Charmstrings

[Irathu]

I was thinking of something, just a thought, and perhaps it could be implemented into a few of the tribes/groups/clans etc that would appreciate such a thing. But what about adding charmstrings to weapons just as they are for instruments.

The reason for this is that it would be interesting for a warrior/soldier etc to have a favored blade and be able to add such things to it to signify accomplishments/kills/loves whatever a charmstring would be willing to represent. Even bards would be able to implement it as well, adding charms to heir blades or instruments allowing for a little more choice.

Just a thought, feedback would be appreciated and welcomed.

[Patuk]

Weapons can be engraved already, and I know that in the clan I'm in at least, achievements are somehow rewarded already. To give the numerous, varied, known-wide crows that is warriors such a thing, well.. I'm not sure if that's very credible.

[MeTekillot]

obsidian longswords can be engraved

that's about it

[Patuk]

.. That's odd. Wood is very engraveable material, and so is bone. Don't suppose the code could be expanded?

[Irathu]

To refine my thoughts, the engraving is awesome, and being able to have it done on anything other than the longswords would require a master crafter, that would be costly and difficult for the average person, but there are many ideas/cultures and traditions IRL that add charms and such to items all the time, why would this not be something that many would do in ARM, or at least have the option to do. I know for myself I would use it with almost every one of my fighting type chars, bows would be interesting as well, but I could live with just weapons having this. That way I could constantly add or change out trinkets on it that represent a great many things, and that way when someone finds such and such's head with a dagger through it, they can say "Oh, he used his own blade on him or thats so and so's blade." Just trying to refine my thoughts a little is all.

[Kismetic]

Super idea.  Not sure if is easy?

[Yam]

Character/weapon customization is cool but charmstrings are pretty specific and I think that brute roleplay allows more than enough opportunities for claiming and decorating weaponry.

Accumulation of unit honors was a pretty organized (17th century) thing and I don't think it belongs in an era of chitin sabers and bone bastard swords.

[Fathi]

I think this would be better served as something like a tdesc for items.

But I'm in Camp Yam as far as sheer emoting being enough to cover this. However, it would be a nifty addition for circumstances such as finding some dead guy in the desert and noticing by the notches in his belt that he's kanked a crapload of lasses.

[Yam]

Yeah I would kill another human to be abe to 'title greatsword buttslayer' or whatever.

[Barsook]

Accumulation of unit honors was a pretty organized (17th century) thing and I don't think it belongs in an era of chitin sabers and bone bastard swords.

I agree with this part because of the harshness of the Known.  It doesn't fit in the world.

[WWYD]

Character/weapon customization is cool but charmstrings are pretty specific and I think that brute roleplay allows more than enough opportunities for claiming and decorating weaponry.

Accumulation of unit honors was a pretty organized (17th century) thing and I don't think it belongs in an era of chitin sabers and bone bastard swords.

Southern templars and the AOD have their own Boy Scout sashes. Not that I disagree - I don't think charmstrings really 'fit' weapons. They're a cultural thing, and combat isn't really artsy fartsy outside of Tuluk. Just random trinkets somewhere on it to signify it as your own would be cool, but probably not feasible from a coded standpoint.

[Taven]

Accumulation of unit honors was a pretty organized (17th century) thing and I don't think it belongs in an era of chitin sabers and bone bastard swords.

I agree with this part because of the harshness of the Known.  It doesn't fit in the world.

Actually... If you look at some of the Armageddon Clans (at least in the south, I ain't be knowin' 'bout 'em heathen northies), they already have specific unit honors. Only they're not put on your sword, they're usually put on a sash or a band. Try finding someone in a military clan sometime (including templars), and trying "l dude's sash". It might be an item other then a sash, but you get the idea.

In terms of the north (and the occasional weird southerner, according to the helpfile), "charmstrings" are specifically for bards, and for specific accomplishments. You can find a specific list of bardic charms here, and all bards have charmstrings. That said, however, this is different (in my mind) to what's being proposed here.

I was thinking of something, just a thought, and perhaps it could be implemented into a few of the tribes/groups/clans etc that would appreciate such a thing. But what about adding charmstrings to weapons just as they are for instruments.

The reason for this is that it would be interesting for a warrior/soldier etc to have a favored blade and be able to add such things to it to signify accomplishments/kills/loves whatever a charmstring would be willing to represent. Even bards would be able to implement it as well, adding charms to heir blades or instruments allowing for a little more choice.

Just a thought, feedback would be appreciated and welcomed.

In my opinion, a bard's charmstring is usually added to their instrument, because that's how they make their living. It's what makes them a bard. Adding a charmstring to a sword would be odd for a bard, unless they were using that sword as a huge part of their performances.

As to warriors and soldiers, as mentioned, some clans already have honors. Even if a clan did not have specific honors, you could keep something connected to each kill. For example, if you went and killed a gaj in the arena, you might be able to keep a part of it and have that fashioned into a weapon, or mastercrafted into something else. Clans of the past (at least one anyway; likely more), would collect an item from people that they killed. That way when you looked at them, you'd be intimidated by all of the scary things that they were wearing. Obviously, this might be best avoided in some cases, but you get the idea.

To actually make a new charmstrings and charms I think would be a fair bit of work. You'd need to add the string to be worn on a weapon (which in my mind might also make it harder to use, since it would dangle and get in the way), and then you'd actually need charms for each specific kill/accomplishment. You would also probably want different charms for different clans, to further increase the complexity.

I agree with Yam that simply role-playing out specific customization is a good option, if you're inspired to do it.

[WWYD]

adding "ninja'd taven" braid to my sash, wewt

thx lord templar

[Kismetic]

I'm not sold on how this is too complex for a low fantasy world.  Reading and writing, yes.  Tying a charmstring to your dagger?  Newp ...  And the argument that a bard wouldn't tie their "fought a mantis" charm to their weapon instead of their instrument ...  is that really an argument?  A masterbard surely wouldn't put 20+ charms on their lyre, would they?  That's just tacky. 

I guess you could roleplay it.  You could probably say the same about charms before they were linkable to instruments.

[Taven]

I'm not sold on how this is too complex for a low fantasy world.  Reading and writing, yes.  Tying a charmstring to your dagger?  Newp ...  And the argument that a bard wouldn't tie their "fought a mantis" charm to their weapon instead of their instrument ...  is that really an argument?  A masterbard surely wouldn't put 20+ charms on their lyre, would they?  That's just tacky. 

I guess you could roleplay it.  You could probably say the same about charms before they were linkable to instruments.

As I understand it, a bard ONLY has ONE charmstring to hold their charms. I could be wrong, but this is where I'm getting that from:

Tuluki Charmstrings

It should be noted that a bard is attached to his or her charmstrings, some of the more superstituous believing they contain some measure of the bard's soul. While a bard may give away charms from a string, they will never dispose of the string itself.

So having one string to tie to the end of your dagger, and another for your instrument, seems odd.

But then, the real way to resolve this argument seems to be to "Find Out IC" by asking bards about customs. If it's A-okay, then I support RPing it out. I think making coded changes to allow it is too complicated, as I already outlined.

[Delirium]

Charmstrings are a bardic thing. There is only ever one charmstring per bard. They can tie it where they want. Code supports adding them to instruments, or they can request a charmstring object, or use tdesc and emotes, etc. While the original idea has merit I don't see it working too well as presented (an almost direct rip-off of Tuluki bardic customs).

[Kismetic]

D'oh, you're right.  Well, whatevs, right?

[Irathu]

I have noticed a trend in all the replies, everyone is getting tied up on the title of "charmstring" for bards and the military honors given out by a few of the military based clans. I am not talking about either of these, what I am trying to represent and say is that I think it would be interesting to be able to add trophies, tokens, trinkets and what not to items, which in most cases would more than likely be the weapons of said hunter or mercenary. Someone spoke of a bard making their living by their charmstring, a hunter or what not would fit right into that, by saying showing his blade with a tembo tooth hanging from it, or a warrior showing off his blade with a tuluki soldier item hanging from it showing that he might have killed one of them. Just as bards though this could also add more to the fact of warriors and hunters running around with trinkets and what not and when he shows it to "Lordy lord noble" they say "That is nice, now go kill another to prove you did it" or what not.

Also I feel that the tdesc thing would be just great, it could fix all the issues and (I don't know so don't shoot me) but it seems it would be easy to implement. Then perhaps the idea of hanging actual items from your blades could be implemented or perhaps placed in Arm 2.0. Either way, I did not mean for anyone to get caught up on the bard's "charmstring" or military honors. I just thought that (since I play alot of outdoorsy and warriory types) having something to bring a little more to these types of characters would be really interesting and unique.

Thank you all for your time, and replies.

[Patuk]

I have noticed a trend in all the replies, everyone is getting tied up on the title of "charmstring" for bards and the military honors given out by a few of the military based clans. I am not talking about either of these, what I am trying to represent and say is that I think it would be interesting to be able to add trophies, tokens, trinkets and what not to items, which in most cases would more than likely be the weapons of said hunter or mercenary. Someone spoke of a bard making their living by their charmstring, a hunter or what not would fit right into that, by saying showing his blade with a tembo tooth hanging from it, or a warrior showing off his blade with a tuluki soldier item hanging from it showing that he might have killed one of them. Just as bards though this could also add more to the fact of warriors and hunters running around with trinkets and what not and when he shows it to "Lordy lord noble" they say "That is nice, now go kill another to prove you did it" or what not.

See, this is much more like it already. Charmstrings and militia sash decorations are official, set rewards. Charm X and Y represent this and that, a blue and a red ribbon suggests the soldier saved an officer's life and managed to slay a wanted criminal. I was thinking that your suggestion was one to implement something along these lines for warriors in general, which I still think would be a bad idea. To add the option of somehow adding anakore claws or soldier insignia to your weapons/armour seems like a far better idea, however.

[Iiyola]

I have noticed a trend in all the replies, everyone is getting tied up on the title of "charmstring" for bards and the military honors given out by a few of the military based clans. I am not talking about either of these, what I am trying to represent and say is that I think it would be interesting to be able to add trophies, tokens, trinkets and what not to items, which in most cases would more than likely be the weapons of said hunter or mercenary. Someone spoke of a bard making their living by their charmstring, a hunter or what not would fit right into that, by saying showing his blade with a tembo tooth hanging from it, or a warrior showing off his blade with a tuluki soldier item hanging from it showing that he might have killed one of them. Just as bards though this could also add more to the fact of warriors and hunters running around with trinkets and what not and when he shows it to "Lordy lord noble" they say "That is nice, now go kill another to prove you did it" or what not.

See, this is much more like it already. Charmstrings and militia sash decorations are official, set rewards. Charm X and Y represent this and that, a blue and a red ribbon suggests the soldier saved an officer's life and managed to slay a wanted criminal. I was thinking that your suggestion was one to implement something along these lines for warriors in general, which I still think would be a bad idea. To add the option of somehow adding anakore claws or soldier insignia to your weapons/armour seems like a far better idea, however.

Or you could get a tattoo.

[A Large Bag]

I have noticed a trend in all the replies, everyone is getting tied up on the title of "charmstring" for bards and the military honors given out by a few of the military based clans. I am not talking about either of these, what I am trying to represent and say is that I think it would be interesting to be able to add trophies, tokens, trinkets and what not to items, which in most cases would more than likely be the weapons of said hunter or mercenary. Someone spoke of a bard making their living by their charmstring, a hunter or what not would fit right into that, by saying showing his blade with a tembo tooth hanging from it, or a warrior showing off his blade with a tuluki soldier item hanging from it showing that he might have killed one of them. Just as bards though this could also add more to the fact of warriors and hunters running around with trinkets and what not and when he shows it to "Lordy lord noble" they say "That is nice, now go kill another to prove you did it" or what not.

Also I feel that the tdesc thing would be just great, it could fix all the issues and (I don't know so don't shoot me) but it seems it would be easy to implement. Then perhaps the idea of hanging actual items from your blades could be implemented or perhaps placed in Arm 2.0. Either way, I did not mean for anyone to get caught up on the bard's "charmstring" or military honors. I just thought that (since I play alot of outdoorsy and warriory types) having something to bring a little more to these types of characters would be really interesting and unique.

Thank you all for your time, and replies.

I like this idea actually. Yes, it could be rp'ed other ways but I still think it would be neat to be able to do if it's fitting for your character.

[The7DeadlyVenomz]

I like it too.

[Reiteration]

I would like to charmstring the sword of my fallen enemy to my current sword, and use the combined weapons as sword-chucks.

[Karieith]

I would like to charmstring the sword of my fallen enemy to my current sword, and use the combined weapons as sword-chucks.

Hahahaha. I want to be able to weave charms into my pubes which declare my countless sexual conquests.
I am really not that big of a whore, it's all talk.


Anyway, tdesc is too small for older characters to denote all their achievements.
It would be cool to have a way to show off, that is not silly.

Though I think I just accidentally came up with the best tribal concept.