Magick in game.

[Anonymous]

straw-man argument.

Uh oh.

that's not what i said. that wouldn't even be fun.

either respond for real or leave please.

What more do I need to say to be allowed to stay?  Invading hordes of mantis don't stop along the way to see if there is anyone who wants to get brought along for the ride.  The world turns and major events happen and low level aides and independent hunters and prancing bards have no real reason to be consulted or engaged other than to be entertained as spectators.

[RunningMountain]

Straw-man? What is that?

[Wykydtronn]

http://uncyclopedia.org/wiki/Straw_man

I think...

[Anonymous]

Straw-man? What is that?

It's sorta like 'Wax on - Wax off' from Karate Kid but for discussion boards.

[Larrath]

I'd like to see more mundane plots and magickal plots.
It would be nice if a few people in Red Storm would need to deal with spice raiders and that half of House Kurac's spice became poisoned and a third of the world died (including your character) and Kurac was destroyed.  Or if some salt worms started nesting aroud Luir's, damaging the economy and obliterating House Kurac.  Or if some distant cave with a cache of non-magickal treasure was found and people had to race there and find it and destroy House Kurac on the way.

But I still don't see why we need less magickal plots.  Powerful magickers are the people that can stand up and fuck the Known World in the ass, this is why everyone is giving them such a rough time.  You don't hate a Krathi because he's filth or even because he might infect your soul and make your children mutants.  You hate a Krathi because that Krathi can go to a farm around Allanak and burn it down in half an hour.  I think these magickal plots also help the magicker huggers to realize just how insane they are.
They also put the world in perspective - Zalanthas is a world where magick is scarce, meaning that it's distributed very unevenly and the people who do have the power pretty much hoard it to themselves.  One of the things I really like about Armageddon is that, in contrast to Invasion-type quests in other MUDs, when somewhere is being attacked you don't -always- have a reason to stay and fight, and sometimes your 80 day warrior with branched eighth attack is simply meaningless.  Hasn't this always been a part of how the game works?  Each character has his forte, and killing extremely powerful magickers isn't really a job for Amos the Temboslayer.

Logging out to avoid an RPT, intentionally, is the same as logging out to avoid being captured by a templar in my book, and I don't care if you can justify the quitting as huddling in some alley somewhere.

What next?  Is it a problem that most RPTs are clan-exclusive and not the entire playerbase can join?  Hey, this is a game and I'm a player too, I wanna be in that Bardic Contest so why can't my Allanaki Templar come compete?  It's a game!
Sorry bub.


About quotas on magickers, I thought these already existed when people special-app for a role they don't have enough karma for.  Special apping a mul when there are 7 other PC muls active in-game is harder than special apping a mul when there doesn't seem to be any PC mul in game at all, right?
So Vivaduans and Rukkians are pretty common compared to other Elementalists, which is meant to be that way, and Whirans and Krathi are somewhat rarer but there's still a chance you must stumble into one in a dark alley, and Drovians, Elkrans and Nilazi are pretty hard to find, taking the place of an acid-coated needle in the haystack that you'd better not sit on.  And defilers and mindbenders are rarer still, but they too exist.

What's the problem?  If you have a really good idea for a plot, you could always just email the MUD account and say what's on your mind.  Or if you want the alternate route, take your own character and create a plot yourself - find a new watering hole or make one by burying Vivaduans alive in a circle and punching them in the face.  Look for a new cave or a strategic location and email the staff to explain why it would be good to the game if a few new rooms were written for that purpose.

About magickers being hated in Allanak, they are hated and they are feared, but they are hated more in Tuluk.  In Tuluk, any magick-wielder is automatically considered to be as bad as a defiler - an evil mage that destroys the world for their own benefit and eats babies.  In Allanak, Vivaduans are feared and hated but not as badly as, say, Drovians or Nilazi, and defilers are feared and hated the most.
It's like - a lower level magicker is a religious extremist, a higher level magicker is an active terrorist and a sorcerer is Osama Bin Laden or Britney Spears' singing.  In Tuluk, any religious extremist is considered to be just as bad as Osama himself.

[John]

that half of House Kurac's spice became poisoned and a third of the world died (including your character) and Kurac was destroyed.  Or if some salt worms started nesting aroud Luir's, damaging the economy and obliterating House Kurac.  Or if some distant cave with a cache of non-magickal treasure was found and people had to race there and find it and destroy House Kurac on the way.

Poor, poor Kurac. They just never get a break. They get invaded by Allanak, they get invaded by Mantises. They get banned from Allanak, they're allowed to return but no spice is allowed. Will they never be safe from the torments of the world?

How about we screw over Kadius? Or Salarr? Or Nenyuk (that clan's closed right? The apartment script is taking their place? PERFECT time to kill them off)?

[Larrath]

that half of House Kurac's spice became poisoned and a third of the world died (including your character) and Kurac was destroyed.  Or if some salt worms started nesting aroud Luir's, damaging the economy and obliterating House Kurac.  Or if some distant cave with a cache of non-magickal treasure was found and people had to race there and find it and destroy House Kurac on the way.

Poor, poor Kurac. They just never get a break. They get invaded by Allanak, they get invaded by Mantises. They get banned from Allanak, they're allowed to return but no spice is allowed. Will they never be safe from the torments of the world?

How about we screw over Kadius? Or Salarr? Or Nenyuk (that clan's closed right? The apartment script is taking their place? PERFECT time to kill them off)?

You're derailing the thread!

Remember, people, this is the thread to discuss magickers and magickal quests and ways to destroy House Kurac.

Derailment: okay, but give Salarr and Kadius l33t NPC units of soldiers, too.  And kill Kurac anyway.

On topic: yeah, so...another reason why just up and killing gemmed magickers in Allanak is rarer than in Tuluk is that the Templarate would discourage these sort of ideas.  You talk about killing a gemmer in the open and the Templarate or Militia could well enough kill you because they want to spare the city the terrible destruction that gemmer could cause as a result of being attacked.

[John]

You're derailing the thread!

Sorry, I tend to go where the conversation takes me, rather then strictly adhering to a specific topic. Both philosophies on internet threads have their pros and cons


On Topic, absolutely no derailing happening here:

You talk about killing a gemmer in the open and the Templarate or Militia could well enough kill you because they want to spare the city the terrible destruction that gemmer could cause as a result of being attacked.

That and gemmers are useful to the Templarate. Who knows what a relationship is like between a gemmer and his/her templar.

[moab]

FWIW, Magick was far, far more common in the days of yore, prior to karma.  Magickers were allowed in Tuluk, you didn't need to be gemmed to live a good life as a magicker in Allanak.

There are fewer magickers than before.  If you are saying something different, then you are either ignorant of the past or choosing to have a selective memory.

Further, to restate what Hal touched on - the world is founded, based on, magick.  The Dragon, the sorcerer kings, the templarates (of both cities), and yes, elementalists and sorcerers.

A glance here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_fantasy shows me that magick should be rare (it is, especially compared to RL years prior and is growing ever more so), and that no absolute good and evil should be defined.

I think this defines are game pretty well as a low fantasy game.

[bloodfromstone]

I think putting quotas on classes would be lame, first of all.

Secondly, I do feel there is some validity to making less magickal RPTs be more common. I have no problem with magickal RPTs, per se, but it can be sort of conflicting from the perspective of a player trying to play out the magick intolerant setting. Yes, a dinosaur made out of fire tromping down the streets, eating people will certainly make it easy to roleplay hating magick. But being chilled by the fact that someone can light a torch with a wave of their hand? It easily becomes "I've seen weirder things."

That's my very limited experience, at least.

[Halaster]

So, hold on a second. I'm puzzled, are you saying that Magickers are not hated within Allanak? I thought they're hated and feared universally by everyone who dont wield magick themselves. It's just in Tuluk there's open license for them, and in Arm there is a ... private license for them Atleast that's how I always understood it.

You're describing it like Allanak is like ... a city of the wizards, or some such.

Allanak is not a city of wizards, nor is magick happily accepted by everyone.  Most average commoners do not like magick or mages.  However, the templarate allows mages (except sorcerers) to exist and legalizes magick - therefore the average commoner has little choice but to accept the fact it's there.  They don't have to like it, but there isn't a whole lot they can do about it.  That's where the back-alley vigilantes come in, who quietly whack mages in the night when no one's looking (or die trying).

[Anonymous]

Allanak is not a city of wizards, nor is magick happily accepted by everyone.  Most average commoners do not like magick or mages.  However, the templarate allows mages (except sorcerers) to exist and legalizes magick - therefore the average commoner has little choice but to accept the fact it's there.  They don't have to like it, but there isn't a whole lot they can do about it.  That's where the back-alley vigilantes come in, who quietly whack mages in the night when no one's looking (or die trying).

I guess this is what I was trying to say, but less eloquently.  "accept the fact" (i.e. tolerate)  I did not mean to give the impression that mages are liked.  They may be considered "useful tools" by a spare handful of (usually either desperate or rich) people, but they are not largely openly hated because they're just a part of life (as the Highlord commands).

[LoD]

LoD, as someone who it seems like a lot of people look up to on these boards, I think it sets a really bad example when you say you're just not going to log in for RPTs involving magick. To me that sounds like a cheap way out, and I really hope whatever PCs you're playing aren't even remotely important if you choose to do that.

I'm opening myself up for multiple-flamethrower retaliation here, but if you guys want a no-magick setting? Go play in Tuluk.

I hear you, ale.  Perhaps let me provide you with a few reasons why I have come to shy away from large scale magick RPT's when given that option.  

Plots and quests should focus primarily on the PC's involvement.  PC's should be the main instigators, proponents, opponents, planners and victims.  This should happen because players are representing their role within the game world 100% of the time.  They have the time to RP not only the pro-active stages of their character, but also the downtimes where they have fun, relax, sit around, be vulnerable and off guard.  When any NPC, magickal or otherwise, is used to further a plot or quest,  the time allowed for that role is in direct competition with an Imm's avatar, their clan duties, their personal projects and their real life.  That usually leads to very direct and pointed sessions that don't allow much time for the rest of the world to react and interact with you anywhere outside of the very narrow goals being pursued.

My last character (100 day warrior) was invited to participate in a "high magick RPT' in Tuluk (as you suggest) and so I went along because I wanted to help support storylines.  30 minutes later when my character was killed by some magickal being in 2 seconds,  I started thinking why.  Why would I want to throw all of my time played away to a single NPC that probably took 5 minutes to create, load skills on and setup.

Did they have to work their skills up over RL years?  Did they have to practice their skills in secrecy with danger lurking around every corner and escape countless situations where they almost died like I had to get where I was?  Did they develop friends, enemies and relationships with people that made them vulnerable before they reached their pinnacle of power and might and raised their undead army?  I was not made privvy to that information, but I'm doubting it.

If the answer is no, then I don't much care for it.  I don't much care for pitting my characters against ghost concepts that don't put the time or effort into becoming a real part of the gameworld before being used to further the plot because someone wants to skip "the hard part" of the game in actually growing this character/entity within the confines of the gameworld.

IMHO - players need to be the main motivating force in the game with the Imms placing NPC's/Avatars in supporting roles of the major clans where they are not in a position to dictate the course of the clan as much as guide it.  Of course there will be situations where leader PC's need to interact with a higher force, but those times should be kept to a minimum so that the stories can be fleshed out on every level by the players instead loaded up when someone has a 'cool idea'.

It takes a long time for PC inspired quests or ideas to take shape, and the Imms tell you that you can do it if you have the proper planning, commitment and RP to back up every step of the journey.  I only ask for the same policy to be applied to any character (NPC, VNPC or PC) that wants to effect the story rather than simply guide it.  If the force is going to interact with PC's in a way that can mean their death, then I would hope that force has established themselves in such a way that the rest of the game had a chance to know them at every stage of their journey.

The Imm Staff do an incredible job, but I know that my issues with high magick have always come at the end of a session involving these spawned armies of mantis, undead, kryl, serpents or whatever you want.  They aren't players, they usually aren't created or controlled by players and so -I- don't want them to be greatly effect players.

It makes me feel like I spend all this time working on a sand castle when someone says, "Man, check out this wave machine I just made, isn't it cool!"  WHOOSH.  There goes my castle.

Morale of the story : WHOOSHING sand castles makes me not want to build them.

-LoD

[RunningMountain]

A point well made LoD.

[Agent_137]

I'm going to run with LoD's derail for a bit.

Hm, LoD, you are mostly right, but even 98% pc designed and lead events can be susceptible to the problems you described. Case in point was my second character's death (which ended up turning me off of the political scene).

He was my first character over 3 hours, and ended up making it to about 14 or 15 day and becoming a byn sergeant. Immortals facilitated the clash of the two armies somewhere out in the red for two reasons: One, the staffer had to go to bed soon, and had already spent more time than planned on it, as they were standing in for some one else, and two: otherwise the armies might have missed each other.

A blood bath ensued, and my character and most of his unit were killed, mostly by NPC half-giants and mutants.

How can a soft force of mostly PCs compete with that? Further, without advanced guarding and max-attackers code, the fight became even more onesided due to the ability focus on one opponent at a time with multiple people assisting. An OOC combat leadership skill, yes, but realistic, no.


So what seemed like something great: A PC led plot, turned into what LoD dislikes about Imm led plots: NPCs slaughtering PCs, and Immortals making things happen faster than naturally they should.

Who knows, maybe in the forced encampment that we missed because the immortal OOCed us back to full stamina, my char would have spoken with his old sergeant via the way and found out that they were actually on the other side, which could have changed things completely. As it turns out, my char's old sergeant ended up disarming him which lead to the NPC half-giant and mutant finishing him off. good stuff.

This happened about 2 years ago, and I did speak with the mud account and the staffer who ran the event. Perhaps immortals became more careful after it. Or perhaps the one staffer who was in charge of it simply filed it away in their brain as something they should be mindful about, and the rest of the staff goes on doing as they do.

p.s.
there were magicakal NPCs, though I know not how many. At least one on our side.

[Intrepid]

All of you who are so desperate to be in pc plots need to start making them--don't wait for them.

That said, I don't think all plot should be pc-centric.  Events in game are meant to happen outside
the control of pcs, just like in reality.  I doubt anyone here had any personal control over
9/11, for example, and having imm-run RPTs and HRPTs give the sense of a larger world than
just the pcs.

[Marauder Moe]

I don't know about two years ago and older, but since then PC casualty rates in RPTs seem to be fairly low.  None have really been the Halasterian death-fests of legend I keep hearing about.  In fact, I believe the last major RPT where a lot (10+) of PCs died was entirely PC-driven.

I do think that the last few really big RPT plots have been pretty high-magick, though.  A more mundane threat every now and then would be a nice break.

[UnderSeven]

LoD's bit I think is a completely different subject.  Maybe not to him, but a great deal of people are talking about pc magickers.  This has virtually nothing to do with Magick plots and magick npcs and how staff choose to play them, it's not even comparable.  Furthermore those Allanaki magickers are probably not the uber powerful mages people think.  Sure they can cast in their temples safely, but the fact of the matter is, they're the templar's little biizzz's and therefore have a boss to look over their shoulder.  

So are we complaining about the free roaming magickers?  The magicker plots? Or Allanaki magickers?  

I literally think just about everyone on this thread has a different thing in mind when they say 'magicker'.

[Jherlen]

Yeah -- IMM-run RPTs with souped-up NPCs as the chief villians are a completely different topic, whether they're uberbuffed magickers or uberbuffed warriors. I don't think refusing to take part in them just because the big mean beastie might kill you is very cool, either. And for my own part I don't think it's realistic to expect a staffer to take 50 days building up an NPC's skills just to be able to run a plot with it. But this is all a different topic.

So back on topic to magickers: At least for me over the last year or so, the spread between magickal plots and non-magickal plots has been relatively equal. It's definitely true that magickers have a greater potential to affect things (they should), and that the presence of magick in a plot diminishes the usefulness of non-magickal PCs somewhat (of course). This, I think, is fine. We shouldn't be playing our characters to be the save-the-world hero. To me, magickal plots are interesting, and even if my PC can't do much more than stand and watch on the sidelines I'll still have fun enjoying the story.

That all said, I think some policy to prevent saturation of magickers in the PCs might not be a terrible idea. I don't like quotas, but expendable karma is a little more palatable to me, maybe. A better thing would just be a rule that players can't make repeated magickers one after another. (Every karma-guilded PC would have to be followed by at least one non-karma-guilded PC.) Though as long as people are playing responsibly, I think the way things are now is okay.

And, Larrath... we get it. You don't like House Kurac. Stop flaming?

[LoD]

Well, I think the title of the post opens this dicussion to all kinds of points.

The topic is "Magick in game" and I chose to discuss Magick as it was used by the Imms to drive and steer plotlines rather than to discuss the number of magickers in game.  My thoughts on that topic are as such:

Elementalists

I don't believe there are too many elementalists, nor do I believe they are a problem with regard to guild and world balance.  They are hunted in the northlands, gemmed in the southlands and not trusted anywhere.  Recent changes to the guild balanced them a bit in relation to the other classes, but the limits imposed on the elementalists keep me pretty happy.

As Underseven mentions, 'naki magickers are already watched by the templarate or whomever is on "gem patrol" and so their presence is muted.  Rogue magickers may post more of a threat, but even they are still somewhat limited.  They have the potential to be very powerful, but the nature of each elementalist guild has inherent weaknesses.

Sorcerers

This is my main beef.  There was another thread that discussed this topic in far greater detail and depth.  Sorcerers have so much potential for power, and the tendency to gather it in the small, quiet places of the world, that we only seem to bump into them when they can easily handle most of the PC or NPC opposition.

They have access to enough tools that people who want to "hunt" them would have be lucky not only to find them, but to catch them at a time when they would be vulnerable, or visible, enough to defeat.  I feel that sorcerers should be even more hunted and rare than they are presently, and Marko made some pretty nice suggestions for changes that could be made to make them be as difficult as they should be. (i.e. No spell progression through practice, only way to learn new spells would be to find a mentor).

While I don't feel there should be a cap on elementalists, I DO strongly favor a cap on sorcerers just as there is normally a cap on templars.  The defilers that do manage to live long enough not to be discovered by a sorc-king or other worldly power should be precious few, and even those should have a difficult time of every reaching their true potential.  For when they do reach that potential, it's truly an awesome and potentially world effecting event.

Warriors, rangers, assassins, merchants, burglars, pickpockets, elementalists -- they can each become quite powerful and influential, but they pale in comparison to what true magick can do.  It is really just this point with which I have issues.  Sorcerers, as a class, have been the ones to irk me the most and cause me the most fits with regards to quests, plotlines and general encounters out in the wildnerness.  Without them, I'd probably have very little to say on this entire subject.

-LoD

[UnderSeven]

Staff correct me if i'm wrong, but arn't sorc apps more or less special app even if you do have the karma for it?  What I mean is you can probably get a warrior in the game without a snap if you put in a acceptable app, you probably need a good app for a karma character, but a sorc of psi, even with the option likely requires you actually have a good concept.  I doubt if there are as many 'magickers' in game as people think, in regard to sorcs. plus almost any sorc seen casting is going to get attacked.

I think this might be a perception issue more than anything.  But I supposed if it was a problem, staff could just clamp down on requirements.

[Halaster]

Staff correct me if i'm wrong, but arn't sorc apps more or less special app even if you do have the karma for it?  What I mean is you can probably get a warrior in the game without a snap if you put in a acceptable app, you probably need a good app for a karma character, but a sorc of psi, even with the option likely requires you actually have a good concept.  I doubt if there are as many 'magickers' in game as people think, in regard to sorcs. plus almost any sorc seen casting is going to get attacked.

I think this might be a perception issue more than anything.  But I supposed if it was a problem, staff could just clamp down on requirements.

No, if someone has the karma for a sorcerer, they can play one without having to special app for it.

[UnderSeven]

What I meant Halaster is that during the regular app process, higher karma roles I would imagine anyway, have higher standards on what will get accepted and what won't.

[moab]

The sorcerer that you know about is not the sorcerer should be worring about, anyways.

[Marauder Moe]

I don't have a problem with PC sorcerors.  I think the fact that they're probably roles that require extreme isolation as well as lots of spell practice is enough of a natural limiter.  I really can't imagine there are more than about 4 active sorceror PCs at a time.

Yes, sorcerors are powerful, but probably far more so than people realize.  If a PC sorceror wanted to, he could probably eliminate every PC in the game with little danger.  This why they are 8-karma, though.  They are the most trusted players in the game.  I trust that they won't insta-kill everyone stranger they run in to.  I trust that if a group of people sets up an RPT to hunt one down, they'll try to be online.  I trust that they have better goals than to just kill as many PCs as possible.  I trust that these players will keep the entertainment of others in mind.