issue number is ####" (I use IM mostly for work) Thoughts First Waking Up: Where is my wife off to today? Your Best Physical Feature: Lupita says "my beard" - and I will be divorced if I ever shave it off. Your Bedtime: 12pm. Sometimes earlier. Pepsi or Coke: Home made mocha made with Mexican chocolate. (Diet Coke if I'm forced to buy a soft drink.) MacDonalds or Burger King: Subway (a US sandwich joint). If forced to choose between the above, Burger King Chocolate or Vanilla: Chocolate. Cappuccino or Latte: Latte Worst (PG) Vice: Gaming too much How many times do you Shower Daily: Once. Have you Been in Love: Still am after 20 years Do you want to go to College: Nope. Once is enough for me. Do you want to get Married: Nope. Once is enough for me. Do you get Motion Sickness: No. Are you a Health Freak: No. Do you get along with your Parents: Yes, generally. Do you like Thunderstorms: Sure. Don't get many in Oregon though. Do you play an Instrument: Piano. I compose music. People say my pieces sound like George Winston In the past month have you gone on a Date: 20th anniversary date with my wife to a fancy hotel. Got a professional massage side-by-side. Neither of us could walk very well after. This made for a not-at-all like a young couple's honeymoon night later.  In the past month have you gone to a Mall: Nope. In the past month have you eaten a box of Oreos: A couple from the box that we get our son every once in a while. In the past month have you eaten Sushi: Yes. I really like Saba. In the past month have you been on Stage: Not in the past month, no. In the past month have you been Dumped: Nope. In the past month have you gone Skinny Dipping: In the shower. How do you want to Die: When the universe collapses to a singularity in several trillion years, with none of my loved ones dying before me. (Note: I may not get what I want.) What do you want to be when you Grow Up: An author with a few influential works What country would you most like to Visit: Antacrtica - to visit the scientists.
16
« on: April 15, 2010, 01:53:22 am »
The thing that makes the Greater Sanctuary bug a killer is that all the negative consequences of being in Greater Sanctuary still apply. (GS is far from an "I win" spell.)
Most importantly, you can't cast spells until the effect is gone. This includes using dusts.
Probably what happened is that you tried to use your second dust and it "fizzled" because of the still active GS effect.
What you need to do is to disable the effect. One way is to go into combat for a round. Or, if you prefer not to be killed, get a Rune of Sanctuary return and use it while running. Then use your second dust, and pray.
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« on: April 10, 2010, 10:45:31 pm »
Yes indeed, happy birthday.
And may you have many more.
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« on: March 22, 2010, 08:02:23 pm »
A fully armored figure, with a barbarian female voice, leaves word that she wants the "keep swords away" cloak. Will pay many goldies for it.
Cloak of Protection bid by (noname)
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« on: March 21, 2010, 02:45:24 am »
Let's see... Darthi 28 Deaths 3 DTs +2 (1 map bug/1 GP) 5/28 = 17.8% (noname) 7 Deaths 1 DT 1/7 = 14.2% Hmmm.... 10% seems a bit low. Either that, or all my PCs have *explicative deleted* luck. Rottie is better at 1/13, but only because almost all of his deaths were at very low levels. Then there's... Akul GodHunter 7 Deaths 0 DTs 0/7 = 0%. Akul is still level 3 though. As a naked Layo wemic, he can hardly sneeze w/o dying. But the one saving grace is that if you always get killed, instead of killing the spawns, you won't gain levels, and will always be immortal! 
20
« on: February 14, 2010, 04:12:43 am »
Scriber's note: I was unsure how exactly to title this story. Nothing seems to fit perfectly. The elf who took the stage, though, is a rare gray elf, with silver-metal hair. She is beautiful, yet I cannot help but be concerned for the elf who falls in love with her. This is her story:
"I speak of another tale, one more that has to do with relationships than love.
It concerns one Kar'ititi. Who was a Drider.
Now since, perhaps not all know what a Drider is, I shall explain: it is a half-elf, half-spider, created as a sort of punishment for those who displease the lord of Spiders, Who I shall not name here, but many of you know.
And this Drider was indeed, for all his other failings, still a dutiful worshiper of the Lord of Hate. Which meant that his heart was infertile soil indeed for true love to grow in.
But, that did not mean he has lost his desires. For the transformation does not take away that. And Kar'ititi found himself needing to pick and choose mates that he would never have considered before.
Of these, he found two female Driders. One, was Ty'llian, who was not abandoned by her family. And thus rich, healthy, and desirable. But... she was also not meek. Nor weak. And one thing remains true of many species: weak males hate strong females. They are afraid of them.
The other was For'nan, who was meek and poor, and easy to dominate. But also inferior - ugly. So in truth, in making his choice, between wealth and pleasure of his kind, he desired neither fully.
And so finally came upon his other, true, love. Not a drider. A spider.
She was strong, and healthy, and powerful. But, as she had no vocal chords, he also never found that he had to put up with her telling him he was wrong, which he often was. And so, seemingly at least, she was weak, and easy to dominate.
What more perfect a mate could this drider ask for?
Well, he fed her, and wooed her... as he suspected spiders were wooed. And given that he was far more attracted by her underside than her face, he finally did manage to mate with her. And took her in his loving... or at least aroused... embrace.
As she did him....
And then, he discovered something about this perfect mate that he did not know about before. For while she could not speak, and was smart for her kind, she needed sustenance.
And when they mated, she decided to consume him, then and there.
He struggled of course, but the poison took hold, and darkness enveloped him, and his spirit was freed. Freed to be an even more menial servant of the Lord of Hate....
But that is not the end of this story. For the spider had been far smarter than he had ever imagined. She had known what he wanted, and had assented to it, thinking all the benefit was for her.
But it was not.
For as she consumed him, his lower parts continued to mate, and his seed filled her womb to overflowing. Enough so that the poor spideress was left with brood for the rest of her life.
The little beasts kept coming and coming! Her body worked overtime, making more spiders, and she had to take care of them all, until she finally was simply unable to go on, and her own hungry children drained her, for the last bit of sustenance.
It is believed by some, that this unholy mating produced spiders who are able to cast spells. But that is not the point of this tale. Instead, we have two morals we can get from it:
First, if you are male, select a mate who does not like you simply because she wants to suck you dry.
And second, if you are female, while there will come a time when you absolutely positively want to kill your mate....
Scriber's note: The elf raised an admonishing finger
"Do not actually do so.
Inevitably, you will be stuck taking care of the children for the rest of your miserable life, while his spirit goes free to haunt someone else."
Scriber's note: At the end of the recitation of this story, half the audience was green. Such was the discomfit, Jaelle felt tried to lighten the mood by making a heckling joke about making sure to buy a girl a complete dinner before making any amorous advances. Yet the elf who told this tale seemed to be perfectly at ease, as if this was something to say to children.
Oddly enough, as disquieting as it is, this story is exceedingly compelling, especially to those who have felt the sting of an imperfect romance. So I am not sure how to categorize it. I think this tale is allegorical, or perhaps a piece of wickedly droll humor. I certainly hope so. I pray to the goddess that it is so.
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